[N4NV]

I found part of my problem today. I had a broken wire at the encoder connector I made. I guess I nicked it when stripping the outer jacket off the cable. When I bent the cable to fit under the cover, it broke. I was able to solder it together.

Looking through the Gecko start up procedure, I noticed that I would have to remove the drive to remove the cover to get to the test points. I decided to just wing it again. This time when I powered up the Gecko it was trying to hold the motor still. After a lot of very fine adjustments, I was able to get the drive tuned enough that the motor would stay in position no matter how hard I tried to turn it, and without growling and loosing steps.

But, another problem cropped up. I think my DB25 cable is not a straight through cable. I could not see any step signals on my scope while mach was commanding a move. I also had other ouput pins active that should not have been. On the way home I stopped off at a computer store and got a different DB25 cable. Hopefully this one is a straight through. I will check them both tomorrow, pin for pin.

Vince

[N4NV]

The new parallel cable fixed some of the problems. I also had a slight wiring problem. I connected the Gecko common to the common on the breakout board. The Gecko common is +5v not 0v. Once I made that switch the motor started turning under mach control and I could start tuning.

I was able to get it to turn smoothly in one direction, but not the other. Then I noticed that when I placed my hand on the motor, it worked fine in both directions. I realized that the motor was setting on the floor and not grounded. I also noticed that I had not grounded the negative side of my DC power supply. When I applied a ground wire to the motor casing, smoke came out of the motor. When I took the motor apart I found that one of the brush sleeves was grounded to the case. I checked the other motor and it was fine. In all of my testing, I had only run the motor on an ungrounded power supply. I will take the brush end of the third motor I have and install it on this motor. That way I will not have to drill a hole in the end of the shaft for the encoder.

Vince

[N4NV]

Good news and bad news. The good news it I successfully tuned the Z axis motor. The bad news is I fried the X axis Gecko when the motor ground faulted yesterday.

The Gecko is very sensitive to noise and grounding issues. Once I got everything grounded and bonded properly the motor tuned in just a couple of minutes of adjustments. I uploaded a couple of videos of the motor test. One is low resolution at:

[ame="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7632419183813512412"]Z axis motor test[/ame]

The other is 24 meg and much higher resolution, but I don't think it really shows much more.

http://www.flyingcritters.com/video/Z_test.mov

The test is running a Gcode program
G00 Z100
G00 Z-100
It goes through this cycle 20 times. The motor ramps up to 1550 rpm at 30 inch/sec/sec. It reverses direction and ramps back up to 1550 rpm in about 1/10 of a second. I will not be able to mount the Z axis motor yet as I need it to turn the X axis Gecko drive. I order another one today and should see it here on Wednesday. Maybe I can get the motor mounted Thursday or Friday.

The first picture shows the faulted Gecko and some of the wiring, the second is Mach and the Gcode.

Vince

[N4NV]

These last couple of weekends I have been working on my plane, changing out magnetos and doing the annual inspection. I got the plane signed off yesterday so today I flew over to Kirk's house to see his HNC. I got to tell you, seeing that turret do its dance really got me excited about getting the turret to work. On his machine (which has the factory original turret) a full rotation of the turret is only 2 seconds. He is using EMC and I am using Mach, so there are some differences, but obviously it can be done.

Vince

[N4NV]

While waiting for my new Gecko to arrive, I decided to work on some ancillary wiring. Once I saw how Kirk's oil lube time worked I knew how to wire mine, so that was the first thing to hook up. I ran the power through the original fuse that was in the cabinet. The lube timer is directly above the capacitor.

I wanted some way to turn off the DC power in a hurry so I installed a 3 pole contactor on the positive, ungrounded side of the DC power. The contactor is to the left of the capacitor in the picture. By using a three pole contactor I was able to series the one wire through all three poles. What this does is decrease the arcing across any one pole by a third. In the picture the coil of the contactor is wired directly to the transformer, this is just for testing. I will wire the contactor coil through one of the solid state relays, which will be controlled by my EPO switch.

Vince

[N4NV]

I installed and wired my EPO button. For now, I have it on the cabinet with the controls. When I get the enclosure done, I will mount it next to the door and monitor. I used 5V from the power supply through the EPO to one of the existing solid state relays to control the AC to the contactor. Everything worked as tested. I did have to re-install the bleeder resistor on the capacitor for safety, since the DC power supply can now be isolated and hold a charge.

