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Using the 29.11 version. I have all my coolant stuff working perfectly on the real machine, but when I bring that profile to another computer and change it to simulation mode, the mist and flood buttons do not highlight when clicked or the M7/M8 scripts run. Everything is functional in that I can see the Active M-Codes change on the GCode panel, just no highlight.
I'll email the profile I am using so that you can check.
Cheers
Simon
Thanks for profile. I see you have some heavy customization :-)
Simulation does not support all controller features. Certainly not I2C.
However I will study your case in detail because on first sight it looks like it should work and update button states correctly.
I certainly wasn't expect the I2C stuff to do anything, I just thought the UI should probably behave in the same way. I do have some pretty heavy customisation, both hardware and software. I was never happy with the 0-10v speed control as it was so inaccurate, so I built a board that takes I2C commands and then talks RS485 to the vfd for perfect control :) I added a bunch of relays to the board while I was at it as it was pretty straight forward.
There is definitely some stuff in those scripts that still needs cleaning up, and possibly some that are just testing and seeing what is possible.
I will "reverse engineer" your profile :-)
I'm sure I will find what is different in simulation and then I can fix it.
Are you willing to share your I2C to RS485 project with me? Something similar is on my TODO list for my machine?
I would also like to control the VFD via RS485 but I do not have the technical / IT skills to self-build an I2C-RS485 interface to be used with TNG .... if there were an add-on ready to use with the price ... right, the I would gladly buy.
I fixed problem in simulation. Now it highlights correctly
This may be possible if I were to rewrite some code. At present the MCU code is specifically written to work with a NowForever VFD. I notice that there isn't a standard for what needs to be sent so I would need to make it generalised so that you had more control using the scripts in PlanetCNC. I will look into this at some point. I also have 9 spare pcb's so I could put more together. Only problem is they are in Australia so shipping might be costly.Quote:
Originally Posted by mar_cone
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Nice work, as always :)
I state that I use the CNC as a hobby and not to earn my bread; thank you very much theRat for availability but reading your post I realize that it is more complicated than I thought.
Although my thinking was more focused on PlanetCNC (with an updated Output board that integrated the RS485 port) the problem remains of interfacing RS485 with the myriad of VFDs on the market, which is quite difficult (if not impossible) for PlanetCNC.
I use the economical VFD of the Toshiba VF-nC3 more than enough to manage the Teknomotor 2Kw spindle in my possession but even if the VF-nC3 is a fairly widespread model (as PlanetCNC's MK3 controllers are now widespread) it will be difficult to obtain the management SW. I stay at the window to watch, if something comes out of this discussion I will surely be an interested user.
Thanks again to theRat for availability and PlanetCNC for the enormous work it is doing.
[QUOTE=PlanetCNC;2338934Are you willing to share your I2C to RS485 project with me? Something similar is on my TODO list for my machine?[/QUOTE]
Somehow I failed to see this request. More than happy to share the design of that board. The board basically consists of 2 parts. 1. A TCA9535 to provide more IO options (the chip is controlled by I2C and provides 16 configurable IO pins. 2. A Atmel microcontroller and a SN65176BD to handle the I2C to RS485. The firmware on the microcontroller is currently specific to the Nowforever VFD's but I have though about changing that so it is generic and make it so the customisation for different VFD's can be done in TNG scripts (ie. simply have the microcontroller simply pass the data it receives though to the VFD without understanding it).
How would you like me to share it with you? I use DipTrace for my electronics designs and the microcontroller code requires Atmel studio.
Simon
Just code for MCU and schematics is enough for me. So that I don't have to reverse engineer protocol.
I have sent an email with requested stuff to the support address. I can also export to eagle if that is useful.