A Few Questions

 I believe that I'm going to go with the 7I96S and possibly a 7I84. When adding the 7I84 I'm assuming that I just need a standard ethernet switch and assign an IP address?

 The servo drives are GV-U3E and the stepper drives are GT-L5. Are the servos better to use if a person has them rather than the steppers?

   Again, thanks and bear with me I'm an old school machinist and have a little understanding of controls. I'll try not to ask too many silly questions and pester you all too much.

tommylight wrote:

Yes i do.

 

I'll get started on something low-level and post it tomorrow.  Thanks for your vote of confidence.

JuniorC wrote:

 I believe that I'm going to go with the 7I96S and possibly a 7I84. When adding the 7I84 I'm assuming that I just need a standard ethernet switch and assign an IP address?

 The servo drives are GV-U3E and the stepper drives are GT-L5. Are the servos better to use if a person has them rather than the steppers?

   Again, thanks and bear with me I'm an old school machinist and have a little understanding of controls. I'll try not to ask too many silly questions and pester you all too much.
 

1 - you don't need an ethernet switch for the 7i84.  Mesa Smart Serial boards use ethernet cables, but it's not 'ethernet'.  Don't ask me for the details, that stuff is gibberish to me... You just need an ethernet cable and you'll chop off one end.  The bare leads are then connected to the 7i96s terminals and the RJ45 end is plugged in to the 7i84.

2. You will need to choose between a 7i84 and a 7i84D.  The "D" has sinking output, and no-"D" has sourcing outputs.  Your drives, sensors, and other IO hardware will determine which model you should use.  The 7i96s has IO that can handle sinking/sourcing.  If you don't understand sinking/sourcing and need help, search the forum and see if you can work it out.  Then check back and ask for help confiming you've got it straight.

3. Good news on the drives.  Steppers will be easier to set up, servos will very likely have better performance after (potentially annoying) tuning. 

Do you have motors to go with the drives?  If you've already got some Parker BE's or other nice servos I'd say go servo as the GV's are pretty much set up (all the motor specifications are available in the Parker software).  If you have other Mfgr motors you're in for a treat making your own encoder adapter cables.

Last issue with those drives... Parker's software is really old.  You might need a Win7 or WinXP computer to run it.  A virtual machine might work but I haven't tried that.

4. This forum is littered with my silly questions.  Best advice I can offer is to read as much as you can - forum, LCNC manual, ect.  It will eventually start sinking in.

The 7i96s itself uses ethernet to connect to the PC. You can't use an ethernet switch for this, it needs to go straight to the dedicated ethernet port on the PC as switches cause latency issues.

The RJ45 connector on the 7i84 is not ethernet, it's RS422. This is similar to the way VFDs use an RJ45 for modbus RS485, it's just a convenient connector for a common cable. As Spumco said, the SmartSerial RS422 connector on the 7i96s side is not an RJ45, its a screw terminal block so you wire that side of the cable in as per the manual.

I'm pretty sure I'm fairly clear on sink and source. Sink is a positive input PNP and source is negative input NPN. Please correct me if I'm wrong. I have not purchased any proxs or switches, so I'll probably go with 7I84 unless there's a plus in a sink setup.

I have a few SM232AE and a couple CM232AE. I have and old laptop with Windows XP Pro that has the parker software loaded. I have plugged it into a gemini gt and it seems to work correctly. Fair as the Parker software.

Blazini36, thanks for the info on the RJ45 connectors. I've downloaded both manuals, I'll do some reading.

Thanks again.

Sink/source is for the outputs.  All the inputs on the 7i84 or 7i84D are sinking inputs, so PNP sensors work with no fiddling, and NPN require additional work.

A sourcing output supplies voltage to the external component's input.  A sinking output grounds the external component's input.  See page 9 of the 7i84 manual.

For dumb external components like LED's or relays, either output type can be used assuming the Mesa's sourcing output voltage matches the component.  This is why (I'm guessing), the 7i84 can be set up with two different output voltage banks.  You can source, for example, 12v to 8 components, and 24v to 8 other components.  Or one voltage for everything.  If you have components requiring three different voltages (maybe throw in a 5v dingus), you'll have to use a relay or similar to supply the 3rd voltage.

Where sink/source really matters is when you have to connect to a drive or PLC which requires one or the other type of output.

Lets say you want to send an enable signal to a servo drive.  If the drive has sinking inputs, you need to use sourcing outputs on the Mesa.  The reverse is also true: sourcing inputs on the external component, you need sinking inputs on the Mesa.

You can 'flip' the signal by using a relay or optocoupler (Mesa output triggers relay, relay triggers component input), but that adds extra cost, components, and wiring.

Your GV drive has an enable input that need to be tied to ground to activate - i.e. sourcing.  The other three inputs can be switched from sourcing (default) to sinking.  You could use a 7i84 (no-D) and a relay to connect GV-enable to ground, and set the other inputs to sinking.

Or you could use a 7i84D and sink the GV-enable - plus the other inputs - with no additional hardware/wiring.

There's no end to the rabbit-holes, is there?

I've once upon a time made an idiot of myself talking about sink/source. The best way to talk about it is to say source=positive, sink=negative,

The gotcha is that a sourcing output provides positive voltage to a sinking input, a sinking output provides ground to a sourced input. It's always better to just say PNP or NPN whether it's actually correct or not because you can refer to both sides as the same thing

Sounds like I was a little turned around on the input vs the output in relationship when sinking or sourcing. Thanks, guys, for lining this dumb old country boy out. Greatly appreciated!!! I'll get the 7I84D instead.