Manual Drive and start to drive = pen drops straight down

[EdmondsLibrarian]

In setting up the device, most everything goes well. The motor jog. The pen is in the middle, The paper size is set. (1100, 500, 1100, 700 Portrait style) I’ve tried various speeds from 500 to 2000.
Problem: When I use the drive manually mode, clicking on any of the positive or negative X or Y buttons, the pen immediately drives itself straight down to the bottom at maximum speed.

The only way I’ve found to stop it is to pull the power plug.
In the case of drawings, the computer keeps sending G code coordiantes like it is still connected.
The movement of the first drawing motion isn’t downward if that means anything. How can I troubleshoot this?

[Anonymous]

Is this still happening? I just read your other post. I’d love to know what changed to make it go away.

[EdmondsLibrarian]

Yes it is still happening. Not sure what additional information to send.

[Anonymous]

I’ve thought about it and I don’t know what to advise. I’ve seen this in the past but I don’t remember what caused it.

[EdmondsLibrarian]

Here’s some further experimenting. I hooked up the laptop with the older version of the software which was known to be performing well last June. The results were the same- the job motor command works, the drive manually causes the pen to drop straight down.
I’m wondering if some sort of movement vibration might have worked something loose? I have to guess a hardware issue- though why it will jog motors, but not drive the motors is confusing. Maybe this triggers a memory…

[EdmondsLibrarian]

In trying to eliminate hardware issues, I took off all connections to the Arduino and Motors, then reconnected them. Alas the results were the same. THe pen drops straight down when driving manually.

[EdmondsLibrarian]

Progress?
I changed the Com Port # to 9, and also used the reset button on the Arduino (hard to access under the stepper shield)
This made it so that the pen no longer drops straight down without stopping.
However, there is no X axis movement (side to side). Will explore the forums now to see if this has been solved elsewhere.

[EdmondsLibrarian]

Here’s another item which might be instructive- though I don’t know how to leverage it
I wanted to try to rule out the Arduino. The blink command works well. When I try to use the AFMotorDrawbot Example (under the Arduino file menu) and choose the MotorParty, this file doesn’t verify due to a AF_DCMotor does not name a type.
Perhaps I’ve installed something wrong.

[Anonymous]

The reset button on the shield is the same as the reset button on the Arduino. They do the same thing.

Perhaps you could call me on Google Chat and we’ll figure it out together? Then I could see video of what your machine is doing and that might give me a hint.

[EdmondsLibrarian]

THANK YOU. This problem is solved! Your offline suggestion to
reload the arduino INO file
onto the Arduino was exactly what was needed.

[Author]

Posts