Sieg KX1 & Mach3 won't come out of emergency reset

[Jess]

There's not a handy manual detailing the internal wiring; any diagnostic lights and so forth? I'd be somewhat surprised if there was nothing at all that indicated a board thinking the e-stop had been pushed.

If you bought the machine from Arc, then definitely ask them for help; after all, support is one of the major reasons that you'd fork out for a commercial machine!

[lateAtNight]

No diagram unfortunately... would probably be in Chinese if there was! Haven't looked on the inside of the machine except for the spindle head (which is where the estop button is located). I am going to take out the multi meter and check if there is continuity on the circuit... should have done it in the first place.

I did contact Arc in the end even though they don't offer support for the machines themselves... its through another website, but long story short Arc did get back to me very quickly and assured me that someone who knows their stuff will be in contact today or tomorrow to try and sort out the problem. Fingers crossed...

[Edit] Ooops, stand corrected, there is a diagram in the manual!

[lateAtNight]

Right, so little update. Got a call from smallcncsuport.com. Said I'd need 15 or mins or so to setup. So I got outside, run the power extension out to my shed etc, plug in and jog and the f'ing thing works just as expected! So yeh... egg on face situation kind of. But I will swear on my life I did everything reasonable to convince that machine to come out of estop yesterday... Cycled power on the machine, restarted laptop, changed usb ports (not that that should matter, but gave it a go), exited Mach about 10 times and nothing... but today different story.

However, he did say that there is a common problem with the plastic guard cover. Its like a little door that covers the cutting tool. It has a switch on the same circuit as the estop apparently. I completely forgot about mine because I removed the plastic cover when i first got the machine... but the circuit that opens and closes with the cover is still there. So I (we) think the estop was being tripped by the guard switch circuit possibly for no reason... I'll see how it goes in the future... if I get any more random estops I might just take the circuit out completely. I don't really know why its there. The guard itself makes sense but having the door on the same circuit as the estop is a little over the top.

Anyway, I hate wasting peoples time, so I felt like a right noob when I got the call back and had to say the machine was working. But I'm trying to tell myself that I did everything I could yesterday... and that the guard switch is the root of the problem which I wasn't to know about.

Interestingly though by my reading of the circuit diagram there is only one switch on the estop circuit... but then again I am a noob... and the manual appears to be for the old version of the machine with a parallel port.

[ptjw7uk]

Just a quick question, should you be using a laptop with mach - Arc recommend a PC.

peter

[lateAtNight]

Sadly it wasn't the end of this little saga. Today I went out to use the machine. Was able to jog etc so setup and let mach do its thing, but it only managed the smallest of cuts before going into estop and woulden't come out again. Just waiting on a circuit diagram and then will attempt a diagnostic.

ptjw7uk: I will eventually use a pc, but I have to say I don't think any of the reasons listed on the Arc website would affect me... the laptop meets the recommended specs no bother, and when the laptop is plugged in (which it always is when I'm CNCing) the OS has the same power settings as a PC. I think theres a little bit of a thing against laptops in the CNC world which comes from the problems you used to get with parallel ports on them... I think they had a lower voltage and slight light different protocol. But when your using a well spec'ed laptop & a usb controller card I'm not sure theres an issue. Or at least thats my thinking on it...

[JAZZCNC]

Your correct about being able to use a Laptop with an external Motion controller BUT you still need to set it up so the Energy saving features are turned off.

This could be your problem.? Laptops are some times setup to turn off USB ports off when not used. To be Honest I hate USB, more so than Parallel port because it's always dropping out or fluctuating power which causes problems like this.

Personally after checking all wire connections for loose or broken wires I would turn off all power saving and Virus checkers etc on laptop. Then for good measure make a Backup of your XML file then re-install Mach3 and the Motion controller Plug-in.