Greenie problems configuring 6i25 with 7i77, using Granite Devices VSD-E drives

Ah! Of course! That pesky negative z axis. I looked at that and got my home switch correctly, etc, but I wasn't thinking that the travel limit would be negative too. Good catch. Thank you.

I will be attaching my tuning plots at some point. I can't get them as clean as the one in the tuning directions. I'm not sure what is "good enough" and what is indicative of poor tuning within the amp itself. Frankly, tuning is the biggest single unknown for me.

Anyhow, I can jog at 60IPM and my 1000 encoder stops about 3 or 4 counts in (so 3 of 4000), which feels like it is probably pretty good (?). I think I'll work on the X and Y axis pretty soon. Z was the safest, for obvious reasons.

One sad thing is that I think my spindle VFD got fried for some reason and I have no idea how. It is possible that it got -10V before I had it configured properly but I'm not sure. All I know is that it has power to it and it looks dead as a doornail. Sigh. 3HP VFDs have dropped a lot in price, though, so hopefully I can get a new one without too much pain.

Yeah, I haven't given up the ghost yet on it. I agree that the concept of a VFD is pretty simple, and I also agree that an input signal problem shouldn't cause a major problem. That is part of the curiosity though. It is completely dead. For all practical purposes, aside from the capacitor charged warning LED, you'd never know it was even hooked to the mains. No LEDs, nothing. That reeks of an internal fuse, but if I can't find one, then it could be that something is truly turned out (but I have no acrid smoke smell that is tell-tale of such events).

I have to do a little more research on it. As my axis home stuff is moving along well, I'll probably look at the VFD before I finish with the axis. The reason is that there will be a lead time if I decide my current unit really is toast.

Alan

Well, I took the VFD apart and I didn't have any luck. It is all conformal coated and I couldn't find any indication of damage to the board or components thereon. Because the display and logic side of things are all low voltage, I looked for a regulator with the hope that it might be bad. I know it is there someplace, or a SMPS, but I didn't see any likely candidates. I also could not find any fuses. Sometimes these can be a little harder to find, but I checked both the components and the legends; I found nothing that was of particular interest.

I think this is one VFD that has flown the coop.

I'll take a look this evening. This is a GE AF300 (E$, I believe, but I'm at work right now so I cannot confirm) 3HP unit. It is very similar, if not identical to this (edit: well, no... this is a 380V unit and I'm running 220V single phase input):

www.ebay.com/itm/Ge-Fuji-6KAF343003E-A1-...5738.m4383.l4275.c10

I'm not sure when it died on me because it is in a different cabinet. Internally there are several boards. The capacitor one is a no brainer. Then there are two control boards, each of which have components on both sides. The boards are stacked (no surprise there) with pins connecting them. The rear board has the large SCRs and a transformer on the rear. That is probably where the SMPS is located. I'll investigate that a little more carefully.

Alan

I only had a limited amount of time last night to pull the VFD apart. Definitely no high voltage regulator. There are two transformers, one very small (maybe 10mm square) that has a primary and a secondary. The second one is about 30mm square and has a plethora of windings on it. Everything is conformal coated so it is fairly difficult to work on. Given that I don't have any indication that the drive "on", however, I am thinking that something is amiss with the SMPS. I'd expect the display to come on otherwise.

I've been running this in a phase converter mode previously. The machine was an operable Hurco when I yanked the control out of it, but then it sat for a few years. I don't really see a failure case that I could have introduced that would screw up the SMPS, so I'm thinking my present state is just bad luck/timing. Working with a full VFD in a disassembled state will be difficult, especially since the PS is on the backside of everything. I think I'll try a few quick things.

1. With it fully assembled, I will try a full 3 phase input power. If it suddenly works, then I know that one of the input diodes is a problem and I can just work through which one (or check it with a voltmeter)... Hmmm, probably easier to do that right now without any power!
2. If there is no love there, I can just work with the power board briefly and see if I can trace down where in the SMPS I have a faulty component

I don't know how long I want to spend on this though as it is a detractor of precious time and I don't want to become side-tracked. I can always buy a Huanyang 2.2kw VFD for about $130 and be done with it. From what I understand, this is a little better now if you can figure out the Chinglish manual. I know everything is made in China now, but it isn't all made equally. I'm a little leery of buying the lowest priced 2.2kw VFD off of ebay when the description is not even very readable. I'm no fool, though. I know all the VFDs, even those from AB, are made in China. But most western brands do a decent job of QC validation to ensure the stuff is decently made. I've got a whole lot more concern about stuff made for a Chinese company. Been there, done that and very often with poor results.

So, we'll see... I'm a bit nervous about the Huanyang but maybe it is worth a shot....