[petsat]

Petsat, that is an excellent list, which I believe many people could use and should be made a sticky on it's own.

A_Camera, my list is not full. It contains the changes and settings needed without digging deep into WindowsXP OS.
Digging deep might cause more harm than good as you can in other areas of the forum
http://www.cnczone.com/forums/mach-s...-software.html
As there are numerous factors in each individual machine, What we all should have in mind is:

"ALTHOUGH SOMETHING WORKED FOR ME THERE IS NO GUARANTEE IT WILL WORK FOR YOU"

BTW, I've been through your pages. Very well documented work! I enjoyed reading it. Keep it up.

Petsat

[petsat]

A_Camera, the shipping of desktop can kill me as it is even more than the desktop itself. i cant buy local ones too. for some reason, local people in my town resell their desktop as if it is a gem, and they usually have only single core. and no market in here. this is no third world town, but 4th world, worst kinda town.

i will try toshiba sattelite dual core laptop. if it doesnt work well, i will then buy a desktop.
i definitely choose the desktop for first choice, more reliable, less dificult troubleshoot, easy to add ram, no hogus bogus like powet management software or bios that will mess up the serial communication, etcs.

cncneeb, just for curiocity, where are you from?
The way you desribe ti you can do good business by buying cheap and selling at a high price!!!

Petsat

[A_Camera]

BTW, I've been through your pages. Very well documented work! I enjoyed reading it. Keep it up.

Petsat

Thanks, I appreciate your comment. I will post more about my CNC as soon as I have some time over for typing. Right now I have some other priorities.

[cncneeb]

PETSAT, im from some middle of nowhere part of indonesia. it is true, local comp merchants make some good money in here, they have comp shops, and sell at rather high price. if they dont have the item to sell, they simply buy from indonesia capital, via internet shopping (average locals have facebooks but they havent bought anything via online, so the merchants can still sell at high price). i am the first to have cnc for sure in here

[petsat]

i am the first to have cnc for sure in here

Cncneeb you are a pioneer!

As you know pioneers always open the road for the rest of the people! Keep walking!

Petsat

[cncneeb]

PETSAT, my cnc laptop has just arrived, i will get everything complete into work on sunday, and i will let you know the result. the longs motor dm542, windows settings, etcs. and i might come up with some more questions too.
i am a pioneer in my 4th world town, sure man, lol. i will be a pioneer in longs motor DM542 too in this forum, and hopefully, i can give you guys more options to quality drivers with cheap price

[fbx]

Hi,

just one more user of the eBay tb6560, and I would like to share my experience and my measurements. Going through this very long thread, one of the main themes is about the shortcomings of the design with respect to the timings and noise of the pulses after the optocouplers.
My motors tend to loose steps at more than 600 mm/s, and indeed, the oscilloscope shows a rather sloppy rise time in the step input of the tb6560. The levels seem quite OK to me:

Attachment 304904

As a test, I tried following someone's advice to connect a 1K pull-up resistor to each optocoupler, and the waveform becomes much, much better, with a reasonable rise time:

Attachment 304916

I did this for all the dir and step optocouplers, which is a pretty simple operation, and I noticed that the motors sound somehow smoother and the machine can run up to 1500 mm/s. I'll keep them at a safe 1000 mm/s, which is more than enough for my needs.

Seems a big improvement, and in the next weeks (eh, free time is what it is...) I'll do more testing after installing the new spindle, as I already destroyed two dremel-like spindles by doing relatively intense carvings...

The other big improvement that I had experienced some time ago was to wire only half of the motors' coils, to lower the inductance. At the time the max speed I could achieve was ~200 mm/s, which was quite disappointing.
My motors are marked 57BYGH603B, and seem to be quite common in cheap eBay kits. They have a very large inductance, which may explain the difficulties in driving them.

I hope that my experience is useful to others, and I wish to thank all those who posted the very useful info and explorations in this forum.

Here's a photo of the mod with the 1K resistors, I'll be happy to check if other people with the same issues as me find any analogous improvement by mounting them.

Attachment 304932

Cheers
fbx

[durango100]

Hi Fbx

Let me tell you the solution i finally found.
I had many missed steps, at the end i couldnt finish anything.
I realized that mising steps increased on hot days, so i installed a second fan (from an old one)
After this simple change i had never get a missed step.... even with 24h projects.

