Ebay Chinese Routers (CNC3040) - anyone purchased one of these machines recently?

**camhguh** · 07-02-2012

Well..its arrived! :) Our chinese 4030 cnc machine....no tracking number...no email communication...but delivered this morning. It was very well packaged and looked as if it needed to be! I assumed it started out box shaped but there were no edges visible on delivery! I rolled it from my front door thro to my kitchen where it will live for a while!

Everything survived intact, no damage and the spindle works fine, quieter than i thought it would be although it might sound a lot louder when actually milling some material. Now just need to cobble together a working pc with xp to run mach3.....to be continued!

**modcube** · 08-02-2012

Mine has arrived too, all perfect, extremely well packaged. Tomorrow I'll try to install emc2 to check if it's working ok.

**camhguh** · 08-02-2012

Originally Posted by modcube

Mine has arrived too, all perfect, extremely well packaged. Tomorrow I'll try to install emc2 to check if it's working ok.

The tracking number arrived in my email this morning...the machine was delivered yesterday lol

Not used it in anger yet...getting our heads round mach3 etc...should be able to give it a run tomorrow for real!

**camhguh** · 20-02-2012

Well...guess what...we have a problem...after around four or five hours intermittent use the z axis is misbehaving....when i jog down it goes up and when i jog up it goes down...hehe not... bloody Chinese gremlins!!!

The odd thing is that we can move the gantry to a certain position on the bed and it works fine but within a limited area. Because we need the parts urgently we are running it for the moment in this manner but its a pita!

I think because it works ok in one area of the machine that the problem is most likely to be with the wiring and not the driver boards...at least im hoping so..because any issue with the wiring would be a lot easier to resolve!

Forgot to mention that we are using Mach3

Anyone come across a similar problem?

**modcube** · 20-02-2012

Originally Posted by camhguh

Well...guess what...we have a problem...after around four or five hours intermittent use the z axis is misbehaving....when i jog down it goes up and when i jog up it goes down...hehe not... bloody Chinese gremlins!!!

The odd thing is that we can move the gantry to a certain position on the bed and it works fine but within a limited area. Because we need the parts urgently we are running it for the moment in this manner but its a pita!

I think because it works ok in one area of the machine that the problem is most likely to be with the wiring and not the driver boards...at least im hoping so..because any issue with the wiring would be a lot easier to resolve!

Forgot to mention that we are using Mach3

Anyone come across a similar problem?

This is definitely a problem with the wire, I've found some people that had this problem too.

**Musht** · 20-02-2012

Unless its`s possible to set some sort of safe area that reverses Z-axis in mach3?

Wiring does sound like the suspect, as price of copper has increased so has the thickness of the insualtion and thinness of conductor on some Chinese gear, looks like the right wire until strip it open.

Straightforward to test with multimeter between connectors of controller and stepper connector, give everything a good waggle and roll the axis by hand, look for open and short between wires.

let us know how you get on.

**Jonathan** · 20-02-2012

Originally Posted by camhguh

i jog down it goes up and when i jog up it goes down

If that's the only problem it implies the direction setting for Z in mach 3 is set the wrong way. Could try going to "Config"->"Ports & Pins"->"Motor Outputs" then changing "Dir LowActive" on the line for Z. However if it's working fine in another place that's not going to help you. The only things that can change the motor direction is the state of the direction pin on the stepper driver, or changing the polarity of either phase. The latter surely cannot happen, so I'd put a voltmeter on the Z-axis driver direction pin and see if it looks right.

Whereabouts are you in Nottingham? I'm at University of Nottingham so if you don't get it sorted today I'm happy to come and have a look as it shouldn't be far?

**camhguh** · 22-02-2012

Originally Posted by Jonathan

If that's the only problem it implies the direction setting for Z in mach 3 is set the wrong way. Could try going to "Config"->"Ports & Pins"->"Motor Outputs" then changing "Dir LowActive" on the line for Z. However if it's working fine in another place that's not going to help you. The only things that can change the motor direction is the state of the direction pin on the stepper driver, or changing the polarity of either phase. The latter surely cannot happen, so I'd put a voltmeter on the Z-axis driver direction pin and see if it looks right.

Whereabouts are you in Nottingham? I'm at University of Nottingham so if you don't get it sorted today I'm happy to come and have a look as it shouldn't be far?

Sorry i missed your offer to come and sort us out Jonathan, lol, much appreciated mate!

At the moment we are able to run ok on approx 50% of the bed without problems which enables us to continue and produce parts (for the moment anyway!)

In the meantime I will make up a new cable if i can work out what the connectors are!

**Philly** · 22-02-2012

Originally Posted by camhguh

Sorry i missed your offer to come and sort us out Jonathan, lol, much appreciated mate!

At the moment we are able to run ok on approx 50% of the bed without problems which enables us to continue and produce parts (for the moment anyway!)

In the meantime I will make up a new cable if i can work out what the connectors are!

Try the yellow cable that connects to the Z axis connector on the parellel board. I had a similar fault and it turned out to be loose in the socket.

Phil

**JAZZCNC** · 20-02-2012

Originally Posted by camhguh

Well...guess what...we have a problem...after around four or five hours intermittent use the z axis is misbehaving....when i jog down it goes up and when i jog up it goes down...hehe not... bloody Chinese gremlins!!!

The odd thing is that we can move the gantry to a certain position on the bed and it works fine but within a limited area. Because we need the parts urgently we are running it for the moment in this manner but its a pita!

I think because it works ok in one area of the machine that the problem is most likely to be with the wiring and not the driver boards...at least im hoping so..because any issue with the wiring would be a lot easier to resolve!

Forgot to mention that we are using Mach3

Anyone come across a similar problem?

Could be a dodgy keyboard and it's just coinsidense it happens to be working in one spot to the other. If you have another KB it's Certainly worth eliminating for what it takes.!!