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jhandel wrote:

Howdy all,
     I am working out the high level architecture (and ordering) for a Ethercat retrofit of my CNC Mill ( its VFD is dying and its as good an excuse as any to re work may decisions I made on it when I converted it to LinuxCNC the first time).. 

Anyways, I am looking at the MPG and realizing that I have open IO pins on my pi (like all of them).

So here is my current "plan" for I/O which I would love feedback on 

1x EK1100 - Ethercat to FieldBus coupler
2x EL1819  - 16 inputs (I need 28 so 2 it is) - (the response time is killer vs the EL1809)
1x EL2819 - 16 output (need 11 so that works)
1x EL5151 - Encoder for the MPG  <-- this is where I would love feedback because this guy is $250 used

The really open question is what risks on integration and general PITA am I facing if I use my Pi's IO pins to handle MPG encoder rather than the spendy EL5151. 

I plan to use either Leadshine or Innovance mult-turn servos for all of my motors and spindle so my only current known need for an encoder is the MPG...  This is less a question of "can I mix Ethercat with Pi IO pins" and more a question of "should I"... Am I setting myself up for sparks and pain getting the realtime thread where the Pi IO will come in syncing with the rest of the system that is all running on the Server Thread? 

To that end, should I be using other parts of the Pi's IO for emergency stuff like e-stop? 

Thanks in advance. 

The pierce delay starts from when qtplasmac gets an ArcOK signal signifying that arc transfer has occurred. If your synthesized arcOK is off, you will have problems.

Do yourself a favour and wire in the machine's arcOK signal. The time you will save stuffing around trying to get a synthesized arcOK working will more than cover the time you will spend wiring it in properly.