Attachment 304934

[A_Camera]

Hi,

just one more user of the eBay tb6560, and I would like to share my experience and my measurements. Going through this very long thread, one of the main themes is about the shortcomings of the design with respect to the timings and noise of the pulses after the optocouplers.
My motors tend to loose steps at more than 600 mm/s, and indeed, the oscilloscope shows a rather sloppy rise time in the step input of the tb6560. The levels seem quite OK to me:

Attachment 304904

As a test, I tried following someone's advice to connect a 1K pull-up resistor to each optocoupler, and the waveform becomes much, much better, with a reasonable rise time:

Attachment 304916

I did this for all the dir and step optocouplers, which is a pretty simple operation, and I noticed that the motors sound somehow smoother and the machine can run up to 1500 mm/s. I'll keep them at a safe 1000 mm/s, which is more than enough for my needs.

Seems a big improvement, and in the next weeks (eh, free time is what it is...) I'll do more testing after installing the new spindle, as I already destroyed two dremel-like spindles by doing relatively intense carvings...

Yes, I agree, if that single and simple mod would solve most of the problems I'd be fine with it. But there are dozens of other issues also to be solved...

Also, if all you want to do is improving the pulsing that can be done very easy by removing those opto couplers all together and connect the inputs to the outputs. The opto couplers don't provide any protection anyway, so they have no use in that card.

Also, if you can run that fast I assume that you have a 5mm pitch screw. My maximum speed was 350mm/min with a "fixed" card but my screw pitch was 1.75mm. One thing I recently learned is that with the standard flexible couplers most people are using it is not possible to run faster than 1500mm/min with a 1605 lead screw because the vibrations may stall the machine. Plum couplers are better, up to 2500mm/min. Of course, maybe a short lead screw allows faster runs, but generally speaking, 1500mm/min is the maximum regardless which driver you are using, so can you get that with your machine than you are at the top of recommended speed already. But...

Speed is not everything. Since I threw out that blue card I can run both faster and MUCH smoother using any micro stepping I want, the hissing noise is gone, power management works as expected, no drivers are blown, no driver overheating issues even after long runs and so on.

[A_Camera]

Hi Fbx

Let me tell you the solution i finally found.
I had many missed steps, at the end i couldnt finish anything.
I realized that mising steps increased on hot days, so i installed a second fan (from an old one)
After this simple change i had never get a missed step.... even with 24h projects.

Attachment 304934

But...

That mod increases the load on the 12V regulator even more. The way that card is driven is completely wrong. The 24V supply is connected to a 12V regulator which drives the fan AND the 5V regulator. It would be a better solution to have a separate 5V supply. It would also allow you to follow the power on recommendations from Toshiba, which says that logic supply (5V) must be turned on BEFORE motor supply and the reverse for power off. You can't do that without adding a motor power on delay circuit, or a separate 5V supply. Even so, you are risking of frying your driver because it will not handle emergency stops or sudden power loss.

[HPB]

Hi All,

Have said all here and on USB CNC forum, these PWM chips are from Toshiba and noting wrong with the chip
design it's self and at the time. Toshiba has a replacement for TB6560 PWM chip with better motor handling
specs. as you need not worry about powering 5v logic circuit.

But all said, the Chinese implementors of various TB6560 stepper controllers must have blindly copied, & further
corrupted the original circuit from a Japanese source if could remember!

Any one trying to recover/correct these errors MUST read Toshiba's Technical manual and TB6560 application
note.

For example, on some Chinese TB6560 controllers power save mode is implemented as recommend by Toshiba
see page 10, paragraph 5 of TB6560AHQ/AFG technical manual. If you are fortunate and DIP switch is
implemented then you may tune individual settings for

1. Excitation Mode on Page 9 paragraph 1.
2. Torque Settings on Page 10 paragraph 5.
3. Decay Mode Settings on Page 9 paragraph 4.

Finally see CR oscillation tunning on Page 10 paragraph 8.

Every stepper motor has to be tuned to run smoothly, thats what Decay Mode Settings is for!

See Toshiba Application Note [TB6560AHQ_applnote_en.pdf]. On page 6, paragraph 5 its all there.

One caution I will add is that, pay attention to Z axis motor setting as gravity pulls on what ever spindle you've
got in there, else you might loose steps as spindle assembly is in free fall due gravity when in stepper motion!

I just don't get it. What the heck are the opto-isolators doing in there. Should you closely study these Chinese
controllers on the market, circuit layout just defeats the purpose of an opto-isolator! this brings to mind a
Copy-And-Paste syndrome.

Can someone enlighten me on worse case scenario should Toshiba chip goes up in puff of smoke/fire to
your PC parallel port?

These Chinese controllers are comparably affordable but be prepared to fix these sloppy design at your
own cost if you know how, else go get yourself a Rolls-Royce stepper drive and have some peace of mind.

