IPGregory - QueenAnt Pro V2 Build Thread

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IPGregory
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Re: IPGregory Build and Progress Thread

Post by IPGregory »

Yeah, these are off Amazon. Not the cheapest but certainly still Chinese sourced. I will use Steel flags or 'targets' when I re-do the setup. Haven't found the brackets in the US at the moment and Chinese ones are 3 or 4 weeks away.

Noise was my first thought when I noticed the comms errors, so I pulled the Eth cable out of the raceway and away from everything to check. Errors persisted so it's likely not that. I was careful both with my layout and with grounding. Also, it fails the Comms Stress Test that runs without anything moving which lends to it not being noise either. As a last check, I'll pull power to the Drives and the VFD and run the test again this weekend. If it still fails, I can be pretty sure it's not noise related.

Thanks as always for the help!
Thx
Ian

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IPGregory
Posts: 162
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Location: Nevada, USA

Re: IPGregory Build and Progress Thread

Post by IPGregory »

Got home and had some time to look into my comms problem.

Run Comms Stress Test NC File = Fail
Change Adaptor settings to force 100Mps at Half Duplex.
Run Comms Stress Test NC File = Pass
Run it a few more times = Pass each time.
Re-Install Eth Cable into wire duct on board.
Run Comms Stress Test NC File = Pass.
Update to V4.82.
(Note that the recommendation to screen shot all the Wizard Pages was a lifesaver as the update wiped the Wizard Settings)
Run Comms Stress Test NC File = Pass
:D :D

Thanks Uwe and ShawnM for the help. Looks like the Comms issues are gone!!
Thx
Ian

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suntravel
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Re: IPGregory Build and Progress Thread

Post by suntravel »

Cool, thanks for feedback.

Uwe
ShawnM
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Re: IPGregory Build and Progress Thread

Post by ShawnM »

Glad you are making progress. Is it an Intel NIC? Just curious.

The “update” is really a fresh install so screen shots are the absolute perfect backup because you can’t always restore an older report when jumping to a much newer version. Store those screen shots on a thumb drive, the cloud or another pc.

Be sure and make new screen shots when you get the new version configured and setup.
IPGregory
Posts: 162
Joined: Sat Oct 08, 2022 9:27 pm
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Location: Nevada, USA

Re: IPGregory Build and Progress Thread

Post by IPGregory »

Yes, it's an Intel NIC.

I was going to just update, then I remembered seeing multiple recommendations to screenshot, so I did. Luckily.

I am still configuring so will need to update them anyway when I'm done. I have Wi-Fi to a share on my NAS where I keep everything so no need for a Thumb Drive. I keep the reports and the screenshots on there. I did it to move .NC files back and forth between my design machine and the CNC one because I hate 'SneakerNet'... :)

Did have an odd one. Was trying to check if it stayed square after runs and checking axis drag earlier and noticed the paired axis was juddering and dragging?? Eventually worked out that it had kept all of the wizard settings I put in except the axis pairing?? Just that one setting out of multiple changes that it did keep. Odd.
Thx
Ian

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tblough
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Re: IPGregory Build and Progress Thread

Post by tblough »

Do you have the Pro or Ultimate license installed? Software axis pairing does not work on the Free version.
Cheers,

Tom
Confidence is the feeling you have before you fully understand the situation.
I have CDO. It's like OCD, but the letters are where they should be.
IPGregory
Posts: 162
Joined: Sat Oct 08, 2022 9:27 pm
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Hickory CNC Controller: No
Oak CNC controller: No
CNC Control System Serial Number: 20D7787C45AB-0819226470 - 98F07B6F97F8-0623237343
DC3IOB: No
CNC12: Yes
CNC11: No
CPU10 or CPU7: No
Location: Nevada, USA

Re: IPGregory Build and Progress Thread

Post by IPGregory »

Hi Tom, I have the Pro license. I had it working in V4.80. The quirk was that when I upgraded to V4.82, I went through and re-entered all of my wizard settings from my v4.80 screenshots and this 1 setting reverted for some reason. It's fine now.
Thx
Ian

QueenAnt Pro V2 - CNC Router - https://photos.app.goo.gl/kg7CSvJsrAvAgRs26
MPNC - CNC Router - https://photos.app.goo.gl/ees2SER6C2Aw8AJ89.
IPGregory
Posts: 162
Joined: Sat Oct 08, 2022 9:27 pm
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Oak CNC controller: No
CNC Control System Serial Number: 20D7787C45AB-0819226470 - 98F07B6F97F8-0623237343
DC3IOB: No
CNC12: Yes
CNC11: No
CPU10 or CPU7: No
Location: Nevada, USA

Re: IPGregory Build and Progress Thread

Post by IPGregory »

Weekend update..

