325 Limit Error? <resolved>

[martyscncgarage]

Marty,

The Avanexpress DB25 Breakout Connectors should arrive tomorrow. Unfortunately, house guests arrive at the same time so it might be a few days before I can make the change.

Since I have no plans to control my VFD from CNC12, I'll just remove the existing circuit. Without this functionality, is there still a need to buy the relay board?

Update: I cut the cable from the VFD to the BOB at the BOB end and ran the program. I got the fault in under 2 minutes. Too bad, that sure would have been a nice fix.

Thanks,

Rick

What does "CUT" the cable from VFD to BOB mean.
Did you UNPLUG THE DB25 from Acorn and run the program?

Marty

[cnckeith]

good, if you can get the error to show up that fast then it will be simple to figure out. its the really intermittent ones that are hard to track down..
i'd get the system back to basics.. with nothing but estop connected to the inputs. the message log is showing lots of probe tripped messages. Remove "ProbeTripped" from input 6 using the Wizard (effectively defeating them.) and then run the job as a test. use same strategy for other items as well. process of elimination to figure it out.

[martyscncgarage]

Rick, and connect the Estop TO Acorn, NOT the DB25.
It also appears you have a Leadshine clone drive. This schematic may apply to you (Would need to see the manual on your drives to confirm): https://www.centroidcnc.com/dealersuppo ... 976.r4.pdf

When you use the Acorn inputs, make sure you run the +24VDC jumper from the spare +24VDC terminal on the Acorn power connector to ONE of the two +24VDC terminals on the Acorn input connectors

[Gary Campbell]

The BOB was left over from when I ran Mach3. One attraction to using the Acorn was that I could just plug this hardware into it without modifying my existing hardware

.

Did you assume that, or did you read it here? Very few if any knowledgeable guys would steer you in that direction

Gary, he has one of the older Acorn boards. We were saying unplug from A parallel port and plug into Acorn. It still holds true to a certain extent, however, my hunch is that old breakout board maybe causing his problem.
If he unplugs his DB25 cable and reruns his program(bench test) and there no more problem, then that could point to that old break out board causing it.


Marty

Marty...
Understand, I assume that like me you saw dozens of mach BOB's, the vast majority were Chinese junk

[martyscncgarage]

Marty...
Understand, I assume that like me you saw dozens of mach BOB's, the vast majority were Chinese junk

Yep, and never want to see another one!

[RGSparber]

Also, you still have probe tripped messages in your log file (F7 Utility, F9 Logs, F1 Errors)
YOU DID DISCONNECT AND REMOVE IT FROM THE INPUTS CORRECT?

(1) 12-19-2021 8:36:15 CNC12 Acorn Mill v4.64
(4) 12-19-2021 8:36:16 9033 Reset Initiated, Press Reset to Clear
(4) 12-19-2021 8:37:06 8040 WARNING: PROBE TRIPPED
(1) 12-19-2021 8:37:55 Tool change: T1 1/4" end mill
(4) 12-19-2021 8:44:42 9033 Reset Initiated, Press Reset to Clear
(4) 12-19-2021 8:44:42 8040 WARNING: PROBE TRIPPED
(1) 12-19-2021 8:45:04 Tool change: T1 1/4" end mill
(1) 12-19-2021 8:45:06 303 Paused...
(4) 12-19-2021 9:12:53 9033 Reset Initiated, Press Reset to Clear
(4) 12-19-2021 9:12:54 8040 WARNING: PROBE TRIPPED
(1) 12-19-2021 9:13:43 Exiting CNC and shutting down machine (68)
(1) 12-19-2021 10:15:54 199 CNC Started
(1) 12-19-2021 10:16:01 CNC12 Acorn Mill v4.64
(4) 12-19-2021 10:16:01 9033 Reset Initiated, Press Reset to Clear
(1) 12-19-2021 10:16:17 Creating report...

I did disconnect the probe but forgot to un-provision the input. I just did another run. Still got the fault but the log does not show any probe tripped warnings. It only shows the tool change.

This got me thinking - if an Acorn input is defined as normally open, is there a pull up on it or must the user supply a logic 1? Flopping inputs are extremely sensitive to noise. Sadly, that isn't my current problem.

Rick

[RGSparber]

Marty,

The Avanexpress DB25 Breakout Connectors should arrive tomorrow. Unfortunately, house guests arrive at the same time so it might be a few days before I can make the change.

Since I have no plans to control my VFD from CNC12, I'll just remove the existing circuit. Without this functionality, is there still a need to buy the relay board?

Update: I cut the cable from the VFD to the BOB at the BOB end and ran the program. I got the fault in under 2 minutes. Too bad, that sure would have been a nice fix.

Thanks,

Rick

What does "CUT" the cable from VFD to BOB mean.
Did you UNPLUG THE DB25 from Acorn and run the program?

Marty

Marty,

I literally cut the cable at the BOB with my dykes.

Maybe I misunderstood your intent wrt unplugging the DB25. It was my understanding that you were looking to see if any other faults appeared. Since I don't get any faults while running the program if the VFD is off, I figured there was nothing to see.