By the way am a proud owner of one of these Chinese controllers but I did my way

Cheers to you all.

[A_Camera]

Hi All,

Have said all here and on USB CNC forum, these PWM chips are from Toshiba and noting wrong with the chip
design it's self and at the time. Toshiba has a replacement for TB6560 PWM chip with better motor handling
specs. as you need not worry about powering 5v logic circuit.

But all said, the Chinese implementors of various TB6560 stepper controllers must have blindly copied, & further
corrupted the original circuit from a Japanese source if could remember!

Any one trying to recover/correct these errors MUST read Toshiba's Technical manual and TB6560 application
note.

For example, on some Chinese TB6560 controllers power save mode is implemented as recommend by Toshiba
see page 10, paragraph 5 of TB6560AHQ/AFG technical manual. If you are fortunate and DIP switch is
implemented then you may tune individual settings for

1. Excitation Mode on Page 9 paragraph 1.
2. Torque Settings on Page 10 paragraph 5.
3. Decay Mode Settings on Page 9 paragraph 4.

Finally see CR oscillation tunning on Page 10 paragraph 8.

Every stepper motor has to be tuned to run smoothly, thats what Decay Mode Settings is for!

See Toshiba Application Note [TB6560AHQ_applnote_en.pdf]. On page 6, paragraph 5 its all there.

One caution I will add is that, pay attention to Z axis motor setting as gravity pulls on what ever spindle you've
got in there, else you might loose steps as spindle assembly is in free fall due gravity when in stepper motion!

I just don't get it. What the heck are the opto-isolators doing in there. Should you closely study these Chinese
controllers on the market, circuit layout just defeats the purpose of an opto-isolator! this brings to mind a
Copy-And-Paste syndrome.

Can someone enlighten me on worse case scenario should Toshiba chip goes up in puff of smoke/fire to
your PC parallel port?

These Chinese controllers are comparably affordable but be prepared to fix these sloppy design at your
own cost if you know how, else go get yourself a Rolls-Royce stepper drive and have some peace of mind.

By the way am a proud owner of one of these Chinese controllers but I did my way

Cheers to you all.

In fact, Toshiba clearly states on page 29 that:

• The power-on sequence described on page 28 must be properly followed.

and page 28 is saying:

1. Power-on Sequence with Control Input Signals

Turn on VDD. Then, when the VDD voltage has stabilized, turn on VMA/B.
Hold the control input pins Low while turning on VDD and VMA/B.
(All the control input pins are internally pulled down.)

After VDD and VMA/B completely stabilizes at the rated voltages, the RESET and ENABLE pins can be set High. If this sequence is not properly followed, the IC may not operate correctly, or the IC and the peripheral parts may be damaged.
When RESET is released High, the CLK signal is applied and excitation is started. Only after ENABLE is also set High, outputs are enabled. When only RESET is set High, outputs are disabled and only the internal counter advances. Likewise, when only ENABLE is set High, the excitation will not be performed even if the CLK signal is applied and the outputs will remain in the initial state.

An example of a control input sequence is shown below.
A power-off sequence should be the reverse of this sequence.


Toshiba stopped making these chips a long time ago because it is faulty by design. The fact that those cards have even more errors in their design doesn't make it better, but the Toshiba chip is simply crap. No, the alternative is not just this or a Rolls-Royce super expensive card. There are plenty other alternatives, the one I went for is the DQ542MA. Excellent quality, I have four and all work well. No issues whatsoever, nothing to fix, just wire and set the DIP switches. With these my maximum speed went up, the hissing noise disappeared as well as all the other unfixable issues.

BTW yes, I read the Toshiba app manual and app notes and understood every word of it and also fixed my blue card according to the app notes and all the other possible mods. Then one day I forgot to follow the switch on procedure and my card went up in smoke. I had another one, fixed that one as well but in the meantime I ordered the DQ542MA cards, not waited for the second disaster. The DQ542MA surprised me because it is VERY good and not really a Rolls-Royce, at least not price wise.

[HPB]

The TB6600HG has all the improvements lacking in TB6560 and yes of cause without startup sequence describe in the
TB6560 tech. manual as this is automatically handled on TB6600HG.

My good guess is that the startup process on these TB6560 controllers is not exact science as numerous contributors
to this post [How I fixed my Chinese TB6560 controller] has shown.

Am inclined to believe that some of these TB6560 chips could be fakes.

Have used these these TB6560 controllers for over five years without a single chip going up in smoke!
till last year replace Z axis with a TB6600HG chip has all the power to hold my stepping rates on that
axis.

