I wrote a long (hopefully correct explanation of how offsets and sensors worked, over in the general questions -> Where should linux cnc tool offsets be stored? thread forum.linuxcnc.org/38-general-linuxcnc-q...ets-be-stored#342300
That may help. If not, it may help you ask more specific questions

Hi all,
Hope you are doing well! I'm trying to implement a status bar using a LED strip (WS2813 RGB LED - Grove) and an Arduino (uno or nano). I wanted to connect the arduino through serial communication directly to the a MESA 7i95T board, to send some string commands to the Arduino to control the LED strip behaviour.

Is it possible to do so? Can I just connect the Arduino to one of the two RS422/485 interfaces of the board? Do I need a specific firmware for the board? In case yes, my setup also includes a MESA 7i87 for reading some sensors.

Thanks,
Best,

Amedeo

Hey everyone,

we are making progress. All axis work, limit switches work, spindle works (ish) and remote works now.
We are using QTdragon as interface.

Coming from CNCGraf my biggest question right now is: Probing.
For most cutting operations that I do, i just need to go to a position and place the Z0. The top surface of stock, since I am either driving into the material or through the material.
Now it is all totally different in setup.

My normal workflow was that I am using the tool-length sensor for three operations.

First i had to calibrate the tool length sensor. The value (lets say 22.2mm) was stored as variable. For first setup i had to measure the table dimensions with this as well.
Normal Process then would be:
I am putting in the tool, measure the the tool length, place the same sensor then on top of my stock and on top of the scrificial plate. Then I am measuring again and set the Z0 (I think this is a relative value or workspace coordinate, not a machine coordinate) add the 22.2mm of the tool length (automatically) and this will then give me perfect Z-0 and Zheight of my work piece or stock.

How is it done in linuxCNC? How do you calibrate the sensor?

I see — if you want to explore EtherCAT and your machine already has absolute servos (including the tool changer magazine), that’s a perfectly valid reason to go that way.

Just be aware that you’re moving from a very KISS, well-understood Mesa setup into more of a “welcome to the jungle” zone: more knobs to turn, more things that can affect determinism (NIC, kernel, DC config, drive modes, etc.), and more commissioning work before you get the same level of predictability.

Coming from Mechatrolink, where a lot of this is implicit in the controller, with PC-based EtherCAT it looks like you first have to make these fundamentals explicit (DC, cycle stability, NIC behavior, jitter) before worrying about pushing the servo thread frequency.

A lot of people on the forum are still exploring this space too, so expect some iteration and experimentation along the way. And those who are really “in the trenches” with EtherCAT on LinuxCNC can probably give you much more concrete numbers and practical advice.

Please specify what you mean by idle. Is this with LinuxCNC running or one of the other programs polling the pendant?

I left the pendant connected last night directly to the xhc-whb04b-6 component, and now some 15 hours later there still hasn't been a single disconnect.

Hi Meschde,

ich habe meine CNC Portalfräse auf MESA Karte umgebaut. Quasi neue CNC gebaut .
Vorher war es eine alpha version von CNC Graf.
Die Oberflächen und Prozesse sind schon extrem anders...

ABER genau was du beschreibst war vorher mein Arbeitsprozess.
Wenn ich z.B. Karbonplatten schneide: Homing XYZ. Dann Werkzeuglänge messen auf dem Werkzeuglängensensor. Dann nehme ich den selben Sensor und legen ihn auf das Material. Dort messe ich dann Z0. In CNCGraf war die Schalthöhe des Sensors hinterlegt und zieht bzw. addiert diese zur neuen Z0 Koordinate.
Hat perfekt funktioniert.

in Linux CNC QT Dragon bin ich am verzweifeln. ... Wie lässt sich das hier abbilden? Kennt es nur die 3D Probe?

@Derriell
Warum möchtest du den Fräsmotor ersetzen? Fehlt es dir an Leistung? Was hast du schon alles mit der AMB gemacht?

