[ufly]

My controllers are cw250's from circuit specialists. I must be wiring them incorrectly. When everything is turned on my steppers lock in place, they don't do anything else. I've searched till I was blue in the face for a solution. Hopefully someone can help

I'm using mach 3. My machine was up and running with my old controller boards. All the settings have stayed the same. (same stepper motors are being used but have been changed to bipolar) I don't have any limit, home, or stop switches wired in at the moment.



My 6 wire steppers are wired in bipolar. I used an ohm meter to detect and connect the 4 required wires to the controller. I also followed the data sheet for my motors. The white and black wires on the motor are not connected to anything or each other.

Here is a link to the motors.
http://circuitspecialists.com/prod.itml/icOid/8929



Link to the controllers
http://circuitspecialists.com/prod.itml/icOid/8922

I'm using a 36 volt 150 watt power supply. It does turn on and have power going to the controllers. I verified with a volt meter. Plus my steppers do lock in place.

I'm pretty sure the motor and power supply are connected correctly to the controller. One of the phases may be reversed on the motor but that can be swapped once it makes noise.

These are the pins I'm using for step and direction.
z 2,3
y 5,6
x 8,9

My questions...

1. Can any pins 18 through 25 be used as a ground?

I noticed the controller has an input for GND on the same side as the inputs for step and direction. Does this have to be hooked up to one of the above pins? Can this be hooked up to the same ground as the power supply?

3. My old board which I did not build appears to use pin 16 as a ground is this possible?


2. There are 2 step inputs and 2 direction inputs on each controller. (one is a plus and one is a minus for each) Do I need to connect both to the parallel port and configure both in mach 3?

Thanks for the help.

[george4657]

Normally pins 18 to 25 are connected together to ground. Pin 16 should not be ground.
Are you sure you are reading the pins in the right direction.
You can check for ground with your ohm meter. check pin to bare metal on case of computer.

Your controller has isolated inputs so there is no need for ground between the cable and power supply ground of the driver. Connect power to Vcc and Power ground only.

Connect + terminals (CP+ CW+) to separate control pins as setup in Mach3
Connect both - terminals to ground of cable.

Pin 7 (H/D microstep) connects to pin 8 (Gnd) to tell driver to use micro stepping.
Without this the driver will full step.

I don't have this controller but this is my reading of the PDF

[ufly]

Normally pins 18 to 25 are connected together to ground. Pin 16 should not be ground.
Are you sure you are reading the pins in the right direction.
You can check for ground with your ohm meter. check pin to bare metal on case of computer.

Your controller has isolated inputs so there is no need for ground between the cable and power supply ground of the driver. Connect power to Vcc and Power ground only.

Connect + terminals (CP+ CW+) to separate control pins as setup in Mach3
Connect both - terminals to ground of cable.

Pin 7 (H/D microstep) connects to pin 8 (Gnd) to tell driver to use micro stepping.
Without this the driver will full step.

I don't have this controller but this is my reading of the PDF

Thank you.

I tried what you suggested with no luck. Maybe it's time I try another computer.

I checked out the grounds with the meter all is good. My parallel cable is numbered too, it appears everything is hooked up correctly. yet nothing happens.

Just so I understand correctly If I don't connect the microstep or Gnd connections at all it should still work, correct?

Thanks for your help.

[ufly]

Well i hooked the rest of the controllers up. The motors are making a bit of noise now. The noise seems to correspond to the keyboard commands which is a plus.

Anybody know what velocity and acc. settings would be good to start with? Also on the boards how much amperage should i select.

thx, mike

[ufly]

Thank you for your help George. Turns out it was the computer. I must have damaged the parallel port somehow. Everything is working great with my spare computer hooked up.