I also worked on the lubrication circuit. After some review of the schematic I got that working as well, or at least the contact is closing. I tried to test it by hooking up the air line, but found out that without the parting tool installed, there is a massive air leak. It also blew about a quart of oil out of the line which made a big mess. Tomorrow I will plug that line so I can get the air connected and start checking for leaks and test the lube system.

Vince

[N4NV]

I left my camera at work today so no pictures. I installed 90 degree fitting on my air regulator so the air hose would not stick out into the isle. I installed a plug in the line that was feeding the parting tool. Once this was done I could check for air leaks and the lube system. I found a small amount of air coming from the turret cushion at the small hole next to the hex fitting. I don't know if this is normal. The rest of the lines did not leak.

I jumpered the lube clock so that it would be on all the time. I left it this way for 6 hours and I never could tell if there was lube getting to the cross slide. Tomorrow I will take the lines loose and see if there is oil. The restrictors at the lubricator might be plugged.

I started to install the cross slide limit switch assembly, but realized that I had misplaced the attachment screws. I had removed the switches to replace the wiring and clean them up. I ordered new screws from McMaster.

My replacement Gecko arrived today! That means I might be able to tune the X drive and install the Z drive tomorrow.

Vince

[N4NV]

I made a big push today because I figured I could get the Z axis moving. I got to work at 4:30 AM and spent an hour and a half before starting my paying job, then another 3 hours after work. It was well worth it.

The first picture shows the quick disconnect on the air regulator. I found that the pressure gage does not work.

The second picture is the X axis limit switches. The unit is just lying loose for now until I get my screws.

The third picture shows what I started working on today. I installed the Z axis limit switches. I had to get these mounted and wired so I could install the Z axis motor. The motor drive pulley is in the same housing as the wiring.

The forth picture is the wiring in the Z axis drive cover. I think there is supposed to be a guard over the belt to keep the wires clear, but I don't have it. I will have to look up in the parts list and see what it should look like and then make one.

The fifth picture is the X axis Gecko drive with the motor connected. When I connected the motor for testing, I installed two ferrite beads on the motor leads. Don't ask me what value because I don't know. I found them in a bin at a local surplus store called Halted. With these ferrites and some additional grounding, I could not find a setting where the drive was not tuned. It was perfect from the start. Just for fun I ran some crazy test. I did a G00 move back and forth from full speed to 0 to full speed in the other direction at an acceleration of 500 inch/sec/sec. The test was twenty cycles and only took about 3 seconds. The motor never faulted.

Since I was using the Z axis motor to tune the X axis, and I successfully tuned the X Gecko, I installed the Z axis motor. I was able to move the axis under Mach 3 control! With a step setting of 20,000 counts per inch, I was able to move the Z axis at 100 IPM without faulting. I have the acceleration set at 10 inc/sec/sec. To get 100 IPM I had to set the frequency in Mach at 45,000HZ. When I tried to run flat out (130 IPM the max I could get at 45 KHZ) the motor faulted. Maybe with a smooth stepper board it would go faster, but I am ecstatic at what I am getting now. The 20,000 steps per inch is just arbitrary for now. I will have to bring in my indicator to measure accurately what it should be. I think it will end up at around 18,000 steps per inch.

I tried to load a video of my Z axis dancing, but Google video was busy, so for now I have the full 12 meg file at:
http://www.flyingcritters.com/video/Z%20axis%20test.MOV
The quality is not very good because I am using my digital camera in video mode. In the video the Z axis is running at 100 IPM.

The last picture shows all the wires coming out of the bed that I had to bring back to the control box. It will take me a while to get everything landed properly. Some of the wires are spare.

Vince

[N4NV]

More good news, I got the X axis motor installed and running under Mach! It only took about an hour this morning.

http://www.flyingcritters.com/video/xz.wmv

The video above in only 2 meg so it should load OK. Actually, the motor has been installed for a month now, I have just had to complete a bunch of wiring and install the encoder I adapted to the tach/resolver mount. I will have to remove the encoder again to install the X limit switches. I just could not wait any longer, I wanted to make sure both axis’ were going to work OK. The motor ran fine without any adjustments. I was a little concerned that the motor would oscillate because the encoder is mounted on the ball screw and not the motor. My worries were unfounded as it is as good as I could have possibly hoped.

Arturo from CNC4PC sent me his newest break out board to Beta test, the C11T. It is made specifically for the Gecko 320 and 340. It is able to take the ERR signal from the Gecko and output it to Mach. It will then reset the Gecko through the reset command in Mach. On my previous CNC mill build were I used Gecko 320's, I just tied the ERR pin to the +5V for an automatic reset. The problem with that is you never know exactly what happened. His new board also had a programmable chip (I have not looked that close yet to know what one) that he can add more functions to in the future.