@Plasmanfm
Bitte korrigiere mich, wenn ich was Falsches sage.
Letztendlich ist ein Sprung von 1,4 zu 2,2KW erst einmal „nur“ die Möglichkeit schneller bzw. mehr Material / Zeit abzunehmen.
Was ich gehört habe ist, dass die Effizienz bei HF-Spindeln größer ist. Also was am Fräser noch ankommt.
Man kann natürlich z.B. eine Spinology auf seine CNC-Fräse schrauben.
In meinem Fall wäre das aber Unverhältnismäßig!Zur Erklärung… Ich baue mir gerade ein „Endchen“ (also die Fräse, die Sebastian End auf YouTube vorgestellt hat). Nur alles etwas kleiner. Also keine Servos, 60er statt 80er Profile und kein ATC.
Das alles aber so genau, wie ich es mit meinen Möglichkeiten hinbekomme.
Die ist aber halt eine Hobby-CNC.

I'm trying ethercat for a new machine. It makes sense to go with ethercat because it originally had absolute servos for all axis and for the tool changer magazine. If I'm running a mesa setup i need to get the absolute encoder reading at the start via modbus.

I've been running Linuxcnc for a ling time for 3 of my machines. Also like to play with ethercat as it's more interesting.

I've seen a video of ethercat running at 8kz servo thread but also found out that some Ethernet ports do not support that due to power saving Ethernet stuff.

Running a faster servi thread might solve most of these issues i guess?

Ok es wird Birnen mit Äpfel verglichen das eine sind 1,4 das andere sind 2,2 bzw 3,5 Kw was die für Drehmoment haben sagt keiner und
was an Leistung am Fräser an kommt auch nicht .
Des weiteren ist alles was aus C kommt nicht berauschend.
Wenn man was gutes will muss man Industrie Produkte kaufen oder erheblich Abstriche machen.

Gruß
Juergen

I am getting out of ideas.

It's a new computer so if you haven't done so already, you can check overall latency with and make sure the min and max are below +- 20 microseconds or so.

If that doesn't give anything I think you should go back to the working setup you had
with a laptop. If I understood right that setup worked, with the Realtek dkms driver.
Follow your own notes in this thread.

Ethercat master is always distributed as a package separate from linuxcnc due to licensing constraints.
So there is no better or worse linuxcnc version, they are all the same what concerns ethercat and locally compiled master.

Rod you should check out the new V8 Sheetcam. Increased license price, no linux version,
marginal support, company sold and lead developer left the ship (if I understood right).

Anyway, I do most prototypes, one-offs of everything. Sometimes 2 or maybe even 10 but not more. And never again.
I find the Conversational tools to work well, but could be expanded upon.
I already have G-code when it enters QtPlasmaC.
Nesting of several G-code files would be very helpful. Positioning, rotation. Some tools exists in Conversational.
Interactive positioning would be nice. Moving lead-in positions would be nice, but I see the problem.
Very rarely, if ever, I go via dxf and Sheetcam.

Thank you so much, Mr Hakan.
I set udev rule, and then I don't need to type "chmod 666 /dev/EtherCAT0" anymore to exec LinuxCNC.

I'm using  PC,  HP Elite800 G4 which have Intel NIC , And I clean installed for 3 times. (In BIOS I disabled SecureBoot )

But all results was same.
Ethercat is unstable. (Alarm A12 flicking,  I can't do anything.  But I could reset if A12 happend before with EoE disabled master, and I could Jog, Run GCode with Yaskawa servo with DELL OLD PC)

I have attached dmesg file.

By the way, which LinuxCNC version (iso?) are good for EtherCAT( Especially DisablingEOE) ?


 

Interesting, a lot of output there.
I was just about the write that it must be the connection to linuxcnc, hal that's the problem.
Then I noticed that it disconnects when I turn the wheel. Almost always, when idle.
You have that too?

If your current Mesa setup already delivers stable rigid tapping, and you’re not confident you can guarantee the same margin of performance and robustness with EtherCAT, then from an engineering and risk standpoint there’s no strong reason to change.

EtherCAT can certainly work and can reach high performance, but it requires more integration effort, tuning, and understanding of the drives and control cycle to achieve the same level of determinism you already have with Mesa.

If the goal is simply to get “the same performance” you already have, the change becomes technical risk without a clear benefit. In that case, the most conservative and rational decision is to stay with Mesa.

Moving to EtherCAT only really makes sense if there is a clear advantage (architecture, cabling, drive availability, industrial standardization, etc.) and you’re willing to invest the time needed for commissioning and tuning to extract the same level of performance.