StepperOnline A6 Servo

I got my motors and drivers and was able to get them setup thanks to dschultz's configuration files. My next goal is to get sensorless homing working, using homing method -2. My understanding is that I will need a custom homing component to use the external homing on the servo drive. I noticed that rodw was working on a github repository for just that . I gave the instructions a shot, and was able to build and install the component; however, it does not seem to work. I can see the additional pins that it creates in LCNC (e.g. joint.n.request_custom_homing, joint.n.is_custom_homing, and joint.n.custom_homing_finished), but starting homing does not set joint.0.request_custom_homing and setting it manually does not seem to do anything. I feel like I must be missing something in my hal file.
Something else that is unclear to me is how the homing method is set. In the manual, PDO 6098h sets the homing method. Would I need to set that in my hal file using setp? Attached are my configuration files. Any help is greatly appreciated!

     

I have not yet got a working custom homing component but I am back working on it. Basically over the weekend I threw in a bunch of pins with a view to eliminating the cia402 component. I think I will modify that so it has a parameter that bypasses all homing features of cia402.comp. I have not connected anything to hal.

github.com/rodw-au/cia402_homecomp

Rod, thanks for you time and effort on this!
I am currently in the middle of my mechanical install on the machine and plan to have that done in the next couple of weeks.
At that point it will be on to setting up homing and tuning.
Hoping to be able to use internal homing...

I am closely watching this too. I was trying to make work external homing on Delta B3 servos, but it did not work, no matter how I connected hal pins.
The closest I got was, when I was able to home drive, but it jumped back to original position (if the following error was large enough).

Glad there is some interest in this. I made a bit more progress last night and have now hooked up a hal file, but have not done any more.
We should not hijack this thread but I will raise another thread when I get a it further. 

 

I just got native homing working with an A6 servo the other day.  I have a system with mixed servo drives (two StepperOnline T7 (aka LeadShine EL7) and one StepperOnline A6).  I had to make some custom mods to both the cia402 and custom homecomp components.

Nothing is really documented aside for some sparse comments, so apologies for that.   I can vouch that these modules do work together for homing on an A6 when configured right.  The components are here:

github.com/tangentaudio/linuxcnc-bridgep...tree/main/components

For reference, this homecomp is based originally on the one from marcoreps, not Rod's.

The LinuxCNC config that has the A6 configured on the Z axis is here.  You might want to check out the .ini, .hal and the .xml for hints.

github.com/tangentaudio/linuxcnc-bridgep...eport-ethercat-pyvcp


 

Thanks for sharing your success. I am about to start again for the third time. I keep trying  to add extra stuff in. The first time, my work was obsoleted as the homecomp template was massively changed. Before I started, I did work out that the cia402.comp would never work and at that time changes to homing.c were required.
The homecomp is a very simple but we keep trying to use cia402.comp that as written before custom homing was introduced and was based on drive that homed to index.

I did try building cia402.comp into the homecomp but that was the one that was obsoleted. I don't think it would work because the homing loop sits outside the lcec loop so it will be one step behind.

I think the  best architecture would be to rewrite cia402.comp so it did everything with the drive except homing (inside the lcec loop) and then everything to do with homing was done in the homecomp. 

I think we have all gone off track with how this should work.
Please refer to the template source code
github.com/LinuxCNC/linuxcnc/blob/master...s/homecomp.comp#L257Note that there is a condition here that decides if this joint should be custom homed or homed normally.
So this pin should be set to 1 if this joint is to be custom homed with setp

But if you look at tangentaudio's code, he (and every body else, me included) uses this pin to trigger homing in cia402 which is wrong!
So we should be creating a new pin start-homing to trigger the cic402.n.home pin.

Can you guys review this and see if you agree?

I did enough work in my new basemod.comp homecomp to prove that this works so I was correct. It makes the barest mods to the homecomp template. Its unfinished but feel free to look at this.
I am half thinking that the homecomp should let cia402 start the homing and then monitor the status word for target reached (bit 4)

github.com/rodw-au/cia402_homecomp