C-Beam™ Linear Actuator Bundle using 500mm rails, would anyone be able to recommend a Pulse/Rev setting for Nema 23 Stepper Motor using DM542A Controller?
http://openbuildspartstore.com/c-beam-linear-actuator-bundle/

 

SignWorks, When I get DevFoam, I will definitely go with the dongle as my computers usually get re built from time to time. We have a WIN440CT Dongle that allows us to access our software used to get into WIN phone systems from any PC.

I hooked 5V power supply up to CNC control board and 36V power supply up to motor controller. Then I took the 5V out on Break out Board on pin 1 and 2 to the + side on Motor Controller for Dir and Pul and jumpered the Dir and Pul - back to the ground at the end of the Break out Board on Ground. Also 5V from the Break out Board went out to Enable on the motor driver to Enable5V. Got green lights on everything and the motors got a little warm and motor shafts got locked. I do not have the USB to DB25 converter so am not able to send signals to my motor. Maybe Friday or Sat I will have them spinning.

 

Oh and I forgot I had in my Lap Top bag last night a Belkin USB to Serial adapter. Also got Serial to DB25 adapter to communicate vi maintenance port on WIN440CT cabinets.

 

The problem is with legacy systems such as WIN being out of business for over a year now, you can't get the software or another license. So with Dongle you have software when ever you need it.

 

My 1st time I used electrical crimps and rigged up a tap plate. 3 Power supplies connect in parallel. I did have one power supply not power up and tracing the tap with my volt meter from each output, discovered a break in the last feed going to the 3rd power supply. Same method I used to trace bad stations on a phone system. I unscrewed the connector and the wire just fell of the crimp. So, had a bad connection cause of a bad crimp. All fixed and 3 power supplies working. Also installed 2 fans.

 

Does anyone have experience using usb to db25 adapters to control cnc board? I have my pc and everything wired up but the PC on win xp detects the adapter as USB Printer Interface and the CNC controller as unknown printer. I have no IO range of the printer to put in Mac3 software. Also I have been trying to create a LPT port manual? I just don't know where to start on this.

 

Thanks Keith, I thought the USB adapter to DB25 would work fine. It does not create a LPT Port and assign IO to that port. If I had an old printer and installed the printer drivers, I believe the USB to DB25 would work fine. I have a USB to serial adapter that I set to use com1 when connecting to old WIN cabinets or Old Toshiba Strategy Voice Mail cards by Serial or DB25 connection and it works great. So seems I have to buy a DB25 card to give me LPT1 with I/O that Mac 3 Needs. I buy lots of stuff from New Egg.

 

Got all my PC and CNC electronics and wiring done. Next step will be getting the Parallel card and getting my motors set up on Mac3

 

David the swarfer said:

a usb to db25 adapter will NEVER work with Mach3 because MAch3 will not be able to toggle the pins in the db25 fast enough and 'together'. you have to use a 'real' DB25 port, either part of the motherboard or a PCI/PCIe adapter. but not just any one, read the hardware compatibility list to make sure you get the right one!

Rosewill Model RC-302 - Low-Profile PCI Card - Single Parallel (SPP / PS2 / EPP / ECP) Universal

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815166005

Will this card work? What hardware compatibility list are you talking about?

Link please.

 

I have my PCI Parallel Port delivered today, so I will post back soon as to working or not.

 

Got the Parallel card and still not working. The card installed and created LPT1 Port and I took the IO and feed that into mac3. From my understanding without motors hooked up under Diagnostic in mac3 I should be able to see lights flash for pin activation. No need to have the cable connected to my CNC Breakout Board to test pin activation. I am running WIN XP 64 Bit. The mac3 program for driver test keeps saying no driver found/sensed load driver test. I have another computer might test this card on that runs win 8

 

Mach3 will run on any Windows OS from Windows 2000 through Windows 8. The parallel port driver included with Mach3 will only work with 32-bit DESKTOP computers with versions of Windows 2000 through Windows 7, but will not work with any 64-bit version of Windows or with Windows 8. Windows 8 and 64 bit versions of windows require an external motion device which can be purchased very reasonably.
This is a cut and paste from Mac 3 Support Faq. So why would I need the parallel port driver included with Mac 3? It says it only works with 32 bit version. I am running XP 64 Bit and have my own Drivers for the Parallel card I just purchased. So is it a requirement to use Mac 3 Parallel port driver? Also where is this Driver in the software package of Mac 3. Seems I may have to go with Windows 7 32bit software. Might be why my parallel port card is not working?

 

I found my answer when installing mac 3 software again. Parallel port driver check box. It says installs parallel port driver. this is not needed for external motion control devices. So I take this to say that You must install and use Mac 3 Parallel driver and that driver only works on 32Bit operating system. So I am using XP so no good with my parallel card even though I have drivers that came with the card for XP64Bit.

 

Got my Motors working today and performed driver test. So the Parallel port card does work with mac3. Windows was doing some updating in the background and it started spiking bad. Next is to clean up the windows 7 so it does not cause this problem. I need to turn all background operations off.

 

My CNC motor working

 

Is it normal for the motors to get warm after a few hours then hot even though not spinning?

 

it started spiking and going crazy during the driver test and then I noticed windows had a box going saying updating or something. Screen savers, power saver auto updates and everything else I can think of will be turned off. Also they have a txt file of suggestions. Most of my big problems are gone. Motors are wired correctly and working now.

 

Keith

What is your motor settings under motor tuning? I do understand your using drawer slides and your settings will be different than mine cause I will use C Beam with the auger screw.

The Open Build Team told me under Motor tuning to start with 200 Steps per MM and it seems to be a good slow speed. From left to right I have 200 steps per mm / 127.5 speed/ 333.75 torque under motor tuning.
I have 2 motors hooked up. One sounds sick the other one sounds great. Side to side they are in Sync and rotate the same speed. Do some of your motors have a high hum and some a low sick sound? I wander if this is normal for the motors to sound different? They are in Sync so I don't get it. Maybe tomorrow night I hook the other 2 motors up and see how they sound.

 

Video as to what I am talking about.