Thor, or should that be Zeus?

[Desertboy]

Thanks, probably not worth the effort / concern then. Ill just return the 380V one.

Ill play around with the proxy switches this week / weekend. I wasnt aware home / limit could be the same switch. I cant afford a run away going past my limits - the damage with these motors / big components is difficult / expensive to fix.

Morning hows things today? Just been to vote ;)

I hear you there I'd imagine a crash would be a very bad thing.

What I would worry with an inductive probe is a stray chip triggering a max limit, I'm going to use high quality microswitches wired so if the connection drops off it will fault. (I think NC but too early for my brain this morning.)

I found the best quality microswitches I've come across cheap are proper arcade microswitches.

[Chaz]

Morning hows things today? Just been to vote ;)

I hear you there I'd imagine a crash would be a very bad thing.

What I would worry with an inductive probe is a stray chip triggering a max limit, I'm going to use high quality microswitches wired so if the connection drops off it will fault. (I think NC but too early for my brain this morning.)

I found the best quality microswitches I've come across cheap are proper arcade microswitches.

I agreed, Im not sure if they are the best but I got 6 of them for a reasonable cost. I might just do homing with them.

Can you link the switches you are using please?

[Neale]

I agree with comments re inverter - without studying the manual and doing some parameter reconfiguration (and if the manual is in the same Chinglish as the HY manuals, that's not easy) it probably won't work out of the box.

IP/A - assuming that the digital I/o is the same as my IP/M, which seems likely - Mach3 can handle all the inputs, no problem. If you add one of the I/o extenders, it can handle those as well, so number of ports is not an issue. So, you could use separate limit+/limit-/home switches on each axis. On my own machine, I use a single switch for home/limit at one end plus another switch for upper limit on X and Y. For X and Y, I wire both switches in series (it's slightly more complicated than that but effectively that's what happens) so I only need three IP/M inputs. Wiring proximity switches in series works fine using the 24V supply you need for the IP/M. That's with NPN n/c proximity switches so I get the fail-safe effect of series switch wiring - any wiring fault and the limit switch appears to have tripped. You can use n/o switches in parallel but of course you lose the fail-safe feature. Keeping X, Y, and Z switches on separate inputs means that you can home two or three axes at the same time (I home Z to get it to safe height then X and Y together)

[Desertboy]

I agreed, Im not sure if they are the best but I got 6 of them for a reasonable cost. I might just do homing with them.

Can you link the switches you are using please?

I have to google the ones I've got because I recovered them from this thing (I have an almost identical one with no surface rust and a mint ballscrew to cannibalise for my Z axis.)


But you cannot go wrong with Cherry or Happ microswitches, high repeat-ability and guaranteed for 10 million clicks which should be good for a few weeks lol. Should cost ~£1 to £1.50 a switch which for cnc is refreshing lol.

[Chaz]

I agree with comments re inverter - without studying the manual and doing some parameter reconfiguration (and if the manual is in the same Chinglish as the HY manuals, that's not easy) it probably won't work out of the box.

IP/A - assuming that the digital I/o is the same as my IP/M, which seems likely - Mach3 can handle all the inputs, no problem. If you add one of the I/o extenders, it can handle those as well, so number of ports is not an issue. So, you could use separate limit+/limit-/home switches on each axis. On my own machine, I use a single switch for home/limit at one end plus another switch for upper limit on X and Y. For X and Y, I wire both switches in series (it's slightly more complicated than that but effectively that's what happens) so I only need three IP/M inputs. Wiring proximity switches in series works fine using the 24V supply you need for the IP/M. That's with NPN n/c proximity switches so I get the fail-safe effect of series switch wiring - any wiring fault and the limit switch appears to have tripped. You can use n/o switches in parallel but of course you lose the fail-safe feature. Keeping X, Y, and Z switches on separate inputs means that you can home two or three axes at the same time (I home Z to get it to safe height then X and Y together)

Thanks. IPA is teh same, many inputs. Ill find a screenshot of why I believe Mach 3 is the problem with inputs. Ill do it this evening.

[Neale]

IP/whatever only works with Mach3/4, so Mach3 must be able to handle all the I/O. However, it's certainly not obvious first time round exactly how you refer to the connections. Took me a while to figure it out from the manuals. Post the screen shot and I'm sure someone can talk you through it. Is one of those things that's obvious, but only after you've done it the first time!

[Chaz]

IP/whatever only works with Mach3/4, so Mach3 must be able to handle all the I/O. However, it's certainly not obvious first time round exactly how you refer to the connections. Took me a while to figure it out from the manuals. Post the screen shot and I'm sure someone can talk you through it. Is one of those things that's obvious, but only after you've done it the first time!

Thanks Neale, I understand how the inputs / mapping work. Ive setup a few machines on CS Labs kit. Ill find the image / reference to why I believe Mach 3 is the problem here with limit inputs specifically.

[Desertboy]

Thanks Neale, I understand how the inputs / mapping work. Ive setup a few machines on CS Labs kit. Ill find the image / reference to why I believe Mach 3 is the problem here with limit inputs specifically.

My only experience with microswitches and CNC style controllers are Arduino based but I do know the Arduino has internal pullup resistors so that microswitchs work from 2 wires (Unpowered) but when you use inductive sensors they need to be powered so you have to turn the internal pullup resistors off in the firmware (You also need to wire some resistors to drop the voltage from 12v to 5v so it doesn't fry the Arduino.) and make sure you have the correct firmware setting for NO/NC. I wonder if this could be related?

I have an inductive sensor for auto levelling my 3d printer bed and an aluminium print bed and fried 1 Arduino before I found this out.

[Chaz]

This is the limitation (for limit switches).


'Only 5 of these inputs blah blah' ....

Ive actually crashed Mach 3 before by trying to use other inputs than those (for limit switches, I must stress). No problem using them for ATC switches etc.

[Chaz]

My only experience with microswitches and CNC style controllers are Arduino based but I do know the Arduino has internal pullup resistors so that microswitchs work from 2 wires (Unpowered) but when you use inductive sensors they need to be powered so you have to turn the internal pullup resistors off in the firmware (You also need to wire some resistors to drop the voltage from 12v to 5v so it doesn't fry the Arduino.) and make sure you have the correct firmware setting for NO/NC. I wonder if this could be related?

I have an inductive sensor for auto levelling my 3d printer bed and an aluminium print bed and fried 1 Arduino before I found this out.

Getting them to work as single NC switches is fairly easy on the CS Labs / Mach 3 setup.

Im trying to work out how to wire them in series and how to mix between limit / home options.

Another way is to wire something via the E Stop circuit for limit switches and not actually use the 'limit switch' pins available to Mach 3.