Hello All,
    Brand new to Mach 3 & the forum, this being my first post. I'm also new to home cnc, building a 3 axis gantry engraver, router,mill ? Not sure what to call it yet as it isn't done and as of yet capabilities unknown. I am far enough into it to be stuck though. I purchased off e-bay a 3 axis cnc "kit" from what seems to be a good seller from Korea. I got used (claimed to be tested GOOD) servo drives & matching 200 watt servo motors,breakout board, e-stop switch,noise filter,parallel to BOB cable and wiring instructions + configuring set-up for Mach 3. I won't mention the seller at this time but if you been hunting e-bay for this kind of stuff you can more than likely guess the one.
    I had to add a 24 vdc power supply,non fused breaker, MC contactor, surge suppressor for MC coil,on/off switches + had to make the cables from drives to BOB & from drives to servo motor encoders. The drives came with the proper connectors for the cables but cables had been cut with diagonals. Also rounded up a computer,install Mach 3,run driver test (system excellent), configure Mach 3 as per instructions. At this point I'm excited to finally see motors run but NO, can't get them to do anything.
    I've triple checked everything according to the instructions I got from the seller and don't see anything I've done wrong. I've searched high and low for info on the BOB and can find nothing,(the seller still shows this same BOB with kits he's still selling,forgot to mention I bought mine a little over 2 years ago, taken me awhile to get this far,job & life keep screwing with my free time ya know?) Anyway the BOB has LED's on each axis at clk & dir inputs. When system is first fired up neither is lit till the first time I jog an axis in Mach 3, then the clk lights and stays lit until system is turned off, the dir lights when jogging one way & off when jogging the other, I don't remember right now rather it lights on + or - jog but it does change state when jogging back & forth so seems as though it's receiving signals from Mach 3. The first time I powered the drives I didn't have encoder cables yet & got the expected error on the drive for encoder failure but since making an encoder cable I have no errors on drive so I take that as a sign I have the cable made correctly.
   I e-mailed the seller over a week ago asking for help or advise (I was nice & placed no blame on him even though at this time I think his instructions SUCK or at the very least are incomplete) I have had no reply from the seller. His claim of including the wiring & Mach 3 configuration instructions were a BIG factor I my decision to purchase from him, at this point I'm not a happy camper. Oh and BTW he was kind enough to include a copy of the manual for the drives, INCOMPLETE & part of what is there is in JAPANIEZE !!
    Well there you have it. Now you know where I'm at. I've come here to beg for help from someone who has knowledge of how to get Mach 3 to communicate with Panasonic servo drives. I did contact Panasonic & they were kind enough to send me a pdf manual for this series of drive (it's not for the exact model I have but they said the parameters & setting method are the same). I've gone through the parameters & set all to default except for the ones that seem to do with getting them to accept step/direction inputs. I'm not an expert at this stuff and at this point I've done all I can and I'm afraid to "experiment" much more for fear of letting the magic smoke out. Either the input wiring to the drives is wrong or incomplete or more than likely I don't have some parameter setting correct.
    The drives are :
                              Panasonic MSD021A1XX  with the matching 200 watt motors with 2500 ppr encoders

    If anyone could offer advise on how I can get these drives to work with Mach 3 I would be Very grateful.
                                            Thank You,   Rick

If you can attach the manual and your xml I will have a look.
Regarding the LEDs that sounds like its probably correct, the one staying on all the time will likely be due to the way you have the active state set for the Step pins.
Hood

Hello Hood,
    First off THANK YOU for your offer to help,I do appreciate it. I'm familiar with you from posts I've read on the Homeshop Machinist bbs. You seem to be very knowledgeable & willing to help a newbie like me, a wealth of information for someone hoping to learn this stuff.OK, enough kissing up(I really did mean what I said though). I'm also inexperienced at internet communication like this as well so please bear with me as I attempt to get you the information you asked for. I think I have the pdf manual attached so hopefully you will see that in this posting but I'm not sure what xml you need or how to get it to you. We'll see if you get the manual & then maybe you could tell me how to get you the xml?
                        Thank You,  Rick

You seem to be very knowledgeable & willing to help a newbie like me, a wealth of information for someone hoping to learn this stuff.

You ain't seen nuthin yet!.

The .xml file is in the Mach3 folder in your c: drive.  Look for the one you named when you set up Mach.

Thanks Dickeybird,
     I know you from the HSM bbs as well. The problem I now have is that my Mach 3 computer isn't internet connected so I will have to get the xml from it & try to get it here to send as well, hoping I can use a usb stick for that. Now to see if I can get that done,wish me luck!
                              Thanks again,  Rick

Ok Hood & Dickeybird,
    I've named my machine "The Aluminator"(building the main framework from aluminum extrusions).I copied the aluminator xml file from the Mach 3 folder on the C: drive. I opened it for a look and at this point it's all "greek" to me , hopefully it's what you need.
                      Thanks Guys, Rick

   Yup, makes me happy to be surrounded by good people.  Glad you picked up on that so quick Rick.  Your definitely in good hands.  Great group here.

Copy and pasting your xml to a thumb drive is fine.  Wouldn't be a bad idea to copy and paste your entire Mach 3 folder to the thumb drive and update the backup any time you make changes to Mach once you see the changes are what you wanted.

Brett

Thanks Brett,
     Good advice I'm sure. If I ever get this stuff to work I WILL backup & make it a point to do so again any time a sucessfull change is made. I sure agree with the being happy to be surrounded by good people. I've struggled with this ALOT on my own because, #1- I really want to know & understand this stuff, not just have someone else do it for me and #2 it's hard to help someone who won't help themselves & I don't want to be THAT guy.
                     Rick

Can you attach the wiring diagram you got from the vendor so I can see if it is correct.
Hood

Hello Hood,
    Kinda thought you would want this,thanks for taking the time to help,MUCH APPRECIATED.
                                                      Rick