This weekend I hope to install the new board, check the lube lines, install the X limit switches and maybe get some of the limits connected to the board. It is a little scary watching the lathe move at 100 IPM with only 5" of travel. I will feel better with the limits attached. One slight problem will be that each limit switch will have to be on a separate input. This will eat up 4 of the 5 inputs on the BOB. Arturo said that is because of the way the Hall Effect switches operate.

Oh, and I found the guard for the Z axis belt. Maybe I can get that installed as well.

Vince

[N4NV]

Things are moving along too smoothly, it seems like I am due for a set back. I got a lot done today. I installed the Z axis belt guard, and then I took apart the lubricator and checked the metered fittings. I found two of them clogged. That is why I was not seeing a way oil on the cross slide I cleaned them and ran a check without the oil lines attached and they worked.

My long screws for the X axis limit switches arrived yesterday so I removed the X axis end cover and installed and adjusted the X limit switches. I am using a Molex connector to make the splice for the wires. I wanted to solder them to the pins (even though I crimped them) just to make sure they don't come loose. I did not have any solder at work so I will have to do that tomorrow.

I installed the new CNC4PC C11T board. It is made especially for the Gecko 320 and 340. The err/reset pin on the Gecko ties to the C11T so you can monitor and reset it from Mach. Everything worked when I powered it up. Now I can work on the limits and also try to decode the turret encoder.

I played around some more with different settings on the motor tuning page of Mach. The max IPM I can get without faulting is 115. I think that the motor runs out of RPM at this speed. If Gecko made a driver that would work at 130V I could get 200 IPM (not that I need it with such short travel). I was able to get the acceleration to 100 sec/sec. It was so fast that is seemed it would either damage the belts or wear them excessively. I set it back to 15 sec/sec.

I posted another video here:
http://www.flyingcritters.com/video/xz2.wmv

or Google video:
[ame="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6933003813053348271"]X and Z axis test on a Hardinge CHNC[/ame]

This speed is 115 IPM at and acceleration of 15 sec/sec. It is a series of 1/5" and 1" moves.

Vince

[N4NV]

I think I jinxed myself. I spent about 5 hours on the lathe today and got almost nothing done. The first think this morning I machined a magnet holder for the turret encoder. At least that went well. Then I went to work and finished the connector for the X axis limit switches, so far so good. From here on everything else failed. I tried to get the turret encoder working and found that one of the output leads does not work. I can read bit 2,3 and 4, but not bit one. With out that first lead I can only read 4 stations. If it had been the last lead, I would at least had 7 stations. Now I have to either find one or make one.

I manually ran the Clippard valves for the turret. The stop valve appeared to work. When I ran the other valve that lifts the turret and runs the air motor, there was no air to the motor. I removed the hose from the valve and manually put air to the motor and it turned. I either have a problem with the valve, or maybe I don't understand how they work. It is possible that without the turret installed it will not work. Maybe the turret has to be in the up position for the air to get to the motor? Maybe someone who knows more about this can enlighten me.

I tried to get the limit switches to work with my break out board but was unsuccessful. They are this type:

http://sccatalog.honeywell.com/pdbdo...103sr13a-2.pdf

I don't understand enough about electronics to know what they are supposed to do. Arturo said they could be hooked up to his board. I hooked up the output of the switch (the white wire) to the input of the board, but could not get the board to change states. I will have to ask him for a detailed wiring diagram.

I tried to get Mach to talk to my Cubloc board without success. I kept getting a timeout error. I will have to get help with this as well.

Finally, I tried to install the plumbing for the coolant tank and found that I need all different fittings due to the change I made in the pump location.

I did fine tune the steps per inch setting in Mach. After doing this I found I have about .001" backlash on the Z axis and .002" on the X. Not too bad for a 29 year old machine.

Vince

[kirk_wallace]

The chips on the encoder are probably not available anymore, but there is a modern version. I can try to replace them for you. If there are enough people that need this encoder board, I can make a batch of new ones.

