Re: Camtronics/Gecko troubleshooting

Monte,

What you are saying is correct, without the Arm pins connected there
is no power to the motors and with the encoder connected as you
describe the Fault LED should turn on if you manually turn the shaft.

As you are limited to a Multi meter, there aren't a lot of tests you
can make. One thing you can do is check power is actually arriving
at the encoder, I presume you are using the 600oz" motors from Dan.
The two loops at the end of the encoder connector are gnd and +5.
Make sure that you have power there. If so, you might find a Tandy
open, so buy a 470 ohm resistor and LED and check for pulses on the
Phase A & B pins while you spin the motor.

Hope this helps.

Bernard

--- In CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO@yahoogroups.com, "Monte Westlund
<montejw@e...>" <montejw@e...> wrote:

> I've built up a controller from Camtronics with Gecko 320 drivers,
> and servo motors. I'm trying to get it running. Or at least get one
> axis running. I was trying Mach1 and thought I had a problem with
> the program so I started a big thread on the Master5 group. That
> seems OT there so I'm here now. I've seen some familiar names on
> both boards so I hope that those that were there might follow it
> here. Thanks.
>
> There is a jumper between term 5 and term 7, enc- to enc-, enc+ to
> enc+,
> phase a to phase a and phase b to phase b. Power and ground are

also

> hooked up. I removed everything else, including the 5v from the
> computer, arm- and arm+. I power on, the fault light comes on and
> goes off after a sec or 2 as it should, motor does nothing. I
> haven't taken the cover off the driver to measure voltage across

the

> test points, maybe I should. At any rate it seems that if things
> (encoder?) are working right I should be able to turn the motor
> shaft (arm- and arm+ are not hooked up) and get the fault light to
> come back on because the voltage is supposed to drop or increase by
> 0.04 volts for each encoder count and it eventually faults out when
> the voltage goes above 9.6 or below 0.4. It's a 4.6 volt increase

or

> decrease from the 5v it's suppose to start at. It changes 0.04v per
> count and the encoder is supposed to be a 250 cpr so one revolution
> of the shaft should cause it to fault out. I've turned the shaft
> several turns in one direction and nothing happens.
>
> Lets assume that I've taken the cover off (I will after I clean off
> all the heat sink goop) and I'm measuring this voltage and it's not
> dropping or increasing. What would I need to do? Is there something
> wrong with the encoder? The gecko instructions don't say anything
> about how to troubleshoot the encoder or anything about what would
> be happening if this voltage isn't doing anything. I do have 5v
> across enc- and enc+.
>
> Here is something else: When I first jumped term 5 and 7 I still

had

> arm+, arm-, and the 5v from the computer hooked up, I have removed
> the Eng/Diseng switch. When I powered on the Fault light would

light

> for a couple sec, go out and the motor would start up.
>
> TIA,
> Monte