PM-45M-CNC Setup and Configuration with Mach3

It looks like the problem lies within ProbeIt. The machine will respond directly to Mach3 but it just won't respond to ProbeIt for some reason. It senses when the probe is activated but is unable to do anything with it. What a shame because that program looks really handy. I was exchanging emails with the author and he was at a loss to make it work with the Jamen card. He even refunded my PayPal account without me asking. I was hoping that I could figure something out and give him his money back because I really like the way his program could be used if functional. Now, since you sent me back to the beginning Mr Boswell I was able to find an intermittent wire, of all things. Once the probe activated every time it was supposed to the Mach3 controls respond consistantly. Thank a lot for the tutorial, Bill
 
That is great news and I am glad I could help. I broke my Fowler electronic edge finder a few week ago and have not replaced it so I just ordered one of these probes for myself. I am looking forward to getting it hooked up.
 
Lim1wph, were you ever able to get Probe-It working?
 
Hello Boswell, I just bought a probe and have been setting it up, I wired it up and then set the input in mach3, do you know if there are any other settings in mach3 that need to be addressed?
 
GaryL said:
Hello Boswell, I just bought a probe and have been setting it up, I wired it up and then set the input in mach3, do you know if there are any other settings in mach3 that need to be addressed?
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Is this on a PM45M-CNC ? If not, what motion controller do you have? If so then I was able to get the probe working. I connected one wire to Input #7 on the JNC-40M and the other to one of the logic grounds that are on the control board. I can go into the diag screens of MACHG3 and see the LED go on and off when I deflect the tip. However I am having problems finding ANY software that can utilize the probe that will work. So far Probe-It will see the probe working but as soon as you command Probe-It to do anything like calibration, it fails and nothing happens.
 
Hi Gary, I sure wish ProbeIt would work with our Jamen card but it just seems like it is not going to happen. If you find another program that will function please let us know. ProbeIt looks so useful it's really a shame we can't use it. Bill
 
Boswell said:
Is this on a PM45M-CNC ? If not, what motion controller do you have? If so then I was able to get the probe working. I connected one wire to Input #7 on the JNC-40M and the other to one of the logic grounds that are on the control board. I can go into the diag screens of MACHG3 and see the LED go on and off when I deflect the tip. However I am having problems finding ANY software that can utilize the probe that will work. So far Probe-It will see the probe working but as soon as you command Probe-It to do anything like calibration, it fails and nothing happens.
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Hello Boswell, Yes I have the PM45M-CNC. You are ahead of me, so far the mach3 led won't budge for me. Did you put a resistor in the path?
 
I did not use a resistor. Check your port setup. here is a snapshot of mine. the "Probe" signal should be set to Pin #7 and that is where one wire from the probe should be connected. The "Active Low" will determine if the LED is on normally and goes OFF when deflected or vice-versa.
ports and pins 5.jpg

There are three wires from the probe. Two signal and one for the Shield on the cable. I attached the shield to the ground block in the bottom right of the control box. you can see the metal block that is directly connected to the frame and has many wires going to it. The other two wires don't matter but one goes to the INPUT #7 and ther other goes to a logic GND that can be found on the motion control board. A test would be to just run a wire from the #7 input pin and then while watching the diag screen, touch it to the table. This should ground it and the LED should change On to Off or the other way around. This will let you know if the problem is with the probe or not.
 
Hello Boswell, thanks for the pin inputs picture, any chance I could get a picture of the connect points on the JNC-40M card?
 
GaryL said:
Hello Boswell, thanks for the pin inputs picture, any chance I could get a picture of the connect points on the JNC-40M card?
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I can but it will probably be tomorrow. Let me see if I can pull picture of the card that I can illustrate. if not, I'll take a picture tomorrow of my setup and post it.
 
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