ShopSabre Sidekick 10 Acorn Retrofit

[cnckeith]

And he mentioned that the only time he's seen a defective board is because it was wired incorrectly.

hey that's my line.

[ShawnM]

And he mentioned that the only time he's seen a defective board is because it was wired incorrectly.

hey that's my line.

I think it’s an industry standard phrase for you manufacturers.

[repauli1]

Yes, I stated I had errors in the log file and that I had a bad ethernet cable. I replaced the cable and the errors are all gone. It still wont calibrate.

Shawn did you get it to calibrate? What was the issue?

[ShawnM]

I’ll know more Monday, I have a low voltage issue somewhere in the system. When I first updated to beta 8 it wouldn’t calibrate because apparently beta 8 has a higher threshold for voltage readings. During a teamviewer session with Joey and Chris a setting on my system was adjusted by Chris so it would calibrate and it did and cut a perfect calibration line.

The voltage is low SOMEWHERE so I’m going to test the voltage divider board in the plasma cutter per Hypertherms instructions. I spoke with their tech support Friday. Then I’m going to run the rx/tx bench test file using my lab power supply set at 5v and confirm I’m getting 5v through the rx/tx boards to the Acorn.

I cut hundreds of aluminum I beams just over a week ago with no issues so I’m confused as to what has happened.

Stay tuned.

[ShawnM]

Ok here are some of my voltage test results:

- ran the tx/rx bench test program with a 5v signal from my lab power supply and the Acorn returned 4.97 volts
- set up the plasma cutter to cut a 4" line in 12 gauge steel at 45A. The target voltage is 133 and at 50:1 that should read 2.66 volts on my Fluke
- turned off THC in the profile manager and in the THC config screen and disconnected the voltage divider output coming from the Hypertherm to the
Acorn TX board and wired
direct to my multimeter.
- ran the 4" line file and during the cut I saw it settle in at 2.67 volts so the voltage divider on the Hypertherm is working correctly

So this mean the RX/TX voltage is reading correctly on the Acorn and the voltage divider is working correctly in the Hypertherm. I'm truly stumped now as to why Joey and Chris are seeing low voltage plots when I run the test cuts via my TeamViewer session with them.

What other issues could I have to cause the machine to cut great for a solid week and then not even cut a 2" line because of low voltage? I'm desperate and will take any ideas to try.

[repauli1]

Ok here are some of my voltage test results:

- ran the tx/rx bench test program with a 5v signal from my lab power supply and the Acorn returned 4.97 volts
- set up the plasma cutter to cut a 4" line in 12 gauge steel at 45A. The target voltage is 133 and at 50:1 that should read 2.66 volts on my Fluke
- turned off THC in the profile manager and in the THC config screen and disconnected the voltage divider output coming from the Hypertherm to the
Acorn TX board and wired
direct to my multimeter.
- ran the 4" line file and during the cut I saw it settle in at 2.67 volts so the voltage divider on the Hypertherm is working correctly

So this mean the RX/TX voltage is reading correctly on the Acorn and the voltage divider is working correctly in the Hypertherm. I'm truly stumped now as to why Joey and Chris are seeing low voltage plots when I run the test cuts via my TeamViewer session with them.

What other issues could I have to cause the machine to cut great for a solid week and then not even cut a 2" line because of low voltage? I'm desperate and will take any ideas to try.

Any resolution??

[ShawnM]

Just getting back to the plasma today, I've been busy with a few router jobs. I'll report back when I can.

[ShawnM]

No joy, the voltage is still not right for some reason. If I turn off THC it cuts beautifully. When I turn on THC and try to cut a 4" line from the stock g code in 3/8 plate at 65A which should yield a target voltage of 130 it's not right. After the THC active delay the torch moves up too high and the voltage for the remainder of the cut is 139. I've tried the work lead attached to the table and direct to what I'm cutting and there's no difference.

As I stated before I rand the rx/tx bench test and with a 5v lab power supply at 5 volts the Acorn read 4.97. My power supply bounced from 4.9 to 5 so a reading of 4.97 is pretty damn accurate.

The volts coming from the Hypertherm voltage divider are dead on as well per the other test I ran.

I'm going to upgrade the the release candidate version 4.66 today or tomorrow but I'm not hopeful this will solve my issues. I have some parts that i need to cut and I can run with THC off for these.

[cnckeith]

great info here, please review if you haven't already. https://centroidcncforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=65&t=7096

[ShawnM]

Read all that and already have everything grounded very similar to what Jim Colt recommends. As confirmed by Chris and Joey I have a low voltage issue somewhere but all voltages check out per the Centroid rx/tx check and also what Hypertherm asked me to check.