Partner I Tool Change Problems

[Outlaw6700]

I have a Milltronics Partner I that I purchased a year ago that I am having troubles with. This is my first machining center and I have been very happy with it. I have had very few problems with it until today.

After finish machining a part and changing to the next it lost track of the tool changer. I get an error #452 and it can not find home on the tool changer. If I try to set home on the the tool changer it just keeps spinning in circles and will not stop!! I tried to reboot it and it didn't do any good.

I've had my share of error #450 emergency stop errors with it and I haven't figured out why this keeps happening but it will still keep running. Now I can not get it to run at all. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

[One of Many]

If you question whether you are qualified, I would not be poking around in the electrical cabinet for more than a loose wire.

In regards to the E-stop errors, a schematic will show how these are tied into the circuit loop. With a bit of logic, you can jumper across each Normally Closed switch at the board terminal or canon plugs, to eliminate one at time that may be contributing to the 450 error. The age of the machine might indicate cable insulation deteriorating. Do some detailed inspections of all the homing and over travel limit switch cables. I have also seen chips accumulate under the way covers that can hold the switch in position.

Power supply failures and/or intermittents can also plague you with similar issues.

The tool changer sounds like it has lost feedback to the control. This can be an encoder or proximity type of switch/sensor. Either the feedback unit is dead, the power supplying it is dead or conductors in cables have finally broken. To hard to say whether these 2 issues are related to the same factors.

It may very well be a simple repair......if you can find it before the men in the clean white coats come to take you away!

DC

[Dave1]

Outlaw,
Is your Partner 1 a 6 pocket tool changer of the plunger variety? Or is it a Geneva wheel. The plunger style uses proximity sensors and dowel pins for counting and it has 2 of them for tool 1. It is possible that one or both of the switches is bad but more than likely the pins moved in the wheel and the gap is bad/off.
Hope this helps,
Dave