Have you cleaned and inspected the valve body and pneumatic delay on the motor/raise circuit? I'm trying to remember how my setup worked without the turret on, although I think I waited until it was all together. I think there should be a fair amount of air leaking, in the normal state to hold the turret down. When the solenoid gets activated, the hold-down air should stop and the up air and motor should start. I think there should be enough pressure to run the motor and the leak, but if not, I would try to stop the leak with my finger, no scratch that, something to plug the up air port. Another thing comes to mind, does the coil resistance on both solenoids match? Also, I seem to recall the aluminum cap with the electrical terminals, unscrews to reveal a disk with a small orifice under it which might be plugged. I can post a picture, if needed.

Your limit sensors short the sensor output wire to the sensor ground when activated. With only the sensor output tied to the IO board, the sensor shorts the voltage that is on the input to the sensor ground. The sensor ground needs to be tied to the IO board input ground to complete the circuit. Plus, normally an input doesn't have any voltage on it, so if you short the input to ground, nothing happens. To make this work, you need to tie the IO board's input supply (+5 V ?) to a resistor (2k Ohms ?) to the input. This brings the voltage on the input up. When the sensor activates it shorts it to ground or 0 V. Sometimes the IO board will have a pull up feature on the board to do this. When the IO board is powered up, can you see any voltage on the unconnected inputs?

I don't know anything about a Cubloc, but my wild guess here is that Mach and the Cubloc exchange a signal called a "charge pump", or I prefer "watchdog". It is a periodic pulse that is like the two saying to each other "are you there" ... "I'm here". Mach and Cubloc may check to see if the signal is valid and if not, they assume something is wrong and go into e-stop or shutdown. This may be another signal that needs to go through your IO board.

Kirk, http://www.wallacecompany.com/machine_shop/

[N4NV]

Thanks for the reply Kirk. Arturo gave me the same information in an email. I picked up some resistors to put across the sensors. I will do that tomorrow morning and see what happens.

I ordered 16 of those Hall Effect magnetic sensors you posted earlier. I will machine a piece of plastic with cut outs for the sensors. I will bring out all 8 leads so I don't have to worry about decoding a binary output. I should be able to make it on a weekend.

Thanks to Henrik for the advice on the Cubloc. The 40M board that is the BOB for the Cubloc 405 module has two RS232 DB9 ports on it. One is labeled down load, the other RS232. I could not find anything in the manual about which one to use. I thought the port labeled RS232 was to communicate with another Cubloc. It turns out you have to program the Cubloc through the download port and then plug into the RS232 port to communicate. I tried it this morning as was able to talk to it with Mach, so I am moving forward again. My PLC class starts next Monday.

I am pretty sure the turret has to be in place with all the gaskets for the turret air motor to run. It makes sense. I think when the turret is up, it unblocks an air port that channels air to the motor. That way the turret does not try to turn until it is up.

When I got home Sunday, I wanted to get something positive done since the day went badly. I decided to clean up the coolant manifold. You can see it in the pictures. I think I will not paint it. It polished up pretty good.

My wife is a process plumber. When she got home today I rummaged through her truck and found the fitting I needed to get the coolant pump connected, so that was another step forward.

Vince

[N4NV]

Well, things are back on track for now. After getting the fittings out of my wife's truck, I was able to finish up the coolant pump connections under the table (see pics). I still have to mount the manifold and run a hose from the table outlet to the manifold.

After two hours banging my head against a wall, I was able to get my limit switches working. I did need a 1K resistor between the +5V and the switch output, but the main problem was that my break out board would not work with the switches on input 11 and 12, but did work on input 13 and 15. I have an email to Arturo to find out what is different about inputs 11 and 12. I must have tried 6 or 7 different resistors and various ways to hook up the switches to pins 11 and 12. Finally, just for the hell of it I tried pin 13 and it worked. It's nice to have limits now.

The new break out board has a programmable chip on board to handle the logic functions and I have been asking Arturo to make some changes. All he has to do is program a new chip and send it to me. As the little bugs get worked out the final program will go into all the boards.

I found a local store that has O-rings so I picked up some for the turret. After I get it rebuilt I will try again to see if I can get it to turn.

As you can see the wiring is a mess at the moment. As I get the bugs worked out I will clean it up. At the same time I will nuber all the wires and make up a diagram so I know where they all go.

Vince

[N4NV]

I did a little house keeping today. As I approach 50, I find myself needing more light to see things clearly. After squinting at those encoder wires and limit switch wires, I decided to add a light in the electrical boxes. A 23" slim fluorescent light fit nicely. I should have done that first. Another thing I did was add a 4 plex receptacle to the cabinet that will have the computer (the one with the Cubloc).

