Rotary issues, I’ve solved with a convoluted workaround, but not actually solved.
The specifications are: RD 6445-S controller, v.26.01.19 firmware, RDWorks v.8.01.60. (at the moment, Lightburn is not in question- the LAN lead is also not connecting, for reasons I can’t figure)
Rotary (3phase) with wheels/rollers.
I bought the 6445-S controller a year ago, because it could supposedly control a rotary from the U plug of the controller, without Y needing to be disconnected… A great idea. before that we’d had the RDC 6442-S for 4 years.
I bought a separate drive, just for U. Wired it up to an aviation socket in the laser frame bed, wired it to the 6445 controller, and power.
Then that’s where it sat till yesterday, when I wanted to get it working, and calibrated. I’d downloaded some pages of info on that, but it all was no help. These Lightburn forums have much info, but no post was able to solve the issue, and for reasons I cannot fathom, the LAN port is not working, so for the last year I’ve painfully copied U-files to a USB stick, and plugged that in the controller, and fetched the files from there, deleting them shortly afterwards. You get used to it. (The PC is about 45 ft from the controller, so USB is not ideal)
The 26.01.19 firmware in the 6445-S is supposed to be ok.
RDW version 8.01.60 - I went into the list and selected 6445S as the model. I’ve been using it ok for the last year, no problems.
I created a file of width equal to the circumference of a cup, rotated it 90degrees clockwise, then, after setting the User parameters as rotary [on], Rotating axis [U], diameter 71mm, and the steps Ieft with the 1000 suggested, I checked rotary axis = U (not Y), and for now, I set origin as dead centre in the file, and saved it to send to the controller via a USB memory stick.
I plugged the rotary into the aviation socket. Used Z- key to lower the bed. Pressed U+ & - keys and the rotary moves back and forth with the console keys.
I went into console user settings, enabled rotary [yes], 10 000 steps per rotation for now, (write), went into vendor settings , checked motor, U out, but left it alone, but I disabled Y search for home upon bootup (to avoid possible frame slop issues)
The file opens up looking normal in the console, but when I pressed [frame], Y moves just as much as X, and U does not rotate at all.
I spend the next hour trying to figure things out. IN the end the ONLY way I got it to work was to unplug the green Y axis drive plug from the RD controller, and plug the green U drive plug into where Y was.
Then I needed to calibrate the steps per mm or per rotation, and after much trying, I set in the User settings, 10102.26 steps per rotation as pretty darned accurate, and in Vendor settings, for U motor, 6.929063 steps per micro-meter. (except the U figures are not happening, because the rotary is now plugged into the Y output from the controller.)
However, the file was flipped- a mirror image. Nothing I did would alter that. I changed U positive to U negative in vendor settings. No change. Finally I went into vendor settings for Y, and changed Y direction from negative, to positive.
That fixed it, and I could now laser a file and have it land on the rotary the way I set it up on the PC.
BUT, it’s a half-hearted joke of a process, because it is not using the U socket of the controller, but the Y socket, and the whole idea was to NOT have to unplug Y while using U/rotary.
Otherwise you have to remember to swap Y back to negative direction, and turn off rotary, and allow Y to home, before sending a normal file again.
What surprised me was every time I rebooted RD Works, it had forgotten ALL the user rotary settings, both diameter and steps per rotation, in the User menu.
Also It seemed to make little difference on the PC what they said, numerically. I edited the steps per rotation (on the PC), quite a bit, for zero difference in the lasered product…
The only places things changed were the U axis calibration in vendor settings, and User rotary steps per rev. on the console.
yet the console was not using the U output - once I unplugged the Y plug and put it in the Y socket, then the U + and - keys failed to do anything, but the Y keys made it rotate.
I am totally stumped as to how to get the controller to send the rotary instructions to the U part of the controller. Having to use the Y socket defeats the reason I bought the 6445 in the first place.
I’d love to hear from anyone who’s been here and solved it, thanks!
I could not find a newer firmware file to update from 26.01.19, in case that was the problem.
I did check the [use U for rotary] in User settings. What more could I do? There’s a “use rotary” option to check in layer parameters,-advanced- but that seemed irrelevant. I mean checking or unchecking it, did nothing different from the other.
The rotary works- but only after I set Y to operate in reverse in vendor settings, and use the Y socket to control the U drive.
It’s all a bit exasperating… as well as the time wasted/spent trying to see what edits have no effect, and what ones do.
(I’d just like to have it working the way it is supposed to. I got the 6445-S from Cloudray.) I read here the firmware version 26.01.13 works with U, but I could not find it to download, and backwards-apply - if that’s safe. I could not even find the 26.01.19 version that’s currently on it, as a download.
Thanks for any suggestions!