In Ghana we've had power crisis for over three years, so made modification so I can mill PCB's off
12volt 100AH maintenance free battery. My spindle and the Z axis runs off 7amp boost converter
at 30volts, at the same time should mains power drop off, the 12volts battery takes over without
having to ruin milling.

Am also delighted to run my PCB milling of this affordable CNC3020Z as my Zen Toolworks CNC was
too wobbly.

Good luck.

[petsat]

The TB6600HG has all the improvements lacking in TB6560 and yes of cause without startup sequence describe in the
TB6560 tech. manual as this is automatically handled on TB6600HG.
.

Those stepper drivers based to the TB6600 chip, also suffer from the same disease that is called "Bad design"

see here:

http://www.cnczone.com/forums/steppe...e-ebay-15.html

and here:

http://www.cnc-arena.com/en/forum/ha...0--187150.html

If you are using one without any problems then yours must be a good design that happened by mistake as all the rest have issues mainly missing steps!!!

I agree that is an easier fix compared to the TB6560 boards.

[HPB]

To start with, PCB track layout to/from TB6560AHQ or TB6600HG base controllers on some if not all of these Chinese
sources are not well though out.

But I want to believe the whole point of this discussions was to provide varied solutions to issues numerous users have with
these controllers.

A study probably missing, is how many users are running these controllers without any issues yet.

Look if you remember, Mercedes Benz had issues with 'Baby-benz' overhead cam shaft snapping and there was a recall,
if I remember it must be in the early 90's, then recently comes this fuel emission bypass issues.
Wish there was a recall to those TB6560AHQ controllers.

See this drug trials in France that went horribly wrong last week!

There will be hardware/software issues in the case of the latter a simple patch/upgrade should hold up if the design allows
for that.

I don't want to believe the whole point of this topic is to bash/stop buying these controllers, but to offer better/workaround.
We all can't look through one single glass.

There so many stepper motor flavorers out there, and its the hope that these controllers will work well first and thereafter,
but this has clearly show it's not.

When you make an investment you certainly want a return so I can understand the numerous frustrations express here
on this topic and elsewhere.

But must add that those contributors to this topic How I fixed my Chinese TB6560 controller has show our
determination to recover our investment.

We men have a "male specific disease" to fight/guard our territory, show how exemplary our solutions are, but this
is besides the point.

All those links shown if any proves one thing, bad implementation of TB6560AHQ/TB6600HG chips in a design.
How many times Microchip has issued an errata on silicon with an accompanying work around?

These Chinese sources are yet to develop this mind set as above.

Spent over $1,500 on a Zen Toolworks CNC in the end could not use it, but at the same breath there are happy users
of the same CNC from Zen Toolworks and can swear by the tail of their shoe lace.
Then switched to a Chinese CNC for under $500 at the time of which am comfortable with.

I hope we are all not falling over ourselves in point out how crappy the design is or how inferior a contributor solution is.

In the end this How I fixed my Chinese TB6560 controller topic will offer a better way to implement a
TB6560AHQ/TB6600HG PWM chip in a controller and get a decent return on your Chinese investment.

Cheers.

[petsat]

But I want to believe the whole point of this discussions was to provide varied solutions to issues numerous users have with
these controllers.

.

Could not agree more on that!

That is the reason we post here! To help others fix the issues with 6560 controllers.

By the way, they still sell those controllers without any modification since they design it!!!!!

Amazing

[HPB]

By the way, they still sell those controllers without any modification since they design it!!!!!

Amazing

Looking back,

1. Am inclined to believe these Chinese has gotten the business model right, else why
will we still be buying/falling for these controllers in the first place?

2. It's also rallied some other/obscure individual like myself to pontificate on how to resolve a poor
TB6560AHQ/TB6600HG design implementation, and in the process poking holes at each others
solution with spectacular display of deep understanding of how Toshiba should have design these PWM
controller chip in the first place.

Remember, Rome was not build-in-a-day not even Athens, remember Windows 1?, Win3.0, Win3.11 and
today Microsoft says we all must go for Windows10! it's a process!

Have strong conviction that these TB6560AHQ/TB6600HG chips could be made to work! and mind you
you can't have one size controller fits all stepper motors. We all have budgets to run and these chips above fits
perfectly within, for some of us.

I once dream of owning an LPKF C series routing machine, at the time low end was going for over $10,000.
Thanks to the Chinese for my CNC3020Z and crappy controllers, I can mill PCB's as close as what
an LPKF will do for SMD tolerance.

I don't want to believe the WEST has priced it's self out of the production market of which Chinese factory
enterprises gladly fleecing us all with what we call crappy products as these meet our target budgets.

