Motors, Drivers & Breakout Board Wiring

[OnezerO]

Hey Robinnn, I just strated using a new breakout board because the one that came with my kit did not have any inputs for manual controls.

I do have documentation I found in this forum for the breakout board you are referring to. I uploaded in a previous post but I will include for you here as well.

I hope the documentation helps you.

[doorknob]

Breakout Board have 12 outputs, but unknown what maximum DC and amps of itch.
It is unknown what devices it is possible to connect to outputs (what DC and amps).
It is possible to connect spindle with Inverter to breakout board and than changing frequency?
Can I connect to outputs direct phase control Relay,Solid State Relay, Solenoid coil etc?

Unfortunately I do not have that board, so I can not answer those questions directly.

According to page 3 of the board documentation, each of the 12 output terminals is taken directly from the output of an optoisolator (which is the collector of an NPN transistor - the emitter of that transistor is grounded), and there is a pull-up resistor from that point to the +5v isolated power supply. I do not know the value of the pull-up resistor, however I believe that the resistor will limit the maximum current that you can source from each output terminal. From the photograph, it appears that the pull-up resistors are inside of a couple of SIP or DIP resistor networks. So, it would not surprise me to find that those were low-power 1K or 4.7K resistors. I would expect the maximum current that you could source from any output terminal would be very small. Also, I would not apply more than +5v to any output terminal.

The maximum current that you can sink through each output terminal depends on the rating of the optoisolator.

If you have that board, can you look for the part number of the optoisolators? Maybe you can find a spec sheet for the optoisolator that will tell you the maximum voltage and current that it can handle. If you can read the part number or value for the pull-up resistor networks, then that will also tell you how much current you could source from each output terminal.

It is necessary to connect GND and (+) from " isolating power supply" (witch connecting to drivers) to "isolating source (+)" and "isolating source (GND)" of BOB to use the onboard optoisolators?

Yes, I think so.

I saw this board that looks very similar

The design of that board is different. It has lots of open-collector transistors for driving output terminals, along with a few optoisolators.

That one does not look like a well-designed, high-quality board, and I would be concerned about using such a board in my system.

[Robinnn]

I do have documentation I found in this forum for the breakout board you are referring to. I uploaded in a previous post but I will include for you here as well.

I already have such file, but all the same thanks.

That one does not look like a well-designed, high-quality board, and I would be concerned about using such a board in my system.

In manual for BOB (I mean pictures) I sow connection a spindle to this BOB with help of Solid State Relay.
Can I connect to outputs of may BOB direct phase control Relay or Solid State Relay and next spindle or other device?

[doorknob]

I do not have direct experience with controlling a spindle via an SSR.

Based on the description in http://www.opto22.com/documents/0859...data_sheet.pdf it looks like you may be able to find a suitable SSR that can control a spindle.

If you connect the positive control terminal of such an SSR to +5 volts, and connect the negative control terminal of the SSR to one of the BOB's optoisolator output terminals, it looks like you should be able to switch the SSR on and off via the BOB.

As far as safety is concerned, if you are driving the BOB from Mach3 software, you may want to consider using a "charge pump" detection circuit to ensure that your board can only be activated when Mach3 is "in control" of the LPT port signals. For one example of this, see http://www.micro-machine-shop.com/C4...p%20manual.pdf

[Robinnn]

Thank you very much for helping.
If I understood correctly my BOB don’t be able to change spindle speed?

And if I want to do it I must use something this

[doorknob]

Yes.

See Hoss's G0704 for more information about spindle control.

[OnezerO]

Now that I started to use my new breakout board I have had some limited success. However, I have come to the conclusion that my drivers may be bad and I need some input to determine if my assumption is correct or if there is anything else that I should try.

The system I am testing consists of 5 motors and 5 drivers as per the specifications I attached on my original post. I am only testing 3 motors at a time from a single power supply. After connecting my new breakout board and reconfiguring Mach 3 (according to the breakout board manual) I am only able to get 1 motor to spin in 1 direction. The motor spins but not very fast.

