Spindle2 board Mach3 set up

[i2i]

you have to go into the computers bios/setup. You do this when the computer is powering up before windows, you will se a prompt telling you to press a certain key to go into setup, it's normally F2, or F1, or delete, or sometimes enter.
When you're in the setup screen you need to find the parallel port settings, which are usually on the second page or in the advanced page. Look at the settings and it will probably be ECP, just change it to EPP, then save, then exit.

PS. if you see the windows logo, you've missed the prompt and you'll have to try again

[Simon C]

Ok just checked it and its set to "ECP+EPP" does that mean it should be ok?

regards
Simon

[i2i]

try it on epp alone

[audioandy]

Hi Simon

I ordered my board direct from PMDX in the States, it arrived in less than a week.

Steve who owns the company is very prompt at replying to e-mails and very helpful, the boards are by no means the cheapest you can buy but the quality is second to none and the set up is very easy.

Before you go spending anymore of your hard earned cash I would try to get what you have working, I have never delt with Roy at DIYCNC but I have only read very good comments about him,I would drop him an email to see if he can help if we cannot sort it.

One more thing you could do, is with your meter check the voltage on your output pins on your breakout board, put one probe on the common terminal the other on the step pin, check the voltage without trying to turn on your spindle, then do an M3 command and check again and see if you get a difference in voltage. Depending on your system you should get a swing of between 0 to 5 volts (this could also be around 3.3 volts).

[Simon C]

Ok i tried the 5v check you mentioned Andy, and i think i found the problem. pin 1 is only showing 0.1vdc wether the spindle is on or off and wether i set the rpm to 100 or 2500 its always 0.1v. i put the meter on one of the home switch inputs and it was showing 5.1V or 0v depending wether i had the switch pressed or not, so im thinking pin 1 is nackerd. im gana try soldering the spindle board to another output pin and see if that sorts it.


regards
Simon

[Simon C]

Success!! I wired it to pin 2 and its giveing a voltage, allmost 11V at max rpm but at half rpm its around 8V so its not very linear so il have a play with the spindle settings in mach. I havent tried wireing it up to the motor yet so il have to look into that aswell, thanx for the help Andy,


regards
Simon

[audioandy]

Hi Simon

Glad we got there in the end, it's all a learning curve