And Yet.... Another newbie that needs EZ trak info.

[StilaR8dr]

I should first introduce myself..
Hello my name is Tony.

Here is my deal.
I purchased a EZ trak from the company that I worked for (laid off after 12 years, damm the economy). I need, the all too popular, and most asked for..... Manuals and software for my machine.
I am confused about which and what to buy.
The serial # is BR 270633E from what i have read it is a 1995 year. But which model is it?
It has dovetail ways, hard drive, 3-1/2" floppy, 486 DX2. Is it a ez trak-SX series 1 DX?

I want to get it running but I cant get it to home. I am thinking that I need to change the cmos battery because i think that its the original battery that came with it.
Will I lose the cmos settings?
Can I upload this information (to a 3.5 floppy)from the machine currently before I change the battery and then download it back in?

I have a installation manual (code no 11043163) but I'm not sure if it is the correct one for the machine. The reason I doubt it is correct is because none of the fold out parts breakdown pages for the "Equipment Panel Assy" seem to match what I have.

So let me take this time to thank all my new "best" friends in advance for any insights that they may share.

Thanks!

[machintek]

A machine that is 14 years old may not be stock (factory original) inside.
A SX machine did not have a hard drive, booted from a floppy, and typically had a BMDC2 board.
The DX had a hard drive from which it booted.
Also there have been many variations of software.
Books should be sought for the machine/software you have.
Dove-tail ways means a series one machine.
I do not know a way to download the CMOS to a file and visa-versa.
But if your CMOS was lost due to a bad battery, you would probably not boot, would not read the floppy, and have the wrong time and date. 14 years ago, the CMOS battery was a 3 cell stack up of ni-cad button cells, welded together, and soldered onto the mother board. Usually these last about 5 years. So you must not have a original CMOS battery. Eventually if a bad battery is left on the mother board it will leak its electrolyte (potassium hydroxide) and destroy the mother board.

George

[StilaR8dr]

Thank you for your reply George.

The machine is stock for what I know. It was purchased new in 95' and I started with the company in 97'. But like you said, I do not know.
That is why I included some pictures of the enclosure. I thought that you may enlighten me on, if that is a hard drive or not. I do find strange that it has a 3.5 floppy drive. But in the door file, holder, thing, there is a 5.5 floppy in it. But it is labeled "Basic VGA 006".

Ah... but alas my problems, since my post here, has deepened. Very Very Deep I am afraid. Before the Battery change my machine would boot. And yep!!! You guessed it. It now does nothing:(:

I cant help it. I was born a poor, purebred, Portagee! Maybe I should stick to fishing.:rolleyes: J/K

What am I to do???

[machintek]

Yep, hard drive suspended on springs.
Do you know how to attach a full size keyboard?
You could do it right at the mother board.
Turn on machine.
Reboot pressing CONTROL ALT DELETE at the same time.
Press delete to get into CMOS.
Press ENTER twice to see the first page. Follow instructions to set time, date. type of floppy, AND the hard drive parameters. What are they? I do not know. Too many possibilities.
Depending on the mother board CMOS, you may have a hard disk seek utility. This will find the parameters for you. Cannot exceed 504 MB (in theory).
Then ESC and F10 to save and reboot.
Or find a computer geek.

George

[StilaR8dr]

Thanks George!!

Had to make a adapter for the keyboard (5 pin din vs 6 pin mini-din PS/2) and the Geek is coming over. I think he took it personal, tho. Maybe i shouldn't call him that. Oh well.

Oh and BTW. You hit the nail on the head when it came to the MB... Green fuzz (the potato chloride stuff) spread across a couple of the circuits hope it cleans up.

Wish us luck!
Thanks again.

[StilaR8dr]

I got it to work!!
Its starts up again.
I want to buy a operators and programming manual for it, and also software.
But not sure of what or which of all the versions to buy.
is there a way to find out exactly what is in this machine?
For example what is loaded as far as software and alike.

[machintek]

For the benefit of all, what was needed to get it to work?
manuals: machinemanuals .net (on CDROM)
Software: EMI sell a new version EMI-INC.net

George

[StilaR8dr]

Well...

I think that I had a bad solder joint at the motherboard battery.

I was a little unsure about my solder work that I had done the first time. So I reworked it.

The first attempt at cleaning the green fuzz I had used a soft wire brush.
But, for the rework I sucked all the solder out of the contact. Measured the hole size (the battery contact on motherboard) and opened it up just a couple of thousands with a reamer. I think that in doing this it exposed more of the copper clad in the motherboards circuit layer thus improving the solder joint.

But I wouldn't put it past the fact that just pulling it all out and back in again may have been the ticket.

Thanks Again

[WayneHill]

StilaR8dr,

Did the GEEK get it working? Or were you able to set the HD parameters in the CMOS?

[StilaR8dr]

LOL
I got it going.
I guess it came with a utility that did a "Seek Hard drive" automatically thing. At least that's what I hope it did. I mean I have a picture on the screen and it seems to be OK.
But I have a "homing" problem. dac under/over flow thing. It does not home.
I lol@myself for being in the industry for so long now. Still not knowing how to program or communicate with these fancy CNC things. I been turning handles since the early 1980's.
I guess what I am trying to say is... This cnc thing is all geek to me.

[StilaR8dr]

This machine is driving me insane!!!
As I stated, I have a machine that now boots up. But will not home.
The homing issue seemed to be intermittent.
The switches on the table did not feel right to me. I did some simple testing with a simple meter found that the problem seemed to be simple. Simply clean the contacts, because the switch was not switching, simple enough. NOT!!!!
There was no way that the switches were working before cleaning. Now they switch ok but it seems to not home consistently every time. Am I doing Something wrong?
I don't see that much in the forums about this problem.
could it be software related. I ask because I recently purchased and received software for this.
Should I load the software anyways just because it is a newer version that what is in it currently?

HELP!

[machintek]

Do you know how a machine homes?
The control moves the axis, looks for the switch and then looks for the marker pulse on the encoder. Typically the marker pulse occurs once per revolution of the encoder.
Now, add Murphy's law. What if the marker pulse and switch were too close when they occur. A switch is not a precision device. So if the switch is seen just before the marker pulse, it homes. But if the switch makes just after the marker pulse the axis will travel one encoder revolution more and possibly hit the end of travel,giving a DAC overflow, or on other machines hit the overtravel limit switch, or just home in a different place and be happy. Then again, you may have a broken wire or intermittent some where.

George