Thread: Console the Key Emulator Method

It is worth noting here that if you want to fit up the Spindle Speed Override pot as well then the process is almost identical.
Difference being you need a separate Pokeys Analogue Pin and a different termination in the Brains.
For argument sake lets say you connect the signal wire of the Pot to Pin 46 in Pokeys.
The Brain would be Modbus Address 127 for Pokeys pin 46 and the formula would be a/6.8 (see note) and it would terminate to DRO 74-Spindle %.
The reason you want 6.8 as your denominator is this will restrict the Spindle speed to 150% - no need to have two higher scale in the SSO. Of course you can experiement with this value to make it work for your way of operating.

After fitting up the pot I noticed it had a slight amount of variation in the reading. It was pulsing and depending on the pot used (Homann's was much more stable) it would vary almost 1% but typically much less than this. Remember that the Pokeys is reading the voltage coming through the pot which is powered by the USB port of the computer. The variation in power draw on the computer probably alters the voltage enough to affect the reading.
The other thing I didn't like was it was difficult to set the FRO to 100% through the pot to stop that annoying red flashing light on the screen. I searched the forums and found a couple of solutions that worked but it was a complex Brain and one I would easily forget. Maintenance is a problem with these sorts of things if you do not do the coding regularly.

Got to thinking maybe a switch could disable the pot and return it to 100% feed rate. After a bit of playing around I came up what I think is a good solution without complex coding.
I fitted up two switches in series in Pokeys so that the second switch will only work when the first switch is active. The first switch is an on/off switch and the second switch is a momentary switch.

See my attempt at drawing this in picture 1. A Pokeys ground wire connects to one side of the on/off switch then the Pin 5 signal wire and an additional bridging wire connect to the other side of the switch. The bridging wire connect to one side of the momentary switch and the other connection is the signal wire to Pokeys pin 6.

Maybe the photo will help a little. The black wires are ground and white signal wires. The bridging wire between the two switches is black because it becomes a ground once the on/off switch is activated. I don’t think that helped.

The advantage here is that the second momentary switch will not work unless the first switch is active. The thoery is you only want to set the FRO or SSO to 100% when the pot is de-activated. If you hit the screen reset button when the pot is active it will work but it immediately jumps back to the pot speed rate - not a good thing to jump around like that. All will be clear as we hobble this lot together and write the code to make it work.

Once you have your wiring connected as per previous post open the Pokeys software and assign Pin 5 and Pin 6 as a digital inputs and tick the “Invert Pin” box for both. Notice that the background colour on pin 5 and 6 changes when you select invert the pin.
See picture 1
Hit the button “Send to Device”
In the Pokeys top menu select “Peripherals”, “Digital inputs and Outputs..”
and the screen in Picture 2 will pop up. Now play with your switches. Note that the switch on Pin 5 must be turned on before the switch on pin 6 can be activated. In Picture 2 the graphics circled and also Pins 5 and 6 status will give you the feedback you need.
Make sure the on/off switch is on pin 5 and the momentray is on pin 6
When all is well shut down the Pokeys software.

Now we need to interface those switches and make them perform an action in Mach3.

First lets assign them an input.

Open Mach3 and using the top menu select “Config”, “Ports and Pins” and the “Input” tab.
Scroll down to “OEM Trig #1” and tick enable, Port # is 10 (Pokeys reserved number), Pin Number 5 (corresponds to Pokeys pin number) and tick “Active Low”
Same for OEM Trig #2 but assign Pin 6.
See highlighted area in picture 1

Now click on “Apply” button and then “OK” button.

We now should have Mach3 reading those signal and we now need to do something once they are activated.
We will create a new Brain in the next Post which will combine these new actions to our FRO Brain.

It will be easier to construct a totally new Brain than try to edit our first Brain.
So we don’t get any interference from out first Brain go to the Top menu in Mach3 and select “Operator” then “Brain Control”.
Click on our file “PokeysMPG.brn” and untick the “Enabled Box”.
Press OK to exit the screen.

Go again to the top menu “Operator”, “Brain Editor” and type in “PokeysAnalogueFRO” and the “OK” button. You now have a new file to work with.

By now you should have a reasonable idea of how to work with Brain components so I will not show screen shots unless it is something we have not done before.

Click the “+” and when the “Add Inputs” screen opens, click on the “Inputs” button and in the drop down list select “OEMTrigger #2”. Remember this is connected to the momentary switch on the Pokeys.
Click “OK”
Click on the box you have just created and it should turn to a green background.
Click the “+” sign again and the default of “No Operation” is correct so just press the ‘OK” button. What this means is you do not want to do an additional calculation or function so the signal is just passed through to the terminate instruction.
Click on the box you have just created and the background will turn green.
Click on the terminate symbol (upside down “T”)
When the screen opens click on the “ButtonPress” button and select “1014- Reset FRO” from the drop down list.

Click the OK button and you have completed the instructions for the momentary switch and your screen should look like picture 1

The next part of the Brain will combine the original FRO Brain with the Pokey On/off switch on Pin 5 which is now assigned to OEMTrigger #1 in Mach3. If you are following this then you well on the way.

Click the “+” sign and click on the Modbus” button. “Enter Modbus Address to use” as 126.
Click on “Serial Non-Plugin Enabled” radio button. Easy to forget this so double check. Then click “OK”
Click on the box you just created and the background colour will turn green. Click the “+” sign and then click on the “Formula” button. Type in the formula a/4 or whatever you have adjusted the formula to. Click “OK” button.
Now we need to bring in the On/Off switch to the Brain so do not select any boxes on the screen and just click the “+” symbol again.
When the screen opens click on the “Inputs” button and select “OEMTrigger #1” and then click on the “OK” button.
Now click on the box you have just created (OEMTrigger #1) and the background will turn green. Click on the ‘+” symbol and “No Operation” is correct so click the “Ok” button.

