nm145 - mach3, or 4, or linuxcnc or PP?

[brianbonedoc]

t300 - I used a cnc4pc C35 board on my grizzly lathe and used the Tormach Lathe mesa firmware and it worked like a charm!

Attached are the pin files (which tell you the configuration of the mesa flash) for the tormach default ones.

If these dont fit your board - you download the standard Mesa ones here: http://www.mesanet.com/software/parallel/5i25.zip

The pins dont have to be exact - as you can move axes around easily, and certain things like charge pump, etc. The nice thing about using a standard Tormach one is that when PP updates, it tries to install the Tormach one, so you won't have to go back and re flash the mesa card.

On my novakon - I had to have PCW_mesa tweak the flash, so I have to re-install it with every update.

[Steve303]

Brian, are you running the latest version of PP? I am running 1.9.5 without any problems that I am aware of.

Steve

[brianbonedoc]

Steve yeah I think I'm on 1.9.8?

[t300]

Well good news and maybe not so good news. Got PP as well as my mesa card. Decided to load up Mach3 on a PC to have a 'everything is working' starting point (remember I haven't used the mill since my mill PC got stolen a couple years ago). Built up a Dell gx520 with XP, copied over my mach3 install from 2 years ago (I had a full backup from every week). Loaded it up and... nothing. Nothing moved. Played around with it for a bit, checked parallel port settings, no go.

So I grabbed the working mach3 PC off of our CNC plasma table along with my mill config file. Success! Spindle works, Z works, Y works, and... wait a minute X-axis isn't moving. Mach settings can't be wrong as this was the good working config. Did my best electrician impression (jiggled a lot of cables) and no go. the coolant pump also doesn't come on but I had forgotten there was actually coolant still in there which is now sludgy (I can hear the coolant relay click on so assuming the pump is just stuck).

Any obvious things to check on the x-axis? I'm about as electrically competent as a soggy Dorito chip (ironic for an IT guy isn't it..)

[RCaffin]

The Mach3 config was right for your plasma table - fine.
But is your mill config the same as your plasma config? Who knows?
As you said, the pump may be stuck. So you can't blame Mach for that one.

What to do? Well, first find out what sort of motor you have. What sort of driver? Can't debug without knowledge.

Cheers
Roger

[t300]

Hi Roger. I used my Novakon config file (the xml) for the mill that I had backed up , so its the the correct config. Didn't use he plasma config. As far as I know all machine specific settings are held in that config file. The fact that the z, y and spindle all work lead me to believe it's a physical problem with the x. I'll start by swapping the x and y wiring if I can or maybe the steppers, thats probably pretty quick and straightforward. Never taken this thing apart before so hopefully I don't have to completely disassemble

[RCaffin]

Swap axes - good start.

Cheers
Roger

[t300]

Pulled x motor off. Spins easy. Powered up mill and it energizes/locks, good. Unplugged it and plugged into y harness, works. So at least I know it's not the motor.

[RCaffin]

Seems to me you don't need our advice at all! (This is a compliment.)
But we would be interested in eventually hearing what the problem was. Adds to the knowledge pool.

Cheers
Roger

[t300]

Haha! A little knowledge is dangerous! Don't really know what I am doing that's for sure! I unscrewed the main board that holds the BOB on, the gecko drivers are behind it. Geckos only seem to have one light each but they are all green. Tried 3 different parallel port cables, no difference. So either a) my Mach or pc is messed up b) the bob is faulty? Or... ? Loading up yet another pc now as a test , then I'm out of ideas . I assume this bob (cnc4pc c11g) has a troubleshooting procedure somewhere

[t300]

In parallel I installed the mesa card and loaded path pilot (on yet another pc!) but wow, its way over my head. Won't be getting that going any time soon I don't think!

[t300]

so, fixed it. long story but config reverted to wrong pin config for x axis. doesn't make any sense as i restored backup copy of config from when mill was working. restored 3 different copies of the config XML from 3 different dates, all have x-axis step as 'pin 0'. so 5 second fix that I spent 10 hours on lol. well at least I learnt a lot more about my stepper motors and unit wiring than I did before!. coolant pump is still dead but thats a separate issue. now that I know its working, time to try and get pathpilot to work. so far I'm lost but will keep at er

[bill south]

