Tandem y axis for plasma table

Hey Guys,
I am new to linux, linuxCNC and PlasmaC. I have installed Debian 9 and have a 4 axis plasma machine built, but cannot figure out the configuration for the 7i96 it is installed but i have no idea what to put in for the configuration, i have been reading for hours how to set this up but there is little to no info on how to get this card running correctly. I am using 2 motors for the gantry they are longs 425oz and i have longs dm 542a drivers and then just a single motor for the y and z axis. I also have a Mesa THC A-D card i would like to figure out how to setup. I have tried to plug in some default values (and guesses) to see if i could jog, but when i try to open my application i created it wont open, it gives me hal errors. I know nothing about linux and this is frustrating, kinda wishing i would of went with Mach3 and not the Mesa setup. Any help here would be greatly appreciated.

We should be able to get you going. The good news in the last few days, the release version of Linuxcnc as been bumped up to V 2.8 so now Plasmac is part of the core distribution.

I think your best beat would be to start again. Visit the downloads page and Install the new ISO for Linuxcnc V 2.8 on Debian 10 Buster.
linuxcnc.org/downloads/

That will get you on a common supported platform so people will know what your environment is.

Then I would play around with the Simulations (sims) to get abit of an idea how Linuxcnc works.

You also need to check your latency at this time

The next step is to build a working config so that you can jog your axes and run simple gcode. Because you have a mesa card, the correct tool to use is pncconf which will be accessible from a menu somewhere (sorry I've not tried it out yet). YOu need to know about your micro stepping, and the mechanical details of each axis. Pncconf should let you test your motors and then it will save your config.

Once you get that far, its time to read the Plasma Primer and the Plasmac docs which are both available from the 2.8 docs.

Then run the PLasmac configurator. Sorry but it s so long since I've done this I might be a bit vague on the details but be sure to report back here and someone will help you out.



linuxcnc.org/docs/2.8/html/

It sounds like you've got a 3 axis (4 joint) machine.

I did a small write up on how I got my 5 joint machine running with a 7i96 and a thcad-10. I'm not an expert, some things are probably dated and/or wrong, but it's a starting point. The process for you will be about the same, some details like settings for your stepper motors will be different.

Base linuxcnc:
forum.v1engineering.com/t/lowrider2-plas...ild/13939/6?u=kd2018

Converting to Plasmac:
forum.v1engineering.com/t/lowrider2-plas...ld/13939/78?u=kd2018

Don't forget the Mint 19.3 ISO with the brand new shiny Linuxcnc v2.8.0 is available.

BeagleBrainz wrote:

Don't forget the Mint 19.3 ISO with the brand new shiny Linuxcnc v2.8.0 is available.

Yes. In my humble opinion it's the best out there

forum.linuxcnc.org/38-general-linuxcnc-q...int-19-3-iso?start=0

I came across your post late last night and this morning i am able to jog around the motors but how do i get settings correct? The axis scale calculations dont seem to work right, my motors are super slow i am running a 3:1 gear reduction with longs 23hs9430 steppers and dm542a drivers, i tried to adjust microstep multiplication factor to get the rpms to be the same as what a tach reads but i know this is not correct.

Who's post are you referring to?

It's great that you got movement, you're almost there! When you say they're slow, have you dialed up the jog speed with the speed slider in the interface?

As for calibration, I'm not the guy to tell you exactly how to calculate your settings.

But those who can help you will need to know how many steps/rev of stepper, microstrep settings, belt & pulley, rack & pinion, leadscrew, or ball screw, etc? And they'll need to know exactly the specs of those to calculate steps/unit.

If you wanna guess and check and do some quick calcs based off the error I can help you there probably not the right way to do it though...

Great you are moving!

I find its easier to calculate the steps per mm manually and update the STEP_SCALE settings for each joint in my ini file
See linuxcnc.org/docs/devel/html/config/ini-...t__lt_num_gt_section

I am having an issue with tandem setup for my y axis on my plasma table this is for my gantry. I can only get one of my motors to jog or home the other one isn't responding. I have checked the drive and stepper to make sure it worked by sending signal from the other y axis with the direction reversed and it works fine. I am using a mesa 7i96 card to and have set this up in pncconf although i am having no luck to get this to work, i am new to linux software also. I have included my .ini file for reference, thanks in advance for any help.

The main .hal file would be needed also to diagnose the problem