As this How I fixed my Chinese TB6560 controller topic has copiously shown, contributors has shown an
exemplary tenacity to FIX if not all of the issues on these CNC controllers.

If we understand the production market well and the know how in how these chips should have been build as some
of us has shown on this fora and elsewhere, I dare point out that we should step on the plate and beat the Chinese
at their own game in offering a better controller/price margin and get this done once and for all.

It use to be Japan, then HongKong, then Taiwan and look it's now China! see how mass production facilities have shifted
over the past 45years? thus it tell us something about pricing ourselves out of the job market?

Whiles we are falling all over ourselves on the above topic, the Chinese are getting the work done and laughing all the way
to the bank. Perhaps they are having a good laugh at this Topic too, can't help it myself too.

I guess am done in bashing myself.

Cheers,
Hanspeter.

[HPB]

Hi Fbx

Let me tell you the solution i finally found.
I had many missed steps, at the end i couldnt finish anything.
I realized that mising steps increased on hot days, so i installed a second fan (from an old one)
After this simple change i had never get a missed step.... even with 24h projects.

Congrats durango100 that's fast thinking of your solution! but did you first try installing a baffle on either side of the fan
such that picture you posted in the end, FAN will be seen with two flat wings covering the Heatsink fins.
One issue with Temp. control of our belove Chinese controllers are,

1. Heatsink isn't big enough or implementers only tested controller at 25°C ambient Temperature and hoped to remain same.

2. Short air cycling. meaning air flowing to Heatsink will create such turbulence that some air will bounce off Heatsink and
get sucked back into the FAN reducing effective cooling per cost. This could this easily be observe with a smoldering
lit cigarette. Sorry, not promoting/smoking any brand of cigarette!

3. Cost ...cost...cost, but if you place a 4K7 in series with high mcd LED on the Protect pin 19 of TB6560 one could
easily see if our Chinese TB6560 controller is violating Toshiba's die Temperature specifications found on
Page 7, under Electrical Characteristics, [TSD] Thermal shutdown threshold at ~170°C but Toshiba says this feature is
only characterised and not TESTED! Remember a hysteresis of 20°C before TSD circuit is deactivated, meaning
at ~150°C PWM control & bridge drive circuits is re-enabled.
Note! die temp. is not same as Hestsink temperature.
Whiles your TSD circuit is in shutdown mode, pulses sent to CLK pin 3 are not processed by TB6560 chip,
effectively resulting in missed steps.

On Page 6, of TB6560AHQ_applnote_en.pdf Absolute Maximum Ratings −30°C to 85°C.

Chinese TB6560 controllers with individual Heatsinks are less likely to suffer Temp. issues.

But see, why bother following technical specifications if you know some of your vulnerable/desperate buyers will post a fix
on a forum somewhere in desperation to recover meagre investment made!

Cheers,
Hanspeter

[Ladi268]

Hello,

I am having one of these blue china boards as well and went through the entire thread during the last days. I know that the best thing would be to use a different driver board but since I already have this one in front of me I'll try to do my best to get it reliably to work - that's at least the plan:
I already grounded the heatsinks and jumpered the opto couplers. Unfortunately I don't have any 330 pf cap lying around so I have to wait to fix that.
What is not 100% clear to me is the current regulator circuit removal. I saw a lot of pictures in the thread where people (i.e. petsat) mentioned to remove the resistor, the transistor and the cap which is connected to the transistor, but in all the attached pictures the only thing I can identify is that the resistor was removed. What I am looking for now is some sort of confirmation to remove the resistor, the transistor and cap for each axis (just removing them and that's it, no bridge or jumpering or anything else). Is that correct?
Ans response is highly appreciated.

Regards and thank all the guys so much for all the information that was gathered in this thread and all the investigation which was done,

Juergen

Update: OK, jumpered the optos, grounded the Toshibas and removed the 10k resistors on each axis (3-Axis board). I then connected everything to the CNC and the board still works (had to revert the enable signal for each axis in Linuxcnc). Next up the caps will be changed to 330 pf. Right now the machine is running at 6 mm/sec. I hope this will get better after the caps are changed. I'll keep you updated.

Cheers,
Juergen

[petsat]

If you fix the known issues the board works as it should, but for how long?. The problem still is the power-up power-down sequence that violates the specifications. If you fix this you secure the system powers up without blowing.
As for the current regulator, although removing the resistor will cut the circuit off, I would suggest to remove all 3 components to avoid interference. There is no need to bridge anything.
After the initial blow up, I have done all mods to my circuit and it works for more than a year now without any issues.

Regards

Petsat