Hickory X Axis communication In fault with Leadshine EL8

[adthelad]

Hi,

I am working through the setup instructions for Hickory and EL8. I believe I have followed the instructions accurately, but at step 7 I still have a remaining fault - X Axis Communication In Fault. According to the CNC12 manual, this error is related to parameters 300-307 as I first get a 949 Drive map does not match hardware error before the repeated X Axis fault error.

This error was alongside other errors including spindle fault errors as I was using the default Hickory mpu plc program which had these inputs configured. I adjusted the PLC program to no longer look for any inputs to test things in a bench configuration (This is included in the report file with AbrasiveBlaster appended to the src file name). I am not sure that my edits are correct, but both using my current mpu plc and the default Hickory PLC, the X Axis fault remains.

I currently have a single EL8 drive connected which I call X. Parameter 300 is set to 1, 301-307 are set to 0. 308 is set to 7, 309-315 are set to 0.

For the ethernet cable connection between Hickory and EL8, I see a solid green light on both the drive and Hickory, and fast flashing orange (about 10Hz?) light on both the drive and Hickory.

Is it possible that this is related to parameter 316 not being set correctly? Currently 316 is set at 0, which is not correct for an absolute encoder used with EL8, but this parameter is not meant to be changed until step 9 of the instructions.

Report file is attached, I hope I did this correctly. Thank you.

[adthelad]

Just adding some more information:

I attach a photo of the front panel of EL8 and inside the cabinet. I find the error codes hard to understand from the manual, but I thought it might be useful to see.

I also attach screenshots of things I think may be useful from motionstudio. I also include below a list of parameters which are different from the default on the drive (highlighted red in motion studio parameter list):

PA0.00 - Set to 0
PA0.02 - Set to 0x0
PA0.03 - Set to 61
PA0.04 - Set to 19
PA0.15 - Set to 1

PA1.00 to PA1.09, are different, but these are just servo tuning parameters.

PA1.15 - Set to 0.

PA2.00 - Set to 2.
PA2.50 - Set to 3.
PA2.53 - Set to 107
PA2.55 - Set to 80

PA6.04 - Set to 1500
PA6.08 - Set to 2
PA6.09 - Set to -2
PA6.21 - Set to 1500
PA6.22 - Set to 1
PA6.25 - Set to 50

PA7.16 - Set to 0x7

[centroid467]

Hello and thank you for all of the supporting info and pictures. I can tell you right off the bat that the solution to this issue is to install CNC12 5.07 beta (R8 or newer) or hold off until 5.08 release version.

Long story short, Leadshine EL7 and EL8 drives handle device IDs differently from other drives and we did not have the full list of IDs at the time of 5.06 release. The Hickory does not recognize the drive so it reports a communication error. This is fixed in the upcoming 5.08 release and public betas 5.07 R8 and higher.

[adthelad]

Got it, thank you. I am using the latest beta of 5.07 and it is working better, the drive communcation error has gone.

I am able to complete step 8 now and jog the motors. It helps if you remember to switch on your 24V brake power supply... It saves a couple of hours of debugging

One key difference between my layout and the Hickory EL8 sample schematic is that I am using the internal brake release relay of EL8 (2.7.1 Holding brake wiring diagram of the EL8 manual) rather than relay board 2, output 1 (Z-AXIS BRAKE RELEASE). I have made this choice to save Hickory relay output slots and also to reduce wiring lengths in my cabinet (all motor power cables terminate directly at the EL8 drive and the brake pair doesn't have to be routed away to the Hickory outputs).

One benefit of using the Hickory relay outputs would be that I can freely customise their behaviour in the PLC program i.e. I can enable only certain servo brakes in an e-stop condition. When using the EL8 internal relay, the brake is only enabled when the servo is disabled, which happens when the e-stop is pressed. I think this is good for my application but I see it being slightly less flexible.

Is it possible to control the ethercat communication from the PLC program? For example, if I wanted to only e-stop a single drive over ethercat, not all drives, when the e-stop condition is met? I understand that this kind of usage is probably esoteric but I am just trying to get a better feeling for what is possible over ethercat.

[adthelad]

Sorry to add more questions, would it please be possible to confirm that it is OK to use Parameter 64 with Hickory to create a paired axis over ethercat?

[centroid467]

Yes, axis pairing via parameter 64 should work just fine.
I do not believe we have implemented direct ecat communications from the PLC. I can see reasons why but also reasons to not do so.