At this point we need to combine the two actions FRO and On/Off switch or OEMTrigger #1 so that we can get them to behave in unison.
Click on the box that says “Formula a/4” and holding down the shift key click on the box we created in the step before that says “No-operation Pass Signal”. This is the box attached to OEMTrigger #1.
Both boxes should now have a green back ground.
Click on the “+” symbol and a new screen will appear Headed “Dual Input Lobe”.
See picture 1
Click on the “Analogue Switch” radio button then press “OK”.
If you look at the Brain you can see we have now linked the on/off switch with the pot.

Now click on the box we have just created “ANAS Analogue Switch” and the background will turn green. Now click on the terminate (Upside down “T”) and when the screen opens click on the “DRO’s” button and select “821-Feed Ovrd” from the drop down list. We are done so click the “OK” button and your Brain should look like Picture 2.

Save the file (don’t forget”) and exit the brains.

Now we need to activate the Brain we have just made and save the OEM Triggers.

In the top menu go to “Operator”, “Brain Control” and click on “Reload All Brains”. You should now see your file “PokeysAnalogueFRO.brn” so click on it and tick enabled.

Go to the top menu in Mach3 and click on “Config” and than “Save Settings”.
Now exit Mach3 and open it up again. This will take up all the changes and the new Brain you have just created.

I have attached the completed Brain for those who are having trouble. Extract it to the Brains folder in Mach3 and it should work.

Assuming everything is working you should note the following. When the On/off switch is off you can change the value in the FRO by turning the pot.

If you switch the on/off switch on it de-activates the pot - it will not adjust the FRO until you turn the switch back off again. The good thing is it holds it last value in the FRO and you will not see any pulsing in the value - rock solid steady. With the switch on you can now hit the momentray switch and it will reset the FRO to 100%. As a double check make sure the momentary switch does not work with the ON/Off switch off. As I said before the SSO can be set up exactly the same but with minor changes to connect to the right addresses in Mach3.

I think this is a simple and reliable solution without having to learn too much to get it going or maintain it in the future. I have recorded here every keystroke so if you follow verbatum then it should work. I'm far from perfect (don't tell SWMBO) so yell out if there are errors or omissions.

We have done the two hardest interfaces so from here on in it will be easy.

I'll do some jog switches for X, Y and Z axes and then a couple of rotary switches to compliment the jog functions. This will bring in the MPG we have already done and will include step or continuous jogging, step increment and axis selection so there will be plenty of choices for moving the axes around.

I wil be using buttons for the jog switches but exactly the same interface and connections can be used on a Arcade Joystick so it will be up the individual to decide on what they want.

A point to note here is this type of interface we have just built will work on any Mach3 screen - standard or modifed. This is the major difference between this method and the key emulator method in the first part of the thread.

There will probably be a bit of a break before the next installment as I have a few jobs I need to do.

Rod
You are indesputably a champion.
i asked you one question about Pokeys an pots and you go and spend umpteen hours investigating, then give us pages and pages of detailed response.
i am indebted to you, and there will definitely be a bottle or two of red for you when you come to Sa next year for the BBQ.
Cheers Rod - and a merry xmas to you and yours.
Noel

Hi Noel,
No biggy as it serves as a reference for me as well. I will forget how to do this by next week so if I can follow my instructions I might have a fighting chance.

Thanks to rods straight forward tutorial i have ordered a Pokeys55T and assorted buttons
Now all i have to do is work out what i want on the console, cut it out, learn how to use the Pokeys software, and learn screen4. Easy
No doubt when my stuff arrives i will have a lot of questions
Cheers.

Hi Triden,
Good to hear you are going to have a crack at it. My experience is not to over crowd the console and to group buttons according to functions - eg Jogging Set, Machine Run Set, etc

My first console has so many buttons I spend way too much time trying to find the right button to press. Learnt by that one and next two are much easier to operate with less buttons. Rotary switches can combine lots of like functions and I'll do one or two of those soon.

Keep us posted on your progress.

Things were getting messy trying to keep track of the switches and the wiring was getting tangled on my desk.
Decided to make a quick mock up of the panel to test the layout. Used 3mm whitecoat MDF for the facia and slapped together the rest with a nail gun and dab of glue.
Ignoring the missing switch and knobs I am pleased with the layout and in particular the triangular jog buttons. I think I might run with this on the machine.

Before and after shots below. Panel is 350mm by 250mm.

I was going to write up the connection for the rotary switch that operated the jog modes but the detail to do that is already in the post above. I will be duplicating instructions and there is already too much to wade through here.

Process is to create OEMTriggers in Mach3 then do a simple Brain that picks up those switches and terminate the brain to the following OEM Buttons.
204 for Jog Continuous Mode
205 for Jog Incremental Mode (step mode)
327 for MPG Jog on.
185 for MPG Jog X axis
186 for MPG Jog Y axis
187 for MPG Jog Z axis.

That finishes a different interface for connecting the Pokeys to a concole and Mach3.

Looks great Rod. It's a nice simple layout and should be great to use.

So you reckon the triangle switches will be better than the joysticks for axis control?

Thanks John,
It's a preference thing. Joysticks work exactly the same as they have the same microswitches on each side. Advantage of the buttons are you can move two axes at the same time - you can press a second button on a different axis.

Joysticks you can only poke them in one direction at a time so they are restricted that way. Joysticks do look better in my opinion but the buttons are easier to interpret on a panel - especially the triangular ones.

Analogue joysticks have a lot more features such as being able to move two axes by a 45 degree push (I think) and also speed control by the amount you move the stick (I think). I haven't hooked one up but use the XBox360 wireless game pad for my mill and that works extremely well.

So there's the long answer to a short question.