Mesa 7i95T spindle step/Direction setup using stepgen

Hi All,

As the title suggests i have the Mesa 7i95T, I am wanting to use a AC servo as a spindle motor. 

I am on version 2.9.2
I have the servo wired up correctly, i have validated this by plugging it into the Z axis socked and i get movement. The problem is that non of the configuration tools supports stepgen for the spindle only PWM, I have tried all the tricks i can find online to get this to work, like setting up for a different card then copy and pasting to my config but nothing works. no movement of the spindle.

I have attached my HAL and ini files if someone could kindly have a look.

I know pncconf does support step/dir spindles (but not the 7I95/7I95T)

You might use pncconf to create a say 7I96s configuration with a step/dir spindle
and steal the hal/ini spindle bits from that.
 

Thanks for the reply.

I have tried that already, and no joy, wasn't sure if it was a incorrect setting in my configs

As a first step try this:

[SPINDLE_0]
MAX_VELOCITY = 100.0
MAX_ACCELERATION = 300.0
# The values below should be 25% larger than MAX_VELOCITY and MAX_ACCELERATION
# If using BACKLASH compensation STEPGEN_MAXACCEL should be 100% larger.
STEPGEN_MAX_VEL = 125.00
STEPGEN_MAX_ACC = 375.00
P = 0
I = 0
D = 0
FF0 = 1
FF1 = 0
FF2 = 0
BIAS = 0
DEADBAND = 0.001
MAX_OUTPUT = 2000

Never mind, the PID stuff is all side stepped by:

net machine-is-on => hm2_[MESA](BOARD).0.stepgen.03.enable
net spindle-vel-cmd-rps => hm2_[MESA](BOARD).0.stepgen.03.velocity-cmd
net spindle-vel-fb-rps <= hm2_[MESA](BOARD).0.stepgen.03.velocity-fb

But it looks like machine-is-on is not connected, it probably should be something like:

net machine-is-on  <=motion.motion-enabled
 

Hi, Sternfox.

Did you manage to create a working hal and ini file ?

It would be possible for you to attach it ?

Hello. I have a lathe with a spindle on a servo motor and step/dir control and feedback via the encoder of the same drive on 7i96s. Everything works well. I also have an unfinished project on 7i97, where the spindle still works in an analog way. Step/dir is also planned. I can send the working files of the lathe.

does it work now?

Lathe with Step/dir spindle.