Ive been using gCodeSender and have loved it so far. Now I’m running into a problem. I have a Workbee running a 1.5 KW spindle. I have several gCode files that range from very simple to quite complicated. When I run then the program stops randomly with a message stating that an alarm has been triggered. If I restart the cut the program runs and stops again at a different location with the same message. I’ve run the same 3 minute program several times for over 30 minutes and it is driving me nuts. Any suggestions as to what may be going on?
Hi, the error code was for a limit switch activation even though the spindle was nowhere near the limit any switches. I looked at your help site and found that you recommend attaching a 0.1UF capacitor to the switches. I added a capacitor to the two switches that I thought were most likely to be the source of the problem (x,y). No luck. I have now disconnected the limit switches from the adruino breakout board and am running the gcode that I was having so much trouble with yesterday and all seems to be running smoothly so far. Its odd because I have had the limit switches in place since I built the machine and hadn’t had any problems of note. So I guess the limit switches have to go.
And the error was about the hard limits and not the soft limits?
Then, as it seems easy to reproduce the error, I would try to identify the not working switch and trying to get why it is not working…
Is the cable running side by side with the cable of your spindle?
Does is also happen when you move/bend the cable by hand?
Is there a lose connection to the terminal?
Could be nice to identify the problem and to share how to resolve it.
Just removing the switches should be the last option of all
So tracking down the problem was not as straight forward as it first appeared. I rewired and replaced all three limit switches taking care to make sure all connections were secure. No effect I still got the limit switch error icon that occurred randomly with movement in any direction seemingly triggering the alarm. I bought a new Arduino Nano breakout board as I thought maybe there was a problem with the connections on the board. This turned out to be a solution to the problem, but not what I had suspected. It turns out there was a lose ground connection on the x stepper motor controller output. I’m not sure why a lose connection on the output side would trigger a limit switch alarm in the software but apparently it does. I hope this will help anyone else who seems to have random limit switch problems.
