Need Help!- HAAS VF-3 ERROR Drip feeding

[mdlvmdlv]

I am a new Mastercam (X5) programmer, and recently setup communications with an older HASS VF-3. I use Predator software, and drip feed with an RS-232 cable.
Have successfully ran multiple short programs to the machine, however when running a longer program...have run into problems.
Drip feeding a seven hour program, about 3 hours into it...CNC errors out with alarm 243 'BAD NUMBER'.
Have edited program to begin again at error location...and CNC errors out again, only minutes after start up. This baffles me, considering the program has ran flawlessly for hours.
What would cause this problem?

I am new to Mastercam, and fumbled my through the machine and control definitions for the HAAS VF-3. Could this be due to a tolerance issue between Mastercam and the CNC?

If anyone has any ideas or thoughts that may offer or point me in the direction of a solution...I would greatly appreciate it.

Thank you.

[KenFoulks]

You double-posted, please remove the other one, this has more information.

Check your RS-232 settings. What are they?
Try decreasing the length of the cable if possible. How long is it?
Try routing it a different path to the machine that would have less electrical interference. Is this a problem?

[ROBBY 68]

are you inch or mm?
sometimes if you are in mm and your postprocessor puts out 4 decimal digits you'll get that alarm or if your computer and cable is not Well grounded could be a cause as Well.
Robby

[Tiffany's-1]

With in the HAAS's paramenters you will need to slow down the speed of the DNC to either 9600 or 4800. What is happening is your surfacing program?? Is out running the inmformation being feed to it...The Bad number is the HAAS's way of saying it waited to long for code.

[ccjung]

I run into the same issues occasionally on my 05 VF3-SS. I always think it is bad code, but its not.

For some reason, something gets messed up over the course of a longer drip feed. I prefer making room in memory and uploading the program into RAM.

A common issue i run into while drip feeding 3d contours is the jitter that happens when the machine catches up to the drip fed commands, so loading it into memory is my preferred route.

HTH

Chris

[Wizzard of H]

You desribed this first as running for hours and got "bad number".
Then restarted and got alarm only a few minutes into the program.
This sounds like there is one spot in your program with a bad number.
If the G-code could be read and stored, you would see it on the screen when the error occurred.
In this case, something is really wrong and code can't be read.
This is probably occurring long before the line is executed so it is not on the screen.
You may need to look more carefully.
Maybe try loading that smaller remainder into memory.
It will show where the error is.

[ccjung]

OP - try this experiment. If the program fits into memory, load it and run it. I can almost assure you that it won't "Bad Number Error" on you.

[SORCHEROR]

you have to slow down your drip feed,happens to alot of machines,especailly if you have a long cable,mine is very short so i dont have that problem too offen,only on the more complex surface files,run the baud rate at 9600,should work fine,remember to set the pc and the control to match