UC400ETH- Mach3 Integration Issues

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UC400ETH- Mach3 Integration Issues

Postby atestani » Fri Mar 25, 2022 2:04 am

I have a setup working with Mach3 on my CNC mill using parallel ports on Windows 7. I am upgrading to a UC400ETH on Windows 10.

My problem is when I use the same XML files with the UC400ETH on a win10 computer (3GHz, 4GB RAM) with dedicated gigabit
Ethernet PCI card, I get strange results such as those shown below. There may be more but I can't go
further until I sort these out. I have all of the UC400ETH settings in the Plugin
control at default (e.g. Step rate 100KHz).. I am using the latest version of the plugin.

Here are my currently identified problems:

1. When I click to home to machine coordinates, the action occurs but it is at an incredibly low feed
rate. I estimate it is about .05in/sec. So low it would take several minutes to home the machine!
However, G1 and G0 speeds and travel distance seem to be OK for X and Y. Not sure about Z.

2. What works correctly is a tool change (to my probe) to the tool change location. Speed is correct
and the Z- coordinate is set to 0.0 as it supposed to be

3. If I run a probing script to set any individual axis, this works but if I run a script on a corner of the
workpiece, the first axis is Z which works OK. Next is a move in X and a movement down to locate
the probe below Z=0 to move toward X=0. The move out distance is correct but the down
movement is too short and the probe misses the X surface.

I typically run with MachStdMill (MSM) (for probing operations, for example) but the same problems occur with native Mach3

Can anyone provide any advice on these problems?

I tried to upload MSM/Mach3 and native Mach3 XML files but they keep being rejected. I've succeeded with a ZIP file which I hope can help.
Attachments
XMLFiles.zip
(39.36 KiB) Downloaded 308 times
atestani
 
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Re: UC400ETH- Mach3 Integration Issues

Postby ger21 » Fri Mar 25, 2022 10:46 am

1) What are your homing speeds set to?

What I would try is to setup a new profile from scratch. Mach3 .xml files can get messed up and cause all kinds of programs.
Set the profile up with the default screenset, and don't use MSM until everything is working. MSM does a lot of things with Mach3 that can cause issues. And I thought that MSM is only supported with a parallel port or an ESS, and no guarantees it will work with other controllers.
Gerry
UCCNC 2022 Screenset - http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2022.html
ger21
 
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Re: UC400ETH- Mach3 Integration Issues

Postby atestani » Fri Mar 25, 2022 8:35 pm

Thanks, Gerry

I am working with Mach3 default screens to verify the same homing problem exists. I fixed the probing problem by setting the probe ball diameter which had somehow gotten set back to zero. The homing speeds, soft zones, and limits are all set up correctly

I did find an old thread from 2019 where the very same problem was occurring with a UC300ETH and it was a bug in the plugin.
https://www.forum.cncdrive.com/viewtopi ... =22&t=2308
Looks like the same bug may be back.

Initially, I had emailed Balazs at CNCdrive and responded to his request for XML files. I have not been able to reach him lately after our initial emails back and forth. I get an auto-reply that my email was received but no response after that.
atestani
 
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Re: UC400ETH- Mach3 Integration Issues

Postby atestani » Fri Mar 25, 2022 9:25 pm

I have it "working" but don't know what may be broken now.

I went to the CNCDrive site and downloaded the Mach3 plugin for the UC400ETH. Oddly, it is v1.019 but the latest version is 1.022 which I was using before. The homing is working now like it always did. In the process the firmware was set to v1.132 (don't know what it was before this downgrade).

Anyone know where the change logs are located? I would sure like to know the changes between 1.019 and 1.022 in both the plugin and firmware.

BTW, as far as I can tell MSM is working just fine
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