3rd stepgen not working on 5i20/7i47/7i31 combo

Looks like we're not, and it's my fault

After close inspection tonight, I found out that I do not, in fact, have a 7i47 card. I have a 7i47S card.

I think at some point I had assumed that since there was no choice for 7i47S in pncconf, that the 7i47 file must be "close enough". Obviously this isn't the case.

Looking at my firmware dirs, I don't see any file specific to the 7i47S. What should I be using for this board? Can I even use it with the 5i20?

Thanks,
Erik

PS: I did check the cables tonight before noticing this. FWIW, they're just fine

With a few exceptions, almost any daughtercard or set
of daughtercards will work with any of our FPGA cards.

freeby.mesanet.com/5i20-svst1_4.zip

Has pin and bit files for a 5I20
4 stepgen + 4 encoder config for the 7I47S,
plus the PWM on the proper pins for the spindle analog out.

Thanks!

I'll give this a try tonight. I'm guessing if I install it in the right location, pncconf will see it? Or do I need to configure it by hand?

I'm also going to decide today on a 5i25+7i77 combo or a 7i80HD for my next project. Is the 7i80HD supported in the newer builds of linuxcnc?

Thanks again,
Erik

You should be able to use hal/ini file created by pncconf for the 7I47 on the 7I47S with some minor patching

The 7I80DB and 7I80HD are not supported yet so I would choose the 5I25/6I25 and 7I77 for a current project

Okay, I used pncconf to create a basic hal/ini combo, then edited them to set the BIT file to the one you posted. I can now use the third stepgen

As I'm trying out other things like VFD control, I find myself re-running pncconf to eg. add a pwm output and then re-editing these files again. Is there a version of pncconf that recognizes and supports the 7i47S, or should I just plan on editing by hand from now on and skip using pncconf any more?

Also, for the file you posted here, if I enable a pwmgen on pin 39 of the 5i20 (on the connector attached to the 7i47S), it looks like it will map the pwmgen automatically to the analog outputs, correct? If I then set up 33-37 as gpio outputs, they'll show up on the opto coupled outputs on the 7i47S, right?

I'm quite excited that this is working

Thanks,
Erik

PS: I really like the idea of using a 7i80 in the future so my control PC can be away from the CNC machine. I can probably wait a couple months and see if support is in place then?

If you enable the PWMGen it will assign pins 35, 37 and 39 (GPIO 17,18.19) to PWM pins
ENA/DIR/PWM respectively (and GPIO pins 17,18,19 will disappear)

This means you now can control the analog output with the PWM ena signal and the PWM value.
The sign of the PWM value sets the dir signal. Note that the PWM signal is active low so the invert_output attribute needs to be set for GPIO bit 19

Pin 33 (GPIO16) is not part of the PWMgen hardware so remains a GPIO bit

Even simpler than I thought

Thanks much,
Erik

Forgot to say PWM frequency should be about 5KHz for the 7i47S

If higher , linearity will suffer (its close to 0.5% at 5 KHz),
if lower there will be more ripple

Hmm.. I got that right, anyway. Set it to 5khz.

It looks like it's put the 3rd stepgen on pin 33 and 35 though, so the pwm is showing up elsewhere, and I'm guessing that won't work?

I'll attach my config files again... ignore the duplicate enable/direction pins on the second connector. I decided to use GPIOs instead of the PWM/ENA/DIR combo for control because it's easier to wire to my VFD that way. I'm just using the pot emulating analog outputs for speed control. Thinking it over, it would probably be easier to control my VFD using a +/-10VDC signal and a couple GPIO pins. I probably made a mistake in choosing this board for this setup, I should have gotten one with 3-4 stepgens and a servo drive output to go with the 7i31.

Anyway, if you can point me at what I'm doing wrong here, I'd appreciate it.

Erik