Comms issue is fixed, updated to V4.82, all axis travels checked, drag tests done, etc. Suppose I had better cut something? :D

Need to bore the holes for the lower spoilboard to hold it down so I can surface it. So first 'cut' is a multi bore run to cut the holes and recesses for the bolts.
Image

It made sawdust!! Not showing the video though as it also has smoke because my feeds/speeds were WAY off, but it cut the holes. :shock:

With the board held down, time to run a couple of surfacing passes to get an indication of how much tramming I'll have to do. Have a little left to right lean and some back to front apparently. So quick rough set of the left to right so I can run a full pass to tram it.
Image

MacGuyver's Tramming Guage..
Image

0.05mm Shim for the front to back and slacken the bolts to adjust the side to side and got it pretty close.
Image

Full surfacing pass underway after tramming, highlights that I still need to build the dust extraction system and the proper spindle cooling system. This will do for the spoilboards work though.
Image

Done! Lower Spoilboard mounted and surfaced! Machine cut something!! :D
Image

Thats it for this weekend. I made noise, dust, smoke and a few chips as well!
Thx
Ian

QueenAnt Pro V2 - CNC Router - https://photos.app.goo.gl/kg7CSvJsrAvAgRs26
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IPGregory
Posts: 162
Joined: Sat Oct 08, 2022 9:27 pm
Acorn CNC Controller: Yes
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Oak CNC controller: No
CNC Control System Serial Number: 20D7787C45AB-0819226470 - 98F07B6F97F8-0623237343
DC3IOB: No
CNC12: Yes
CNC11: No
CPU10 or CPU7: No
Location: Nevada, USA

Re: IPGregory Build and Progress Thread

Post by IPGregory »

Weekend update.

Decided to tackle getting the CNC PC out of the way and a support for the Dust Hose. I'm not fond of it but can't really come up with a different way. So goalposts it is...
Image

Moved the CNC PC. Needed to get it out of the machine envelope to avoid crashing into it and also further away from where I typically operate the machine as having a 24" display 1'-2' from your face is no good. I'm still not happy with it so it may yet move again, but it's working fine here for now.
Image

Have the design down for the permanent spindle cooling system, this is the first part.
Image

Picked up a Cyclone Seperator and some hose for the dust extraction. I'll keep the ShopVac for now until/unless I feel a proper extraction set up is needed later. Still need some hose clamps to permanently mount the hose.
Image
Image

Decided to get some steel and make my own Sensor mounts. Better and stronger than the ones I could find to buy. All of which would come from China and be weeks away anyway. Made one for the Y and one for the Y Slave, fitted them and got the sensors set up and working (for a while). More on that later. You can't see it in the pic, but there is a steel 'target' on the edge of the side panel the sensor is reading from.
Image

The machine continues to make the machine. Flipped the spoilboard and drilled all the 3 step holes for the Threaded Inserts. I have had a number of different designs for the spoilboard I played with trying to come up with one that will work best for the type of stuff I want to make. Originally this was a lower board just for a base with another board on top with T-Tracks and inserts. Decided in the end T-Tracks won't really be much use and an insert grid was better. So ditched the upper board idea and decided to put the inserts in this one instead.
Image

Lots of M6 Inserts. Came out really well.
Image

I 'invested' in some 'proper' bits this week not from Amazon. Ended up using Bits&Bits because they had a good Fusion Tool Library import with good bit data and the prices seemed reasonable. Since I removed the board and drilled holes from the bottom, I ran another surface pass with a new bit. Can you tell? :lol:
Image

Back to the sensor part. I installed the new brackets and connected the Slave Axis Sensor finally. Went to set up Auto Axis Squaring and it wouldn't complete the process. Kept getting stuck on the Master Axis and leaving the Axis unpaired and deleting the SW Limits. Did some research on the forum and determined it was because I was using separate inputs for each of my sensors rather than wiring them in series.

I did that because of other information on the forum and elsewhere about the possibility of problems wiring NPN NC Sensors in series and suffering voltage loss across the set. The only option for using separate sensors with the Auto Squaring function seemed to be a .HOM file that a forum member had written a while ago. I grabbed a copy, but it had some other stuff in it relating to spindle coolant and other stuff I wasn't sure about. I don't know enough to dissect the file and use it so that was a dead end.

Decided to bite the bullet and re-wire my sensors in series and be done with it. Did that and everything ran fine. Got the Auto Squaring Routine running properly. Was running some tweaks to dial in the settings to get the gantry fully square when some of the sensors quit working. I had power to X (first sensor in the chain), but no Y and no Z (2 and 3 in the chain). No matter what I did, I couldn't get them back on. Full power shutoffs, numerous wiring tests, etc. on a setup that worked for an hour fine, then quit. Nothing. This was late last night, so I called it a night to think on it.

