[Alan]

To: "Nth"

I'm the proud owner of a ProLight 1000 as of yesterday, and would like to get it running under Mach3. I have two other machines CNC machines using Mach3 and a background in electronics, so I'm decently familiar with the software and what's required.

Now, I COULD just build a whole new controller and in fact might even do so one day, but for now, I'd like to use the existing controller. The information in your post gives just about everything I need to get started, and I thank you for that!

I do have one question though; is it possible to control the spindle On/Off by a signal on the controller's 25 pin connector?

I see from your pinout that you're using the PC's pin 9 and some additional electronics to generate a 0-10v signal from Mach3's PWM output. Supplying 0 volts should therefore cause the spindle to stop.

But I'd like a more positive option, one that removes power entirely.

Is there a way to do this?

Thanks for any thoughts.


Alan

[Rexford]

Alan,I have a Prolight 1000 and am running it with the original black control box and using Mach3. I do not have the pro light control card. I am using a $15.00 break out board from Ebay in its place. I use a little OpAmp circuit to change the break out board PWM 0 - 5 V to 0 - 10 V for the spindle speed. Connections: The Computer to breakout board via parallel cable. From breakout board to Black control box via a parallel cable that has had one end cut off and wired to the breakout board with the connections found else where in this thread. Then that parallel cable is plugged into the Black box. This works only on 32 bit computers. I have just last week updated to a 64 bit computer by placing a Smooth Stepper in be tween the computer and break out board. The Smooth Stepper operates with a USB cable to the computer. If you choose this route I would recommend getting the mill running with a 32 bit and break out board first then Change to the 64 bit with the Smooth Stepper.If there is interest in what I did I may try to put some drawings , pictures and detail on a web sight some where.While I am here I have a Prolight 2000 which has servo motors I would like to switch to mach3 if anyone knows how to do that. It run now on the old DOS system. Rexford

[Alan]

Alan,I have a Prolight 1000 and am running it with the original black control box and using Mach3.

Thanks for the reply!

I'm certainly making progress getting my setup going. I've discovered that in the case of my box at least, there's a bit more required that what was posted by Nth above. (BTW, thank you Mr. Nth, your work has cut hours and hours off my task.)

Late last night I discovered that the RESET line on the L297 drivers is connected to a pin on the DB25 connector (3 or 14, I just forget which). I've also discovered that pin 22 does double duty, depending upon a jumper setting. In one setting, it requires genuine 5 volt power (from an external source), in the other a logic "1" will do. But in both cases, it feeds the ENABLE input of the L297s.

What is slowing me down a wee bit is the fact that there are numerous jumpers on the controller board, some labelled "Old Controller", some labelled "New Controller", some not labelled at all. Sadly, I think my controller falls half ways in between as some (but not all) of the OLD jumpers are set and some (but not all) of the NEW jumpers are set.

Today's task is to try to figure out, if I possibly can, what these various jumpers do.

I have to say, there is an AWFUL lot of logic on this board, for reasons not clear to me...

The Smooth Stepper operates with a USB cable to the computer.

I suspect a Smooth Stepper, or something like it, is in my future, as some of my difficulties with this project are self inflicted.

I have four other machines run by Mach3, all using controllers I designed and built, so I do have some familiarity with all this. However, all these machines are desktops, as the use of notebooks is strongly discouraged by the Mach3 programmers. But I wanted to use a notebook, at least to try this all out, simply for space reasons; a notebook makes the most sense given where the machine is temporarily located. Sadly, the notebook I chose, an older one that I did not think would have problems does have a problem, albeit a very very weird one.

The Prolight controller effectively pulls all inputs to logic 1 internally. What the computer has to do to make a pin "not" 1 is to ground it, generally a simple task. Annoyingly, in the case of this controller, grounding the pin is not the same thing as supplying a logic 0.

The difference is a subtle one of voltage and current. In the modern age .. everything since 1980 or so .. logic signals are voltage levels. In the case of a 5 volt system, a signal above 2.5 volts is seen as a logic 1 and a signal below 1 volt is seen as a logic 0, with the area in between being an undefined state.

