Topics

1

Parallel Port breakout boards, motherboards, and dedicated accessories / no power to G320X after sitting?

« on: February 11, 2021, 06:08:55 PM »

I have a mill that was converted a while ago and it was in working order.  After sitting for a good while I went to use the controls with mach III today and there was nothing.  Mach was seeing the controls and the PMDX-126 was seeing the signal but there is no power to the gecko G320X drivers.  No lights .....NADA.  Any thoughts on why?  I have check the power supply and even switched to a backup unit I have and no power to the drivers.  Any help would be great as I am scratching my head.  When I press the test button on the PMDX board I get the E-stop to light up which makes me wonder.  I'm guessing at this point.

2

Parallel Port breakout boards, motherboards, and dedicated accessories / charge pump for reset works with 2 out of 3 G320x drives

« on: September 20, 2017, 11:31:30 AM »

I wired this up this morning to ensure if there is a drive fault it will stop the program from running/crashing.  All of the drives are wired as per the instructions (pmdx provided) and I will try to explain how I did that to the best of my typing abilities.  I have a wire going from the PMDX126 ERR+ to my Z drive +5V.  I have a wire going from the PMDX126 "COM" to the Z drive +5V.  I have a wire coming from the PMDX126 "RST" and another wire coming from the PMDX126 "ERR-" to a soldered joint which splits 3 ways to go the each drives "ERR/RES" terminal.  When I manually get a line count fault to fault the drives the PC/Mach III see the error on axis Y and Z but not from X and will also reset the Y and Z drives but not X.  I have CONFIG on the PMDX126 to have terminal 1 and 7 to OFF and the rest ON.  In Mach III I had the E-stop enabled to pin 10 already and added the "enable charge pump" to pin 17 active low with a red X as per the instructions.  I have gone over the drives to make sure they were setup the same and they are.  I verified the wiring and I see no difference with the X wiring versus any of the others as they are jumpered together.  Any thoughts?

3

Parallel Port breakout boards, motherboards, and dedicated accessories / Fault at G320 after line count exceeded

« on: September 08, 2017, 11:50:01 AM »

I have been able to get my axis moving however they will only move enough to get the line count to go to the fault mode at the drive.  I am sure I have something in setup goofed up but wanted to run some things past you guys to see if I am missing the forest for the trees.  I have a PMD-126/107 going to Gecko G320X drives controlled by Mach III.  I have CUI encoders set to 500ppr and my lead screw requires 5 turns to make 1".  I set up in Mach to have 2500 pulses per unit.  The drives move accordingly so I am confident that I have the pin #s setup correctly for the servo output from Mach.  Do I need to run a "charge pump" to make things happy?  What am I missing?

4

General Discussion / Pull up resistor?

« on: August 28, 2017, 02:04:36 PM »

Sorry for the repeated silly questions.  I have encoders that have A+ A- B+B-Z+ and Z- signals as well as the +5v and ground connections.  Near as I can tell these are line drive units as they require a separate power supply (over what my Gecko G320X can provide) as they require 250MVA to operate.  I have gone over everything many times and find no flaws in wiring however as soon as power is supplied my servos runaway.  This is a conversion on an older machine so we'll call it frankencnc.  I am wondering if I have missed the boat on what I need to get a good signal from the encoders as I have no dither or signal.  I do not have an oscilloscope to verify the pattern coming from the encoder.  I changed the drive to the other axis and have the same results.  Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

5

Parallel Port breakout boards, motherboards, and dedicated accessories / External E-stop requested in Mach III when there isn't

« on: June 08, 2017, 10:15:55 AM »

The spindle on my machine will run for around 10 seconds and then Mach III states there was an external E-stop.  I have watched the PMDX126 and the E-stop light does not come on.  I checked ports and pins for E-stop function and my manual switch works.  I have debounce set to 400u to eliminate (or help with) noise interference.  Not sure what to check from here.  I did some reading on the dip switch settings and moved 7 to open.  What should I be checking for?

6

General Discussion / Single speed can't get s word or SRO to change

« on: June 02, 2017, 09:48:29 AM »

Using Mach III I am unable to get the MDI input to change speed of my spindle or from the main screen using the SRO.  I have been over manuals and forums and think I might be loosing my mind.  Any one else run across this?  I am using a PMDX-107 for speed control and I am really sure that is not the problem, I'm pretty sure I have something in mach messed up.

7

General Discussion / PMDX-126 &107 with Mach III setup issues?

« on: June 01, 2017, 12:51:29 PM »

I have a mill that I am trying to convert to use the PMDX-126 and 107 for control with Mach III.  The machine is all wired and I think I have the DIP switches in the correct position.  When I enter the test mode on the 107 it will spin the spindle however I have no control with Mach III.  I have done some searching on the Mach forum as well as here and found a general setup guide that referred to using pin 16 port 1 as what I will call a spindle drive however I can't seem to figure out how to get that from the 126 to the 107 board.  I am wondering how I can make it all come together and/or if I have to use a PWM setup to make my spindle work.

8

Parallel Port breakout boards, motherboards, and dedicated accessories / Making progress, need help with inputs to PMDX-107

« on: June 01, 2017, 09:41:30 AM »

I'll try to make this as short as I can.  I have been working on a conversion on a mill for a while now.  Had a guy that knew what he was doing helping me, he bailed and I have been learning as I go so bear with me.  As of right now the VFD works from the VFD panel so I am sure that is in good working order.  I have the drivers wired but not tested as of yet, I am working on being able to control spindle speed from Mach III and need a little help getting that portion up and running.  The previous VFD had a PWM setup and I have limited data on how that was actually wired even though I have a schematic (which is lacking) so I have to figure out which wire is what function.  Any input as to how I can accomplish that would be greatly appreciated.  Also I need to figure out how/where to connect those input wires to the PMDX-107.  I have been over the manual and just can't get my brain wrapped around the entire idea.  If there is a good program for drawing out my wiring it would be great to use and show you what I have so far.  Thanks in advance and please bear with me.