Hey Guys;\
I'm in the process of re-vamping an old RF45 (lathemaster) and want to use Linux. I have a 5I25 mesa card, a computer built for this application, ubuntu installed on the computer and Linux cnc installed. My drivers are dmm dyn2 tech ac servo drives with the DMB4250 BOB. I'm building the control panel as we speak. Now with all this started I find myself at a loss as to how to configure linux, have it talk to the mesa card which in turn talks to the Bob for servo movement. Is there a thread, web site or hard copy of a system description from start to finish that can be understood by a layman?
I'm not trying to cut corners just trying to figure out how to get this system running.
I have used Mach for years but want to try and learn a new system
Many thanks for all the informatyon.
Bill

[t300]

Went to fire up mill. everything was powered off for a few days. x axis didn't move. What the heck. Checked config and pin config for x step was back to 0. Config xml is not read only. Going to rebuild the xml from scratch.

[t300]

Also determined why the coolant pump wasn't moving. Yikes! All good now other than the drain hose that was so stiff it snapped when I took the tray out.

[rodw]

Hey Guys;\
I'm in the process of re-vamping an old RF45 (lathemaster) and want to use Linux. I have a 5I25 mesa card, a computer built for this application, ubuntu installed on the computer and Linux cnc installed. My drivers are dmm dyn2 tech ac servo drives with the DMB4250 BOB. I'm building the control panel as we speak. Now with all this started I find myself at a loss as to how to configure linux, have it talk to the mesa card which in turn talks to the Bob for servo movement. Is there a thread, web site or hard copy of a system description from start to finish that can be understood by a layman?
I'm not trying to cut corners just trying to figure out how to get this system running.
I have used Mach for years but want to try and learn a new system
Many thanks for all the informatyon.
Bill

Bill, best to ask your questions on the LinuxCNC forum. https://forum.linuxcnc.org/forum/index The willingness to help blew me away from the first post I made. I don't use Servos but there is a very good tutorial there on how to tune them written recently by Tommmylight. I use a Mesa 7i76e ethernet stepper controller and once I got Linux correctly configured, actually getting LinuxCNC configured was dead easy on my slow build scratch built machine.

[Ahamay17]

I'm looking to get away from mach3 by going with the masso by Hind Technology
"snip"

Mike, why specifically are you leaning in this direction? Have you researched what all will be required to make this move on your Torus Pro? Have any costs?

We would love to get rid of Mach3 on all 3 of our machines, but to do so will require a reasonable learning curve, a simple conversion, and reasonable costs....(all of which I know are relative)

Ray

[vmax549]

Have you considered UCCNC software with their UC300eth controller ??? Rigid tapping(mill) encoder threading (turn)

(;-) TP

[Steve303]

I am using PathPilot and believe it is one of the better solutions available to Novakon owners. The PathPilot disk can be purchased directly from Tormach for around $100 for non Tormach mill owners, which is a real bargain compared to purchasing Mach3 or Mach4, plus Tormach is working hard to improve it with regular updates. For anyone purchasing a new Novakon mill with Smooth Stepper you can easily sell the included Smooth Stepper card for more than the price of a new Mesa card and needed parallel cable, so your only cost is for the PathPilot disk if upgrade cost is a concern.

Watching a few videos of the MASSO if looks like it might be a nice controller as it matures further but for $500 I'd rather update the built in PC with PathPilot.

Steve

[Ahamay17]

I am using PathPilot and believe it is one of the better solutions available to Novakon owners. The PathPilot disk can be purchased directly from Tormach for around $100 for non Tormach mill owners, which is a real bargain compared to purchasing Mach3 or Mach4, plus Tormach is working hard to improve it with regular updates. For anyone purchasing a new Novakon mill with Smooth Stepper you can easily sell the included Smooth Stepper card for more than the price of a new Mesa card and needed parallel cable, so your only cost is for the PathPilot disk if upgrade cost is a concern.

Watching a few videos of the MASSO if looks like it might be a nice controller as it matures further but for $500 I'd rather update the built in PC with PathPilot.

Steve

It seems to me PathPilot is currently the best option, and probably will continue to be....However, tinkering with the machine itself and it's components is just not something I take any interest in, it's what I can produce with the machine that holds my interest. So the problem, there is ZERO knowledge on my part when it comes to dealing with the hardware swapping and software configuring that is required. If PathPilot would install along side of my current Mach3 install, import my machine's configurations, and then operate properly with my current hardware, I would gladly pay Tormach $500 for the disk...seems like that would be a hell of a bargain after paying $175 for pos that is Mach3...

Ray