[Jeremiah]

Hello everyone, I'm hoping someone can help me out here. I'm trying to
set up a delta tau motion controller ( vme bus model in a standalone setup )
and I'm not having much luck. I have checked all the jumpers on the board
and I'm pretty sure I have them correct. I can communicate with the
controller with the pmac software, and have set the I-variables to the
factory default. The problem is I can't get any response from the DAC's
( analog output). When +/- 15v is applied to the card I get about +/- 3.8v
at the output channels for all the axis, even if the motors are disabled by
the controller. If a motion command is issued no voltage swing occurs it
just stays at 3.8v. I have the limit switches and amplifier faults disabled,
and have toyed with the DAC bias and gain--- still no change. I would
think that the DAC voltage should be zero if no motion is commanded or the
motors are disabled am I on the right track?

thanks in advance for any opinion.

jeremiah

[Ron22]

You do have have IX00 = 1 (100,I200,I300...) right?
Have you tried open loop comand? #1 O50 & O0 (O50 = 50% O0 = off)
Unless you changed IX69 you will not get 10V you will get about 6V.

[Jeremiah]

Thanks for your reply Ron,
I do have I100=1, and have had I169 at various settings while testing.
The commands you suggested is how I have been trying to get a response
from the DACs. Come to think of it, I only have the end of travel limits
disabled for motor #1. Do you suppose the motor could be disabled from the
other axis that don't have their limits disabled? When I view the motor status
screen in PMAC executive (dos version) it shows the amplifier as being
enabled, but now I wonder if this is true. Perhaps it only shows it disabled
if it is from it's own limits. I'll check this later.
thanks again.

[Ron22]

What do you have I125 set at?

[Jeremiah]

Ron it's set at 49152.

[Ron22]

I that might be part of the problem.
You should have I125 = $32C000 or 3325952

From manual

Overtravel Limit Use Bit: With bit 17 equal to zero – the normal case – the +/-LIMn inputs must be held low to permit commanded motion in the appropriate direction. If there are not actual (normally closed or normally conducting) limit switches, the inputs must be hardwired to ground.
If bit 17 (value $20000, or 131072) is set to one (e.g. I125=$2C000), Motor x does not use these inputs as overtravel limits.

Amplifier Fault Use Bit: If bit 20 of Ix25 is 0, the amplifier-fault input function through the FAULTn input is enabled. If bit 20 (value $100000, or 1, 048,576) is 1 (e.g. 1125=$10C000), this function is disabled. General-purpose use of this input is then possible by assigning an M-variable to the input.

Action-on-Fault Bits: Bits 21 (value $200000, or 2,097,152) and 22 (value $400000, or 4,194,344) of Ix25 control what action is taken on an amplifier fault for the motor, or on exceeding the fatal following err limit (Ix11) for the motor:

[Jeremiah]

Ron, your last post has convinced me that I need to quit messing around
with trying to trick this beast with software settings and just hardwire
the the limits to the state the controller wants them. I have it on my
workbench with 2 other computers, (the one I'm posting with, and the other
to talk with pmac (the dos version of pmac executive running in winxp is flakey at best ). So a DOS machine is required, and I'm running out of room. A 24 volt supply will have to wait. Time to play with the jumpers on the board. Even though I am having a bad time with this controller I am still impressed with it's capabilities ( and this is 1992 technology ) I can only imagine what they have today. I will do as stated above and post the
results.
Thanks again Ron for your input.

[karlis_m]

I have an opportunity to buy a Bridgeport Ez Trax Dx II with a Delta Tau controller - purchased a year ago but I suspect that nobody here in Australia has been able to get it to operate correctly.

The government agency which owns the machine is keen to get rid of it they were asking 15k but haven't got any offers. They paid 18k for the installation.


The controller is an advantage 400


Any thoughts on the matter - the motion control card specs are on the Delta Tau website but I can not understand it.


Karlis


Melbourne Australia

[Ron22]

Karlis
What do you want to know. The Advantage 400 is a PC104 based motion controler with monitor. This is Delta Tau attempt at a small cheap easy to interface system. I think in the US the Advantge 400 sells for about $4000.
It is still a PMAC controler so there are alot of different setting that need to be made to get the controler to work with what ever drives and motors that are on the machine. This is not a plug and play system (I do not think any retrofit is). You should be able to get it wroking if you read through the manauls and understand them. It may take some time to find what settings they have wrong. Plus you need to know what the problem.
What is a Bridgeport Ez Trax Dx II worth without a controler in Australia?
You could alway just fly me out there from the US to fix it

[karlis_m]

There are not many in Australia so I can not tell but a CNC Interact with a
Hedenhain controller is about 17.5k.

Thank you for the info I think I will go to Canberra and see the machine as I have found out that the machine did not have any problems as I tracked down the systems intergrator and spoke to him at length - he said that there was no problem with the motion control side of things.

I will try to find out whether the CNC side of things were a problem - it appears that the agency had a competent CNC machinist but he left - that may the issue.

Regards

Karlis