I have connected each of the 5 motors to the same driver and the response from each motor is identical, they only move in 1 direction. I have reversed the polarity on the motors to see if the motors would spin in the opposite direction and they do. I have moved the same driver to two other axis outputs on my breakout board and each access responds in the same way. At this point I feel comfortable that the breakout board and the motors are okay.

Next, I tested each driver with the breakout board and motors and none of the other 4 drivers moves any motor in any direction at all. So I am suspecting that all 5 of my drivers have somehow gone bad since I am only getting movement in one direction from only one of my drivers.

It seems puzzling to me that all of my drivers can be bad at the same time. All 5 drivers give me a green light when powered on and they are all configured the same way (dip switch settings). I did notice that all of the motors connected to each driver did hold torque when powered on. Finally, I also noticed that all of the motors, even the ones that were connected to drivers that did not move them, would get pretty hot after just a few minutes.

Is my conclusion correct that all of my drivers are bad? Are there any other troubleshooting options that I can try? Is it normal for the motors to get pretty hot just after a few minutes even without movement? I have attached the manual for my new breakout board. Please let me know if I left out any necessary details.

Thank you.

[doorknob]

The motor specs do not include a max temperature rating, however my experience with other motor specs is that they may have a maximum rating on the order of 80 degrees C or even up to 90 degrees C. That's very, very hot - so hot that you can't hold your hand on the motor without burning yourself.

So it is possible for your motors to seem hot yet have them still well within their normal operating temperature range.

While you have a lot of things that are not working the way that you expected, you might want to tackle things one at a time. Even though it's possible, it's hard to believe that four out of five drivers are bad. But since you have one of them working after a fashion, a good place to start might be to hook up the driver and motor combination that you did have working and go from there.

For example, you noted that you can only get the motor turning in one direction. If you have access to a multimeter (or, even better, an oscilloscope), the first thing that I would suggest is to monitor the voltage on the DIR- terminal when you think the motor should be spinning clockwise, and then compare that to the voltage on that terminal when it should be spinning counterclockwise. If you are not seeing that signal change from near 5 volts in one direction, and near 0 volts in the opposite direction, then that would indicate that either the breakout board is not working as expected, or the wiring to or from the breakout board is incorrect, or a jumper setting on the breakout board is incorrect, or possibly your Mach3 ports and pins setup is wrong, or the power supply to the breakout board is inadequate or hooked up wrong, or maybe your LPT port is not outputting a proper signal.

If you can test that, report back your results and we can figure out what to do next.

[OnezerO]

Thanks Doorknob for you consistently reliable response and for the troubleshooting suggestions. I will perform the testing you mentioned in the next couple of days and post back. I do not have an oscilloscope but I do have a multimeter.

[OnezerO]

Doorknob, I am hoping to have some time tonight to be able to run through your troubleshooting suggestions as you mentioned in your previous post on this thread.

Before I did so, I just wanted to get your opinion on the troubleshooting which I have already done. As I mentioned before, I am only getting rotation in one direction from only one of my five drivers. The wiring modules to these drivers are easily detachable. During my testing I detached the wiring modules from the working driver and attached them to each of the other drivers (one by one of course) while everything else remained the same. Each of the other drivers failed to move the motor. I then reattached the wire modules to the working driver and the motor started working again.

Is this testing alone conclusive enough to determine that all of the other drivers are bad, at least in the one direction that the working driver is able to move the motors in?

Thanks.

[doorknob]

I don't think that there is enough information to arrive at that conclusion.

If the signals going to the drivers are incorrect or mismatched in some fashion (for example, too low a voltage, or unable to source or sink the required current), then the symptoms that you describe could possibly occur due to the natural variation in component values and tolerances from one driver to another.

In other words, it is conceivable that the one driver that shows some signs of life could be doing so because it is able to (barely) handle out-of-spec input signals, while the other drivers are functioning exactly as designed (but are not responding because the input signals do not meet the design requirements).

Of course, it could also be the case that you have one working driver and four bad ones. My point, though, is that I don't think there's enough info to draw either conclusion.

[OnezerO]

Understood, your response makes perfect sense. However, can we conclude that all of the motors are functioning properly since each one of them behaves the same way with the driver that is working?