Yesterday I picked up $85 worth of Line Loc hose and fittings for my manifold. I put them together today. I still need two more fittings and a piece of hose to finish the coolant system. I see my wife's truck parked out front, I may have to go on a midnight raid.

With the coolant system so close I cleaned up the coolant tank screen and installed it. I also made another gasket for the cross slide. I think I have about 8 more gaskets to make.

Vince

[N4NV]

With the coolant system almost complete, I ordered some Hangsterfers 5418 cutting/coolant oil, 5 gallons. It cost $85.

I decided to work on the turret today. I thought I should tear it apart and make sure it is clean. I replace most of the O-rings and have two of the double O-rings on order. I found lots of rusting, but luckily none on any surface that was critical. I lubed everything and re-assembled, temporary re-using two of the O-rings. After reinstallation, it worked some of the time. I found that I still had little pieces of debris in the channels of the cross slide. I had to run the turret until it clogged, blow out the clog and start again. After about 10 of these cycles, it would work consistently, well almost.

I was correct when I thought all the O-rings had to be in place and the turret had to be up to turn. What the problem now is, it will not go back down without me putting a lot of pressure on it. Some of the problem is it is not aligned properly. When I was installing it the manual mentioned aligning the marks you made prior to removal. Someone had removed it in the past without making any marks. I noticed that the tool plate was not coming down where it should. I will have to take it partially apart and keep adjusting the gear position until it lines up properly.

To test the turret, I installed two light switches to the two clippard valves and to a 15V power source. I could then raise and turn the turret with one switch, and then hit the other to engage the turret stop. I made a video. It sounds like a car trying to start. The picture is jerky because I was trying to operate the two switches and hold the camera at the same time.

[ame="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2328992474025102603"]Hardinge CHNC turret test[/ame]

or

http://www.flyingcritters.com/video/turret.wmv

Vince

[kirk_wallace]

If I recall correctly, when I assembled my turret I noticed that the stop wheel, of course, has eight positions but the spline between the stop wheel and table shaft has more than eight positions such that there is only one way to orient the stop wheel and table. I set the stop pawl to its center of travel and then tried all the positional combinations of stop wheel and spline until the stop pawl, stop wheel notch and table where lined up in a park position. Then I tested the position by rotating the table, engaging the stop and letting the table settle in the up position. The table should then be aligned so that a tool position is parallel (perpendicular, orthogonal, whatever) with the spindle axis. If not, I adjusted the pawl position (large black disk with allen hole on right side face of carriage). While I adjusted mine, sometimes it would get close. and the table would rest on the key blocks and then pop down making an awful noise. I found I could turn the air pressure down to reduce the (my) stress. This was also a problem while adjusting the Stop_Settle time in software. The table would start down before a complete stop, hit the top of the key blocks and pop down. Fortunately, this pop only happened a few times. Now it works well.

Kirk, http://www.wallacecompany.com/machine_shop/

[N4NV]

Kirk, thanks for the information. I decided I needed to figure out why the turret was not going down before I worried about indexing. In the CHNC trouble shooting guide, one of the items suggested for the problem was the check valve. When I was cleaning the cross slide I did not know there was a check valve or how it operated. After a lot of fiddling, I was able to remove the check valve from the cross slide. Looking at the exploded view in the manual, I could see that is was broken (as you can see in the picture below). The shaft is missing on the piston. I will have to make one. Scaling the drawing the shaft looks to be 1.125" long. I also found one of the air channels in the cross slide was plugged. Once I get everything clean and repaired, the cross slide should lower by itself.

I installed the last piece of hose in the coolant system, from the stand to the manifold. I purchase 5 gallons of Hangstefers 5418 oil, for $89 including tax. I was about to pour it into the tank and test the coolant system, but I decided I should finish the turret first.

Vince

[kirk_wallace]

Do you know if five gallons of coolant oil is enough. I put five gallons in my HNC and the pump sucks a tiny bit of air. The previous owner said that the oil level should be about two inches above the bottom of the basin. My current level is about two inches above the bottom of the sump. I used Chevron 504, and like your Hangsterfers, it's not cheap. Although, I guess I don't have to buy a coolant skimmer.

Kirk, http://www.wallacecompany.com/machine_shop/

[N4NV]

Do you know if five gallons of coolant oil is enough.

Kirk, http://www.wallacecompany.com/machine_shop/

I'm not sure. The tank holds 20 gallons. I thought I would start with 5 gallons and see what happens. At least the Hangsterfers does not go bad like water soluble. I read in several locations that you should not use water solubles in a HNC/CHNC.

Vince