SL-20 Lathe, Can't use RS-232

Hello,

I am trying to help a friend of mine with his SL-20 lathe so he can use the RS-232 to put programs in and out of it. The glitch here is his Servo Bar 300 bar feed is on serial port 1. He removes the serial cable and it throws up an alarm about not being connected and he can't reset the alarm until that cable is plugged back in.

He believes it is a 1999 SL-20 and bar feed is same age. On the startup screen it shows the following: VER L03.13N, MOCON 10.02, 01-10-01, Model: SL20

He had spoke to a Haas guy and they were not sure of why the bar feed was on serial port 1 and not on 2 like it shows in the manual. (I looked online to get a manual but it was dated for 2001 and it shows it on port 2) It is brushed so there is the need of the cable to go to the control box that sits under the bar feed.

Is there a setting somewhere that we have not found to change the bar feed back to port 2 and allow the file transfer on port 1? He can still get programs in machine and out with floppy but using the RS-232 port would make things simpler for him as the PC is located next to his other lathe that does not have a floppy.

Any help would be truly appreciated as we are both stumped on it at this point.

Thanks

Certainly not trying to ask a dumb question, but have you tried to plug the computer into serial port 2? Just to see if it works there? It is possible that someone switched it, for one reason or another, in the past. Who knows why people do the things they do... Please don't shoot me for asking..

:cheers:

Mike

Mike,

Yeah he did try it and nothing. He told me that the Haas tech told him that port 2 was for them to load software on the machine or something of that nature. I think he bought the machine new and it was setup by Haas when it was originally installed.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gizmo_454

Certainly not trying to ask a dumb question, but have you tried to plug the computer into serial port 2? Just to see if it works there? It is possible that someone switched it, for one reason or another, in the past. Who knows why people do the things they do... Please don't shoot me for asking..

:cheers:

Mike

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Well, it was worth a shot! The next thing I would ask, is do you have the cable setup correctly? But, you mentioned that he has another lathe without a floppy, indicating he is already using RS232 with that machine. So I would venture to say that if it works with that Haas, it would work with the other, as well. Sorry I couldn't be more help! Please post the solution back here, when you figure out what it is. Good luck!

:cheers:

Mike

Change setting 38 to 0, then unplug cable and use to transfer the files.

Mike,

Yes the cable should be fine as I have same cable and have used it with my VF-4. I don't think the pin outs are different between the mill and lathes as when I looked at manuals, they should be the same. It is just his bar feed is in port 1 not port 2 and he can't use port 2 for file transfer. If there was a parameter he could turn off (for the bar feed) he would so he would get file transfer back on port 1. He don't use it much and would only have to swap cables and enable the bar feed setting again to use it. We just don't know where to go to find said parameter so the control doesn't know there is a bar feed attached to it.

If we do figure it out, I will post it here as it could help someone else.

- - - Updated - - -

Djr - you posted just before me. I will have him try it and report back.

Thanks

Well I had a chance to see my friend and we tried the solution djr posted this morning. Turned setting 38 to 0 and unplugged serial cable to bar feed and hooked up cable from computer. No alarms so we tried to send program from machine to computer, nothing. Checked correct pinouts, and everything is good. Then I had a thought to try port 2 and see if it worked. Hooked cable to computer to port 2 and tried transfer of program and it worked fine. Re-hooked up cable to bar feed on port 1 and tried it, again worked fine. The last try we changed the setting back to show 1 and tried it and it sent it. So somehow they wired the ports wrong 2-1 and 1-2 in the machine but not going to worry about that now as it sends just fine on port 2 of the machine and the bar feed hooked up. Not sure why he couldn't get it to work when he tried port 2 before but it is working now. Thanks for those who chimed in on it to help out.