Rick

[RGSparber]

good, if you can get the error to show up that fast then it will be simple to figure out. its the really intermittent ones that are hard to track down..
i'd get the system back to basics.. with nothing but estop connected to the inputs. the message log is showing lots of probe tripped messages. Remove "ProbeTripped" from input 6 using the Wizard (effectively defeating them.) and then run the job as a test. use same strategy for other items as well. process of elimination to figure it out.

Hi Keith,

Yes, I now have only estop as an input. No other inputs are defined. The probe tripped events are gone. In the log for the last run, it only shows the tool change and nothing else for the time after I started the program.

One small anomaly that I can't explain is the time stamp. I first verified that the time on the PC is correct. Then I started the program at 12:44 and, exactly at 12:45 pressed run while being prompted for the tool change. The log showed the tool change prompt was at 12:43:18. Why the slight difference in time?

The error does show up rather quickly but it can still take 20 minutes. I agree about infuriating intermittent faults. Often the root cause appears while I'm looking at something else.

My estop directly kills the stepper drivers so I don't see any harm in disabling the estop input too. Maybe I'll learn something.

Thanks,

Rick

[martyscncgarage]

Marty,

The Avanexpress DB25 Breakout Connectors should arrive tomorrow. Unfortunately, house guests arrive at the same time so it might be a few days before I can make the change.

Since I have no plans to control my VFD from CNC12, I'll just remove the existing circuit. Without this functionality, is there still a need to buy the relay board?

Update: I cut the cable from the VFD to the BOB at the BOB end and ran the program. I got the fault in under 2 minutes. Too bad, that sure would have been a nice fix.

Thanks,

Rick

What does "CUT" the cable from VFD to BOB mean.
Did you UNPLUG THE DB25 from Acorn and run the program?

Marty

Marty,

I literally cut the cable at the BOB with my dykes.

Maybe I misunderstood your intent wrt unplugging the DB25. It was my understanding that you were looking to see if any other faults appeared. Since I don't get any faults while running the program if the VFD is off, I figured there was nothing to see.

Rick

Earlier in your thread you said the spindle was off and you still got a fault. I asked for clarification. Was the VFD off as well or just the spindle not commanded to run.....

UNPLUG the DB 25 cable. Just run the Acorn and CNC12 in bench test mode. Run your program WITHOUT that Mach3 breakout board attached. (do not use that breakout board any longer with Acorn)

I would never CUT a cable, disconnect it maybe...

In a nutshell, get rid of that breakout board. With only your Acorn and the Estop button wired to Acorn itself (usually input 8 is assigned) run the program and see if you get a fault. You might read the Acorn installation manual and start from scratch. The manual is relatively new. It will walk you through benchtesting, testing the spindle output, basically confirming that the CNCPC and CNC12 are OK. Then using the schematic I posted, start wiring your acorn to one stepper driver and one motor and get them moving. Then add the second and third drives and motors. Then add your home switches. Testing things along the way and watching your error logs.

Using the DB25 for your drives and Acorn for your inputs and outputs is the way to go moving forward. (Order that relay, it is inexpensive. Provide +24VDC to in and then wiring each relay's terminal to each output on Acorn. Acorn SINKS the voltage to turn on the relay.
Marty

[RGSparber]

Marty,

When I said the spindle was off, I meant that the VFD was on but the spindle was not turning. In this state, there was NO fault. I ran for longer than the longest time I had to wait for any fault. This doesn't mean that I wouldn't have gotten a fault one second after I stopped waiting.

The cable is a ribbon and I can see that no conductors smeared into a short. But, yes, you are right about just cutting a cable. I will flair the ends to be sure nothing is shorted.

The breakout connectors you suggested should arrive tomorrow. I believe you want me to use one of these connectors at each end of the DB25. At the Acorn end, I would go directly into the input terminals.

I'll read and follow the Acorn installation manual. Does it entirely apply to my old Acorn board? I noticed that the new Acorn board has bidirectional input optos that connect to a common that can be ground or a voltage. Mine only has "IN24" which I connected to +24V.

I did find two "smoking guns" that are consistent with your disdain for the breakout board and my current arrangement. The breakout board's driver to the DB25's EStop net is an open collector opto. Without the DB25 connected, I see a 1K pull up to 5V at the breakout board. With the DB25 connected to the Acorn, I see about 600 ohms. This says that my Acorn has a 1.5K pull-up. I see optos on my Acorn's inputs but I don't see any optos on the DB25. This could be one smoking gun.

I did strap my EStop input, IN6, to +24v and was still able to send an EStop from my breakout board. This tells me there is a logical ORing and not a direct connection.

Anyway, asking the opto to sink 8.3 mA might be marginal. The input current is around 11 mA but I don't know anything about the opto they used. Not all optos have CTR above 1. This would mean that the EStop node would be marginally pulled down to logic 0 and it might not take much noise to get spikes into logic 1/2 or even 1. Unfortunately, when I clipped the output of the opto to ground to provide a solid logic 0, I still got my fault. So this is not the root cause. However, this is still a marginal situation so my second smoking gun. The new breakout boards will eliminate both of these problem.

Thanks for your help. I'll toss my breakout board and follow the install procedure. I look forward to having a very solid system.

Rick