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My machine is self designed/built, 3 axis wood router. 2.2kW spindle, conventional steppers, LinuxCNC 2.9something, LMDE6.
G540 motor driver at 48V, software stepping with parallel port(s).

My estop circuit is really simple, there is a NC emergency stop switch with a 5k pullup. For the past couple of months, estop has been randomly triggered with no cause I've been able to find. It could happen in 10 seconds after motion enable, it could run for an hour before being triggered. I can enable LinuxCNC and watch it, 10 seconds to 10 minutes (i.e. random) and it will go into estop, with the motors powered (locked) but not moving.

Estop randomly triggering will only happen when either at least one motor is connected to the g540, or a heavy resistive load (15 Ohms, 2x across where the stepper coils would be). With no load on the g540 estop will stay off. I have looked at the power supply voltages, they are fine during an estop event (using a DVM, not looking for a transient with a scope).

The machine has been working fine before this. The only things I can think of that I've done to the setup:
1. Fried one of the outputs on the motherboard parallel port. Now I have 3 parallel ports, two PCI cards and the motherboard. I'm only using the two PCI cards, but the motherboard parallel is still visible to the system.
2. Replaced the estop cable (!) with nicer wire.

What I've tried:
1. Replaced the estop cable again. I realized that the first replacement was no longer twisted pair. I replaced it again with shielded cable, shield connected at the box containing the g540 and power supplies. Interference seems unlikely since the switch is a short.
2. Cleaned the switch contacts, which didn't help. Jumpered the switch, which didn't help.
3. Removed the C10 breakout board. One parallel port goes directly to the g540, the other went to the C10. There were only two switches connected to the C10, the estop (!) and the electrical touch probe, I just hardwired them to the parallel port. Appeared to greatly improve the problem (a lot longer between estops), but now it's back to 10 sec - 10 min.
4. Greatly improved cooling on the g540.

I don't really see how the g540 can be causing this estop problem. The only estop connection to the g540 is estop OUT from the computer. Symptoms, however, seem like the g540 has something to do with it. I did check the 48V is rock steady through an estop. Note that the g540 stays powered up (motors still powered) when an estop happens. I can reset the estop and it will be fine again for 10 sec 10 min. This doesn't sound like a thermal problem.

Any advice?
Thanks, Steve

 

I have a turning application that's better suited towards a constant RPM on the rotary. I have my A axis functioning fine right now with position control.

I'd love to be able to just issue a M3 S1000 $1 instead of playing with the inverse time mode approaches.

I've searched the forum and tried several things without luck. Honestly, anything HAL related is an instant headache nightmare for me. Believe it or not, I'm an embedded programmer and did ladder logic in college, but the HAL stuff just does NOT click for me. I'd be willing to pay for someone's time to figure this out for me. I have a project for my church that is way behind.

I'm using Probe Basic for the GUI. I'd be willing to give up some GUI control as long as I can issue gcode commands.

Attached are my current INI and primary HAL.

Tried: 
- Changing control_type from 1 to 0, but had no idea what else to do
- Considered the rosekins but that doesn't really apply to my needs

Other forum posts I've read:
-  C Axis as Second Spindle - LinuxCNC
-  Using A axis as second spindle with stepper motor - LinuxCNC
-  Lathe spindle question turning and milling. - LinuxCNC

Thank you.

Coming back to my CNC wood router after a good year off (controller PC hard drive died and I got busy renovating my house). I have a new hard drive, doubled the memory (16G), fresh and latest install downloaded last week from here (linuxcnc.org) and I have everything back 'moving and stopping'... except the spindle.

I have an old TB6560 3-axis, chinese controller board (Wantai) driven from my parallel port. It has the outputs for the 3 axes (yes - that is plural for axis - I looked it up) and a spindle on/off control output that I use to control a relay that switches the 120VAC to the Dewalt router.

Back in the 'old days' (when this system worked), there was a section just below the jog/home/tool touchoff buttons where I could turn the spindle on and off. It's not there any more. I've been trying to use Google Gemini and ChatGPT for help (and they are surprisingly helpful if the question is worded well), but I'm just not getting it to work.

I'm using steppers and configured my pins using StepConf. I set the pin for the spindle as parallel port pin 9. But I'm not seeing a [SPINDLE] section in the .ini file nor am I seeing any spindle references in the .HAL file. I can't control the spindle speed (it's a router), only whether it's on or off.

Anyone out there with a good idea of where to start?

Thanks
Arden