[Shelby5041]

hi i have a home brew CNC mogul cnc..version 1 that i bought used recently so i do not know if this ever worked ok or not..

i know it uses a pretty crappy chinese knockoff TB6560 controller/driver and im leaning towards its just bad

issue is all 3 axis motors sound like crap and are herky jerky movement...i use mach 3 as communication between machine and pc via parallel cable...using a very very old laptop Dell C610 with parallel port built in and with windows 7 on it

no steps lost though

just very sporatic movement and lots of stuttering and inconsistent movement speed and smoothness during toolpath..causes lots of vibration..

i tried swapping with new stepper motor..no change
i tried removing stepper motors from railing to rule out v wheels bearings ...no change
i tried swithcing to diff micro step settings no change
i tried increasing voltage on drivers..already was max..no change
tested voltage coming from power supply ok 24V
reseated all stepper motor connections no change

and ideas?

[machinedude]

could see if you are able to tune the drive's? they usually have some kind of trim pot for adjustment. if the motor's sound bad then this might smooth things out. just google it and you get all kinds of hits on the topic.

[Shelby5041]

thanks the only adjusting on the TB6560 drrivers are DIP switches which i have changed to all diff settings and no change..they have diff currents..diff micro and diff decay settings...none made the motors run properly

[machinedude]

i'm pretty sure the current of the drive need to match the motor's. gecko's use dip switches but also have the adjustment pot. you might need to pull the cover off the drive to find it if it has one? i think i seen that being required on some drives?

[Shelby5041]

yes you may be right however this machine i assume is stock...and i assume noone messeed with it so the settings should be ok..like i said i tried all settings and none worked..i changed the current to each setting and none corrected issue..i beleive the issue is its just a failed driver board but thats just a guess..if its a setting then that would be easy to cahnge but ive done a lot already and nothing seems to work it is a TB6560 early version board from 2013/14..and i did have the cover off to do this and there are no pots that i noticed

[Shelby5041]

looked at some other threads regarsding similar issue..its very well possible this is a mach3/windows7/pc issue...i went to my other cnc that uses mach3 on windows xp machine and ran mach3 drivertest.exe ..and at 25000hz the test shows 25000 and says system ecelennt......now when i do the same mach3 drivertest test on this windows 7 laptop on this problematic cnc at 25000hz setting it shows only about 8000hz and says pulse too fast....sometimes it will say system stable but does not say system excellent like other setup..and never shows even close to 25000hz when running test.....maybe this could be the issue?..like i said once in a while the stepper will run fast and smooth but only for a fraction of a second..

[machinedude]

24 V for power is garbage too the better stepper motors can run on 80V and usually run on a 70 V supply. how many power supplies are on the controller?

[Shelby5041]

thanks but 24V was stock for this machine thats not the issue..maCHINE came with small hobby size nema 23 269oz steppers ..garbage or not 24V is what this cnc mogul was designed for..and the TB6560 driver board can only handle up to 30V per schematics .just trying to find out root cause of why motors are running like garabge and herky jerky but not losing steps

[machinedude]

since the design is so bad on the mechanical side i would not be surprised if the electrical side of this is not just as bad. if you have a undersized power supply running all the motor's it will never run right. you need to see what the combined load is with all the motors and see if the power supply is up to the task. i have seen these cheap machines with cheap power supplies on each drive. seems like this machine was done cheap and quality got tossed out the window.

[machinedude]

maybe try disconnecting all but one motor and drive on the worst axis and test just one hooked up to see if it makes things any better. if it does then this could be the problem. simple test and it would not cost anything.

[Shelby5041]

my board is similar to this but mine is 4 axis...no pots

[Shelby5041]

here is the hobby machine im referring to https://milwaukeemakerspace.org/2014...-introduction/

[Shelby5041]

i agree the machine is a pos however im just trying to find out the issue why its not running properly now...it was designed this way and ran perfectly fine when sold..so either the driver is bad or setting is bad..i beleive i ruled out settings just looking for help is all..the TB6560 driver board can only handle up to 30V so the 24V power supply is not the issue.

if its a failed driver board and i need to replace the driver board i will ..once i find out thats the issue..the ps is not the issue..

[routalot]

with the steppers off the machine,can you rotate them by hand?If so,do they feel as though they are turning smoothly?It is possible that the bearings have ingested dust and are objecting.I do agree that the supply voltage looks a bit feeble as I have steppers with a similar rating on my machine and they came with a 36V supply.However if your machine was running smoothly and adequately,the problem may lie elsewhere.Laptops aren't usually recommended for controlling CNC machines although people do use them.You definitely don't want them doing anything else at the same time so are there things going on that could be switched off?

[Shelby5041]

Not stepper motor issue...all 4 stepper motors acting same....odds of that happening at same time...zero..
.plus i tested a new stepper and no change....nothing running on laptop.mach3 only....ive used laptops on all my cncs with zero issues...since cnc mogul went out of business there are no reference for mach3 settings to compare.and cant find settings for this 7yr old tb6560 4sxis board to rule out setting issue....fyi it never ran properly for me...i bought it used. And is all factory stock .no mods. search mogul cnc to see specs.


an you rotate them by hand?If so,do they feel as though they are turning smoothly?It is possible that the bearings have ingested dust and are objecting.I do agree that the supply voltage looks a bit feeble as I have steppers with a similar rating on my machine and they came with a 36V supply.However if your machine was running smoothly and adequately,the problem may lie elsewhere.Laptops aren't usually recommended for controlling CNC machines although people do use them.You definitely don't want them doing anything else at the same time so are there things going on that could be switched off?[/QUOTE]

[routalot]

Well if you have successfully run other cnc's and still have them,a bit of part swapping might be in order.Failing that better drivers and a different BOB ought to do the job.

[durango100]

Hi there
I used to have that board, and it worked like ****, missing steps, etc.... then i realized that the problem was heating. The fan doesnt cool the board good enought. If you touch the heat sink you will find it very hot,
I just add an extra fan and started working perfectly.

[Shelby5041]

off subject matter but yes durango the TB6560 setup on the mogul cnc is totally enclosed in an alum box..no vents nothing..and since mine is an older version tb6560 there was no fan on this version....zero air flow to cool drivers.....absolutely no common sense used by manufacturer of mogul and a horrible design..im going to make a hole in the top and mount a fan in the future...

[ZASto]

I would swap crappy laptop with ordinary PC (old one salvaged from junk) running win XP.
I'm running one Intel board with onboard processor and couple of different CNC software packages, Mach3 (parallel port with MPG pendant on second parallel port) Mach3 with PLCM plugin (ethernet external motion controller from OureLogic), PUMOTIX (native software for PLCM external controller), LightBurn (USB connected to STM32F103, aka BluePill board) to run old chinese laser cutter/engraver), LaserGRBL (when using same BluePill driving Blue laser module), ...
Of course, OS is Win XP.

[Shelby5041]

zato im also thinking it could be a OS/ pc / mach3 communication issue..the more i thought about it all in one board or not .its just too odd that all 4 driver chips on the driver controller board would go bad all at the same time ..i will try to do some swapping of pcs and see if i can get any results...