I have an X-Carve Pro. My Y2 stepper motor has stopped working. It is being pulled along by the Y1 stepper. To make sure the stepper itself wasn’t bad I switched the Y2 wiring over to the Y1 terminals and tested. Sure enough the Y2 stepper fired right up and the Y1 got nothing and was being pulled along by the now functioning Y2 stepper. Does anyone have any insite to tis problem?
i assume you inspected the y1 wiring for kinks, or cut, or connection? did you inspect the end of the connection, on both ends?
Yes. I inspected the connections and there are no kinks in the cable. The interesting thing is that I just switched the connections for Y1 and Y2 and then retested. the Y2 began functioning and the Y1 did nothing and was being pulled along by the Y2 stepper. I switched them back to the correct connections and the original problem resumed. Y1 functioning properly and Y2 nothing.
ok, as i understand, the issue is with the cable then?
It can’t be the cable since I just switched the cables. I used the Y1 cable to connect the Y2 stepper and the Y2 cable to connect the Y1 stepper. The Y1 stepper functions well with the Y2 cable and Y2 stepper is still not getting signal. The problem has to be coming from somewhere before the cable. Any ideas in this direction?
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I’m wondering if there is a problem with the Y2 stepper driver, but I don’t know how to test it.
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When you said that you “… switched the connections for the Y1 and the Y2…” you did not specify 'WHERE" you made that switch. If you made the ‘switch’ at the motors themselves, then disregard the following. If not and you made the switch at the tower, then please proceed …
While they do from time to time, motors very rarely burn out under normal use, whereas cables, and connectors are far more prone to damage/wear. If you do not have a multimeter, the simplest ‘trouble-shooting’ method for this would be to make up a jumper cable and bypass to the other motor that way. This will completely eliminate the cable and connector. If you have a multimeter, and know how to use it. You can simply test the cables/connectors.
If you get the same results as your first attempt, then the next most likely culprit would be the connector at the motor itself. To test this, the best way would be with a multimeter, and confirm that each pin has a good connection to the windings.
If all of these tests pass, then the only thing left is the windings, stator, rotor, of the motor itself. Testing this is a bit more complicated, but still possible for the DIY, and there are presumably videos online to take you through the process.
But if I were a betting man, I would lay money on the cable and/or the connector itself being the problem.
I posted recently the problem that I had with my machine. It was doing all kinds of funky ‘stuff’ for the past year that no one could troubleshoot. Then, in the middle of making Christmas presents, it just DIED. I was at the end of my rope.
Inventables Tech Support wanted me to start throwing parts at it - starting with a new control box ($380.00), if that didn’t work, a new tower ($1,200.00). No way I was going to start buying parts until I knew the problem (I’m an old-timer, we fix things, we don’t replace things).
A friend came to the shop with testing equipment. Less than a half hour into testing, we discovered that the jumper cable for the CAT-5 connection inside the control box had a bad pin connection (pin #8). $8 bucks later on Amazon, and I was back up and running.
Moral of the story, always check the easy/obvious stuff first (and it appears that you are already thinking along those lines, so kudos). It shouldn’t be too hard to find the issue. Just remember to apply Occam’s razor, and be patient. Check everything, starting with the most likely and advancing to least likely. Somewhere along there, you’ll find the culprit.
best of luck.
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I switched them at the motors. I’m stuck as the problem does not appear to be the cables. I just looked up how to reinstall the stepper drivers and I found out that Mac (which I use) connects automatically and there is no need to download a driver. I think I will connect my Windows PC and see if I have the same problem. Thanks for your help though. I know i’m not going to spend thousands of dollars to fix this problem. I will just give the X-Carve Pro to someone who wants to fix it and I will buy one that doesn’t have all the problems I have read about in the forum and all the problems I have had with my machine, which have been MANY. Thanks again for your help.
Cheers,
Kevin
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Well, that’s all that I’ve got… I suspect that your hunch is correct.
Best of luck
Joe, I read your previous message from 12/24 and I agree with you fully. I put in a ticket to tech support, but after reading your post I’m not sure how much help I will get. I’m going to just start checking things myself. I’m a physician, not an electronics wiz, but you can find out how to do almost anything on the internet or U-Tube. I’ll make another post when I’ve found and fixed the problem. Thanks
Kevin