Hi All,
I have a strange issue with my 30x30. I’ve had it for over a year now and it’s been working fine. Last month I built a new table and moved the CNC to it about a week ago. When I connect everything up and jog the positions, the right side Y axis motor will sometimes turn in the wrong direction, or not at all. At first I thought I was loosing my mind, but to confirm, I jogged the mill to the back where both sides make the ‘grinding’ noise. Then, I jog it back again (using Gsender) and I can see the lead screw turning in the wrong direction…sometimes.
To troubleshoot, I updated Gsender, checked the dip switches, checked the tightness of the lead screw (seemed about same from left to right) and swapped the Y1/Y2 cables at the controller. The problem seemed to stay the same, so I suspect a bad stepper motor? The last thing I checked was the motor itself by uncoupling it from the lead screw, electrically disconnecting the left side motor, and watching the right side motor when I jogged from Gsender…the problem seems the same. This leads me to believe that the problem is not mechanical.
One thing different on the new table is the way I ran the wiring, I put a piece of panduit on the back and side, running all the motor wires through it. At one point I had the power supply output wires (low voltage) in there too. I’ve taken the power supply wiring out just in case it’s a case of electrical interference. The 120V wiring is under the table and not really near the same channel.
Can anyone thing of anything else that could be causing this? What I find so puzzling is that it was working fine on the old table. Now I’ve got some customer work waiting while I troubleshoot this. On the plus side, I can’t wait to start using the t-track for work holding (the reason I built a new table).
Thanks!