another hopeful torus pathpilot conversion

Has anyone got pathpilot running on a plain jane stepper run torus All I can find in my searches are for servo machines . I've tried the couple shared files from the forum but no luck . So far the only thing that is working is the estop switch which comes up with x axis limit trip in the status page . At least I know I have some kind of communication . I've got tormachs that are running pathpilot and it would be nice to match this mill up with the same setup but I might just go straight to linuxcnc

My mill is a NM-200 with steppers, although I'm running the older (1.9?) version of PP.

I pulled an all night last night and got it up and running . It took some tweaking and comparisons to the tormach ini but all in all it seems to have worked out . The z sounded really clunky in the 30-40 ipm range . I tried a different driver with the same result , a change in micro steps smoothed it out for the most part . I'll have to run some parts to see if it'll be trust worthy . The x and y are smooth though .

Something not software related that is pissing me off with this mill is the spindle . When I drop the speed down anywhere between 6000 and 4500 rpm then the spindle shuts down and I have to power down the mill to reset the spindle . I can drop from 6000 to 3500 no problem and speed up to whatever speed and i can do this over and over again , but a drop within the 6000-4500 range is shutting down the spindle . Not sure why this is happening but it sucks . I can work around the issue but I hoped running a different software would resolve this

One thing I'm curious about is why there is no base_period in any of the ini's . Is this something that no longer exists in linuxcnc , or is this a thing that is not needed with the the use of mesa cards

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Originally Posted by metalmayhem

I pulled an all night last night and got it up and running . It took some tweaking and comparisons to the tormach ini but all in all it seems to have worked out . The z sounded really clunky in the 30-40 ipm range . I tried a different driver with the same result , a change in micro steps smoothed it out for the most part . I'll have to run some parts to see if it'll be trust worthy . The x and y are smooth though .

Something not software related that is pissing me off with this mill is the spindle . When I drop the speed down anywhere between 6000 and 4500 rpm then the spindle shuts down and I have to power down the mill to reset the spindle . I can drop from 6000 to 3500 no problem and speed up to whatever speed and i can do this over and over again , but a drop within the 6000-4500 range is shutting down the spindle . Not sure why this is happening but it sucks . I can work around the issue but I hoped running a different software would resolve this

One thing I'm curious about is why there is no base_period in any of the ini's . Is this something that no longer exists in linuxcnc , or is this a thing that is not needed with the the use of mesa cards

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The base thread is not needed with external hardware (Mesa, PicoSystems, EtherCAT etc) doing high speed tasks like step generation, encoder counting, PWM generation etc etc
Its only needed for parallel port (or GPIO port) based interfaces

ok thanks , that makes sense

The mill seems to be running well and holding position , the only exception other than my spindle issue is that the mill is picking up noise and tripping the reset mid run . The status doesn't show anything as tripped or any info as to what happens , so I'm assuming it's picking up noise from somewhere . The mesa card was a bit of a tight fit , and after swapping into another slot I hoped that it was an issue of the card not being seated fully . Even in the other slot it is doing the same thing at random times . I'll do a bit of tweaking and I should be able to eliminate the problem .

It would be nice if novakon was to take the time on the few machines they have and offer up configs for linuxcnc . I've always been a big fan of mach 3 but newer and better software's are going to be the death of it . The conversion to uccnc was nearly flawless aside from a few tweaks , and I had it running parts within 1/2 hour . Uccnc ran the mill well but there were a number of things I didn't like , it's not to knock it , it's just not for me . I'd have kept running it except for the fact i have other machines running pathpilot and i love that setup for the most part . The only complaint I have about pathpilot is the inability to change offsets in between cycles , unless I hit the stop button

I don't use the Tormach holders and have to stop at every tool change. Then after setting Z0, set the next line to run. Used to it now.

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Originally Posted by metalmayhem

The mill seems to be running well and holding position , the only exception other than my spindle issue is that the mill is picking up noise and tripping the reset mid run . The status doesn't show anything as tripped or any info as to what happens , so I'm assuming it's picking up noise from somewhere . The mesa card was a bit of a tight fit , and after swapping into another slot I hoped that it was an issue of the card not being seated fully . Even in the other slot it is doing the same thing at random times . I'll do a bit of tweaking and I should be able to eliminate the problem .

It would be nice if novakon was to take the time on the few machines they have and offer up configs for linuxcnc . I've always been a big fan of mach 3 but newer and better software's are going to be the death of it . The conversion to uccnc was nearly flawless aside from a few tweaks , and I had it running parts within 1/2 hour . Uccnc ran the mill well but there were a number of things I didn't like , it's not to knock it , it's just not for me . I'd have kept running it except for the fact i have other machines running pathpilot and i love that setup for the most part . The only complaint I have about pathpilot is the inability to change offsets in between cycles , unless I hit the stop button

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What VFD is installed in your machine. I had a lot of issues with false trips and noise. It was narrowed down to the VFD. I put in a GS-2 and all of that went away.

I had it machining for 14 hrs yesterday without a trip . I believe the change I did to the debounce has resolved the issue . There is still something up with the vfd on the mill but that isn't a software related issue

Quote:

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Originally Posted by metalmayhem

. The only complaint I have about pathpilot is the inability to change offsets in between cycles , unless I hit the stop button

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Just asking, because I am new to all this, but can't you set a second offset at G55 and reference the g-code from there.

More offsets isn't the problem . Pathpilot does not allow access to the offsets once a machine has started a program , nor will it when the machine is stopped for a tool change . Sometimes I want to or need to change a height offset for example and I have to stop/reset the program in order to do so . Then once I make a change , I need to search the spot where I left off in the program , set a start point , then resume . It' stupid to be locked out of these things . I've talked to tormach about it and they said it was something that they plan to address , but who knows when thats going to happen .

What was it that you did not like about UCCNC compared to PathPilot ??

Just Curious, (;-) TP

It's the simple things for the most part with ucnc , plus I just didn't like the feel of it . I could have continued using it but chose not to .
pathpilot is running smoother and it's pushing beyond what uccnc could without causing issues , so it was a better move