old machine, spindle on/off?

[HD_B]

THE SITUATION:

I just started working with an older Chinese made CNC. No one here knows how the thing works since the last guy who ran it left, and its taking a minute to figure out the interface.

my previous experience is with much more open or supported systems and machines (cncmotion, onsrud, komo, fanuc controllers, etc). this is all through a handheld keypad and menus, some of which I don't get yet.

The machine was made by "Beijing East Supper Star Electomotor" and dates to the mid 2000's. the controller software is a bit of a black box, with no tech support available.

I have managed to home and zero and figure out how to set work offsets and use the tool measure device/ set Z etc.

So far what I've run is a simple flycut program posted from Aspire with the generic G-CODE mm (*.tap). I cheated my z up to test run above the table, and this all seems to check out with the right feeds, location, motion as expected, etc. HOWEVER....

THE PROBLEM:

The spindle will not kick on. In manual mode there is a key on the handheld that will toggle displayed setting between SOFF and S-ON, but nothing happens.

when running the file I get an error message: "unidentified character, any key to show error line". The error line is always line 4: which is always: G0X0.000Y0.000S12000M03 This looks completely correct to me, and identical to many line 4s turning on a spindle. am I missing something obvious or dumb here? I've looked at a few older files and they seem to have the same syntax, and while I'm not an expert at G-CODE programming, this is pretty basic...

I'm worried that in my initial scroll through various settings in the controller I mucked something up? the machine was cutting as recently as June from what I gather, with no collisions or major events since then. basically dormant until I switched things on a few days ago.

the spindle turns freely by hand.

Any tips or starting points on what to look for or begin troubleshooting this would be super helpful.

Thanks,
Ben

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[HD_B]

follow up:

When I edit out the "S12000M3" from the g-code and run it, no error message, and correct movement minus any spindle of course...

[kenrbass]

It is probably a good candidate for a new controller. I had a black box on a laguna and switched it to a pc based controller.

Try putting the m3 first. "M3 S12000"

[routalot]

Do you have any old programs that ran successfully on the machine to compare to those you have recently generated?It might be something as simple as choosing a different post processor.Which might be easier if you could call up an old program to see what the header should look like.

[Michael82]

THE SITUATION:

I just started working with an older Chinese made CNC. No one here knows how the thing works since the last guy who ran it left, and its taking a minute to figure out the interface.

my previous experience is with much more open or supported systems and machines (cncmotion, onsrud, komo, fanuc controllers, etc). this is all through a handheld keypad and menus, some of which I don't get yet.

The machine was made by "Beijing East Supper Star Electomotor" and dates to the mid 2000's. the controller software is a bit of a black box, with no tech support available.

I have managed to home and zero and figure out how to set work offsets and use the tool measure device/ set Z etc.

So far what I've run is a simple flycut program posted from Aspire with the generic G-CODE mm (*.tap). I cheated my z up to test run above the table, and this all seems to check out with the right feeds, location, motion as expected, etc. HOWEVER....

THE PROBLEM:

The spindle will not kick on. In manual mode there is a key on the handheld that will toggle displayed setting between SOFF and S-ON, but nothing happens.

when running the file I get an error message: "unidentified character, any key to show error line". The error line is always line 4: which is always: G0X0.000Y0.000S12000M03 This looks completely correct to me, and identical to many line 4s turning on a spindle. am I missing something obvious or dumb here? I've looked at a few older files and they seem to have the same syntax, and while I'm not an expert at G-CODE programming, this is pretty basic...

I'm worried that in my initial scroll through various settings in the controller I mucked something up? the machine was cutting as recently as June from what I gather, with no collisions or major events since then. basically dormant until I switched things on a few days ago.

the spindle turns freely by hand.

Any tips or starting points on what to look for or begin troubleshooting this would be super helpful.

Thanks,
Ben

Do you have any pics you can post of the "black box" that you talked about ?? And the hand held remote control??