In the olden days though, current flow is what determined a logic level; so much current flowing out of a pin or not flowing out of a pin is what was important.

Most modern electronics interface nicely to either; it's a simple matter to "fake out" modern voltage sensitive logic to work with older current flow logic.

But the Prolight is not one of those devices! Since the inputs drive the LEDs inside optoisolators, the computer must genuinely sink current, enough current to turn on an LED and my little notebook won't! It only took me half a day to figure that out because I've never heard of such a thing. Sure, there's devices that don't want to source current but I've never ever run across a thing that didn't want to sink current .. until now.

Well, I've got a decent stock of parts, and I found a decent driver chip and wired it up in between the computer and controller. Now the notebook would indeed "ground" the pins as required. But what it would not do is release the "ground". Turns out that the notebook, when outputting a logic 1, produces a 3.5 volt signal. This is well above the 2.5 volt requirement, and so this is a valid digital logic signal. My driver chip though, is a completely analog device, and needs the signal to go all the way to 5 volts! At 3.5 volts, it's still sinking enough current to turn the LEDs on.

Figuring that out was the other half day.

I'm going to guess that if I hooked this up to a desktop computer, most of my problems would go away. The notebook printer port is likely just fine for driving an actual printer, it's just not OK for this slightly left of center task. I suppose it's time to stop cutting bait and actually fish, which is to say, time to build a proper breakout board with logic input on one side and current sink and source on the other.


Thanks again for the reply.


Alan

[carman2002]

Rexford, I just recently picked up a Prolight 1000 and am looking to do this retrofit using a breakout board. I am interested in more of the detail on how you hooked up the connections from the computer to breakout board to black box. During your retrofit how did you wire the spindle motor. Did you run a 9 pin connector from the computer to the breakout board or was the spindle IO's somehow run out of the 25 pin connection from the parallel port on the computer? I was curious if you could provide any information as to which break out board you purchased on ebay as well. I am new the CNC retrofitting and am excited to get my machine running again, and appreciate all the very useful information that everyone has already posted on this topic.

[Galane]

While I am here I have a Prolight 2000 which has servo motors I would like to switch to mach3 if anyone knows how to do that. It run now on the old DOS system. Rexford

Send me an email to g_alan_e at yahoo and I'll send you a bunch of technical documentation and software for the Animatics servo controller used in most of the Prolight 2000 mills. A person at Moog Animatics who stayed with the company after the merger found it all on an old backup drive. There's a lot that controller can do which wasn't exploited by the DOS software. One such feature is storing g code in its RAM then running it as a canned cycle without an external computer.

With the info it should be possible to add support to Linux CNC and other software. The thing with the 2000 is it's a "smart" machine. The control computer just feeds it g code and monitors the status data the mill sends back. That's why it can run from pretty much anything that can run MS-DOS and had a serial port.

So it *should* be relatively simple to write Windows control software for it since the software doesn't have to do any fancy math, that's all done by the Animatics box in the mill.

[carman2002]

Alan,I have a Prolight 1000 and am running it with the original black control box and using Mach3. I do not have the pro light control card. I am using a $15.00 break out board from Ebay in its place. I use a little OpAmp circuit to change the break out board PWM 0 - 5 V to 0 - 10 V for the spindle speed. Connections: The Computer to breakout board via parallel cable. From breakout board to Black control box via a parallel cable that has had one end cut off and wired to the breakout board with the connections found else where in this thread. Then that parallel cable is plugged into the Black box. This works only on 32 bit computers. I have just last week updated to a 64 bit computer by placing a Smooth Stepper in be tween the computer and break out board. The Smooth Stepper operates with a USB cable to the computer. If you choose this route I would recommend getting the mill running with a 32 bit and break out board first then Change to the 64 bit with the Smooth Stepper.If there is interest in what I did I may try to put some drawings , pictures and detail on a web sight some where.While I am here I have a Prolight 2000 which has servo motors I would like to switch to mach3 if anyone knows how to do that. It run now on the old DOS system. Rexford

Rexford,

Would you be able to provide any of your drawings or pictures of your breakout board retrofit using the original controller box? DId you have much trouble setting up the Mach 3 parameters in the software?