Did some surfing to see if I could get better quality sensors or something but decided the problem was probably how I was using them rather than the sensors themselves and new ones wouldn't help that. In the end I decided that trying a different set up may be the best answer. If the problem was that I couldn't use the Auto Squaring without using the HomeAll Input setting and wiring NPN NC sensors in series might throw an issue, then maybe the NPN NC sensor part needed to change? Found some mechanical plunge type micro switches that looked like they will work and ordered a couple to test. Got them overnight.

Plunge Type MicroSwitch with M12 Mount that should drop in my mounts.
Image

Before the new switches arrived today, I wanted to do the Spoilboard work so rewired the Sensors I had back to separate inputs that had been working fine and disabled the Auto Squaring. When I did this, I noticed that my Y Sensor (#2 Axis) was still 'off"?? Double checked everything a few times before I realized it was tripped?? This didn't make sense initially because the Slave Axis Sensor that is set up to trip first wasn't tripped. Turns out the Gantry wasn't aligned. :oops:

Thinking it through, it's possible the Y Axis Sensor was tripped all along and that stopped power to the Z Axis Sensor as well. Don't know for sure yet because having rewired the sensors back I wanted to get on with the other work I wanted to do today. Now I have the new switches and the possibility that the old set up did actually work. Will re-visit and see what it turns out to be. But I am leaning towards trying the mechanical set up anyway just to ensure fewer potential for issues. To be continued...

Ran a bunch of 3/4/5 triangle measuring tests on the machine today to make sure its square and repeatable. Looks good!

For now, that's it. Got some more progress on the machine and the spoilboard is finished. The new dust set up works great. The bits are coming in for the Spindle Cooling system and I am most of the way through CAM'ing the parts to complete the box around the control board. This is tricky because I have to tile some of them and Fusion doesn't do that well, but I found a video with a process that seems to work on 'paper'.

Thats it for this weekend.
Thx
Ian

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IPGregory
Posts: 162
Joined: Sat Oct 08, 2022 9:27 pm
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Oak CNC controller: No
CNC Control System Serial Number: 20D7787C45AB-0819226470 - 98F07B6F97F8-0623237343
DC3IOB: No
CNC12: Yes
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Location: Nevada, USA

Re: IPGregory Build and Progress Thread

Post by IPGregory »

Weekend Update.

Decided to tackle the sensor issue again. Rewired the Prox sensors back in series after making sure nothing was tripped first. They all came up. Re-enabled Axis Squaring and updated for HomeAll, etc. Everything worked again. Fine-tuned them again to get my gantry properly square. Checked, ran it around, re-homed, checked again. Rinse and repeat a few times. All good. Must have been the tripped sensor last time that threw it off.

Checking machine square with an engraving bit and some 3/4/5 triangle measurements.
Image

With the machine now setup with Auto squaring and working properly, time to take a step backwards. During the week while working on the CAM for the Control Box enclosure I realized I messed up. Last weekend I flipped my spoilboard, drilled a bunch of holes for threaded inserts, installed them, flipped it back and re-surfaced it. At the time I didn't really worry about the grid of inserts as they were just for hold down. However, while working through the CAM to tile the parts that were too big for one pass, I decided I wanted to add locating dowels. Since I already had a grid, I wanted to match them to the existing grid so I could then use that grid in software to prep parts both for through bolting and tiling if needed. Turn my basic Spoilboard with inserts into a fixture board essentially. Problem was my grid of Inserts wasn't completely square. I hadn't worried too much about it then but now I needed to know exactly where the holes where in software so I could use a template of the board in CAM to drill hold down through bolts, dowel holes, etc..

So, this weekend I decided to just bite the bullet and re-do it. No flipping it between processes this time. Drill the mounting bolt holes. Bolt it down. level it up to the machine, then drill the fixture grid and run a surface pass.

Ran a few test holes to find the best size for the dowels and inserts since they were now going to be on the top and also which bit worked best.
Image

Worked out which way I wanted to go and..

Spoil/Fixture Board V2.0
Image

This has both a grid of inserts and a grid of dowel holes for 1/4" Brass Dowels I made.

Now I fixed that mess-up, time to get back to the plan. Control Enclosure Sides, top and Bottom in their raw state. :D
Image

New Fixture Board works as intended. Placed the hold down holes in SW, then cut them out and bolted the board down ready to cut out the parts.
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We now have sides for the Control Board (test fit).
Image
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Ran out of time but have the material for the Top and Bottom predrilled, bolted down and ready to cut.
Image

Bit of a plus and minus weekend. Had to re-do the spoilboard but got the auto squaring working properly and managed to cut out some parts for the machine. Net gain I think..
Thx
Ian

QueenAnt Pro V2 - CNC Router - https://photos.app.goo.gl/kg7CSvJsrAvAgRs26
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