Touch Probe Setup

[DTGuitars]

I am having a little trouble setting up my touch probe with my PMDX-122 and Mach3. I have downloaded and installed the Mach3 blue screen with the probe plugin. I have my probe set on pin 11 on the J5 block, and the ground to GND. In Mach3 I set the probe on ports/pins/inputs to pin 11, and Active Low to high. When I touch the probe to ground, I get nothing. I have tried several different arrangements, and nothing seems to work. Can someone please give me instructions clearly based for dummy level?

[KenC]

I will try to ensure if it is a ground problem.
Take a meter to check if there is voltage across the terminal & the ground has any voltage & if your multimeter can do current measurement, you can connect the meter in series to see if current is flowing.

[IN-WondeR]

What type of probe are you using? A picture please.

[DTGuitars]

I don't think it is a ground problem. When I touch the two leads together the LED on the board lights up for the pin 11 input. That tells me there is continuity. The probe is really just a touch plate and wire with a clip for finding the edge of my work and setting my xyz to zero reference.

Voltage is 5V on pin 11 to GND.

Any assistance in figuring this out would be greatly appreciated. All of this CNC stuff is really new to me. If I can figure the electronics end of it out, I should be able to handle the rest of the stuff with CAD/CAM software, and actually milling a part (at least I think so at this point).

David

[KenC]

David,
1) How about voltage across the toolbit to the touch plate? I suspect there are excessive voltage drop.
2) Did you test the program by just touching the two leads to simulate touch-off sinario? how did it went?

*ps, I'm an electronics idiot... even I can figure out the big blue touch-off set-up, so relax, take it as a on-the-job training... :)

[DTGuitars]

I didn't even make it to the tool side of things yet. There was no response when I touched the probe leads together. The LED in Mach3 didn't light to indicate that it was working. I even hit the axis buttons(not hooked to steppers yet), and the axis just kept right on counting off as if it was moving the gantry when the leads were touched together.

Is there a special configuration of jumpers on the breakout board, or a setting I am forgetting in Mach3?

I am fully open to suggestions on troubleshooting this problem. Should I attempt to uninstall Mach3 and the Blue Screen, and then reinstall to see if that helps?

[DTGuitars]

I finally got it working. I re-installed Mach3 and the BlueProbe screen. Rebooted, and it works. Not sure why it didn't work the first time, but that's OK.

[kanankeban]

I finally got it working. I re-installed Mach3 and the BlueProbe screen. Rebooted, and it works. Not sure why it didn't work the first time, but that's OK.

Getting the same exactly the same problem, what mach 3 version are you using..