DNC question

[within a thou]

I did a search and couldn;t find any information on my question. What I want to do is hook up 4 machines thru dnc without using a hub/router. How I am hoping to do this is to run 4 serial to usb convertors with the USB into the computer converting to a serial then to my RS232 into the control. Is this possible to do or am I way off base with this?

[Guest]

IMO, you're making this ALOT more complicated than it needs to be.

 

What are you planning on using for DNC software?

[within a thou]

Probably MultiDNC and yes I agree this isn;t the way to go but AP won;t sign the cheque for a HUB they went and handed me cables so I am trying to make this work with what I have.

[Guest]

You need to find out if Multi-DNC will function that way.

[YoDoug®]

The version of multi-DNC we have here is about 5 years old, it will not allow usb-to-rs232. Tomorrow the Multi-DNC reseller is coming in to upgrade and add a hub as we now have four machines in our shop. I can check if the latest release will allow usb-to-rs232 after tomorrow.

[crazy^millman]

What I did at one place was get some serial cards. They were about $10 each and had 2 serials per card. We had 6 machines hooked up off of one computer and just assigned the right com part for each machine.

 

HTH

[within a thou]

Ron,

 

Is this what you mean? These look like they would work

 

Serial card

[crazy^millman]

Yes sir that is what I am talking about. Well here is the kicker with the old Cimco for Mastercam V9 you could communicate with 2 machines and with Mastercam you can communicate with 2 machines so you had the ability to communicate with 4 machines if need be without having to buy a software to do so. Now if you have a couple seats of Mastercam you now have more machines you can work with for free from a software stand point.

 

 

HTH

[doyleg]

Crazy's idea is the way to go. You can dnc all machines at once thru one computer - just dif com ports. Cimco dnc max (along with other software)will be able to handle this very well. We are in the process of doing this here. Have already ordered the com ports and just waiting for them to arrive.

 

------------------------

 

x2 mr1 sp1 mill level1

solids

[within a thou]

Ya I am just looking for a place I can get them I need to get these machines online by tomorrow. Thanks a lot or the help guys this seems a lot smarter then buying a hub even if its a pain to get set up

[within a thou]

now with wiring the rs232 is there a standard or is this machine specific?

[doyleg]

you should have a schematic in your machine book. it will show how to wire the connectors for the type of handshaking you will be using. this, i think , will be your choice between software and hardware handshaking.

[bogusmill]

We got 2 new Dell M90 laptops which don't have serial ports. We bought 2 USB to serial cables and had code missing or transfers that didn't complete. Now were getting 2 PCMCIA serial ports instead.

 

I wouldn't go the USB to serial adapter route.

[jctjct]

I have seen this too using USB to serial- large programs missing chuncks of code with absolutely no warning or error. Not cool.

[within a thou]

thank you guys yes I am going to go Ron's way I think it is my best route without a hub

[within a thou]

So I went and purchased the StarTech 4 port 16650 Serial PCI Card with 5V/12V Power. Installed it and with my graphic card which is a high end Nvidia (Sorry I don;t have the model the card is on my lap as I type) With both plugged it doesn;t leave enough juice to power my monitor. So I uninstalled the graphic card and am using the one on the original motherboard (which blows). Now I can see the 4 ports from the Serial card. If I use the existing cable I know that has a proper DB9 to DB25 pin config and plug that into the serial card it doesn;t send data no matter what combination of ports on the card and in my software I use no data is transfered. So I disabled my original serial port through the bios so the serial card was standing alone and tried again and still nothing. Is there something I am missing what do I need to get this to work.

My computer specs are as follows

 

AMD Athlon 64 Processor

3200+

2.20 GHZ 1.93GB of ram

Physical Address Extension (whatever that means)

 

Thank you in advance for any and all help

[Guest]

How many watt power supply is in that box.

 

If you only have a 350 watt you might not have enough juice to power everything, you might need to jump up to a 500 PS. The Athlons are very power hungry and might be hewing up a lot of the power resources.

 

You'll likely have to crack the box open to find the Power Supply information

[within a thou]

where do I check that ?

[Guest]

When you crack the box open, the big silver box usually at the top in back with the big fan blowing out the back, there should be an information listing on it somewhere.

[within a thou]

It says 10 amps with 250watt max output. Should I swap that first? what would the appropriate power supply be? Would this cause the card to not be able to work?

[Guest]

I'd double it.

 

I am actually amazed the system was behaving.

 

Have you been having strange problems with that computer previously?

[within a thou]

The computer is new and I was running 2 cnc's using cimco lite and a switch but I now have 4 cnc's and I want them all online and I want the power to run them simultaniously. Before I run to the computer supply store twice is there anything else I should get to help my situation? The computer is fairly stable my files aren;t that big and I only have level 1 so very little resources are needed to process. I just need to get this going and if I can't go around a hub I will shell out for that but I trust the advise I got earlier in this thread and know I am just about there. I am just not a hardware guy and not to sure how to troubleshoot this thing.

[Anthony CIMCO]

If you haven't resolved your problem I would recommend contacting the folks at In-House. They have three DNC experts on staff that should be able to get you going quickly. In-House tel: 519-658-1471

[within a thou]

Well I have updated my power supply found out the serial adaptor is defective swapped it and now I am getting conflicts with my graphic card. The X2 file will change my toolpaths will update but the geometry stays the same. So I talked my boss into getting a hub so my question is what is recommended for a hub. I need to get 4 machines online