PDA Controlling A Steeper Motor

[ceaser]

Hi

I need help please!!

I have a PDA (Recon) and I use Basic4ppc to program on it. Then I have a controller and stepper motors from Probotix. The controller and the PDA is connected through the PS232 port.

What type of codes must I send to the controller to let the stepper motors turn????? A command like "G1 X100 Y100" does nothing:thumbdown:

Thanks
Michael

[michael]

What model is it, only one I found has a Paralell connection.

http://www.probotix.com/diagrams/PBX-RF_diagram.gif

I did something similar and wrote a program in VB for a WINCE device but I used an Arduino with a firmware G Code interpreter to provide step & direction signals to the drives.

Will your stepper drivers take a step / dir signal?

Michael.

[ceaser]

Hi Michael

Thanks for the reply. I do not know what the model is, but one can use either the RS232 or parallel port. It has 4 ports at the back to which stepper motors are connected. There are also 2 cables connected.....one serial cable and the other a parallel cable.

I can open the serial port and I know that there is a link, because there are sounds coming from the stepper motors. I have looked at G-Codes, but I do not know if that is the right route to go.

Is it perhaps possible to email me a short example of the code that you used?

Thanks
Michael

[michael]

First you need to know the correct Baud rate, Parity and stop bits then we need to know if its expecting an ASCII GCode line or something else?

The humming from your steppers is normal for stationary steppers currently holding. I would stick with the Paralell connection and use Mach/EMC.

If you really want to use your PDA look at the RepRap forums as they use a serial(via usb) controller to supply step/dir signals to the paralell connection on your board. You just send it a line of GCode via serial in ascii and it does it. I wrote a program for Windows Ce /Pocket PC to controll a Router/Mill this way.

Are you sure its RS-232 on the board you have and not 422 or some other bus?

Its possible modbus for which Mach have a plugin.

Michael.

[ceaser]

Hi Michael

I know that I can control the stepper motors through the RS232 port, as I have a program called Mach 3 and that can control the stepper motors from my laptop using the RS232 port. On my PDA (Recon) I have a USB and serial port. I have looked at the G-Codes, but they don't work for me!! I am doing something wrong. By the way the settings for the port should be "4800,N,8,2".

This is what I want to do:

On the PDA is a watered down version of my Land Surveying program. In the program I can define any alignment (ie. center line of a road, railway line, etc). The alignment consists of straight lines defined by coordinates called PI's (point of intersection). At each Pi is also a radius.

What I do next is to set up my base station (GPS) and connect the Rover to the PDA, which in turn is connected to the rover. This all sits inside a small Quad bike (which I stripped!). As the "car" moves along the centerline of the road the rover continously gets coordinates from the base station. Using these coordinates the program can calculate how far away from the centerline the "car" is and apply the corrections to the stepper motors to bring it back on track.

Please help

Thanks
Michael

[rinderpest]

Hi Ceaser, it would be useful if you could attach the pdf manual for the controller etc to your next post. If you dont have a manual then take photos of any face with connectors, writing or model numbers and attach them. Need more data before we can help in a specific way.Then we can have a look at whats inside the thing and maybe get you up and running. Your application sounds like fun, perhaps when its all working you could post a couple of pics of the thing in action. Jim