Originally Posted by
lishmantr
I am a brain injured veteran in much need of help before I absolutely lose it!!!
Hello, this is my 2nd carvewright machine but never had these problems. When I initially got this machine I kept having clear board sensor problems, sometimes itd work, most times it wouldn't. Carvewright techs and engineers always said it was sawdust in sensor to blow it out with compressed air. I do have a vacuum system hooked up that does a great job collecting the dust. Blowing the sensors seemed to work about half the time. I finally just broke down and bought a new sensor with about 120 hours on machine. Still same problem and CW techs still insisted it was sawdust in sensor. The new Sensor has sawdust in it? To test the board sensor you go to sensor data and board sensor. With a piece of white copy paper on the board and cranked down you should get a 156 as perfect. A 90 with a dirty window. Anyway after challenging them angrily they finally told me to check the harness going to backside of circuit board. Sure enough a wire was loose just barely touching the contact in the white connector. Now with the harness replaced, I start the machine, select the project, say no to stay under rollers, then the truck moves about an inch to the left to home but then takes a dive right into the board. Sometimes it will go through the homing process but never make contact with the flip lever on right side of machine to measure drill bit, instead it will go all the way to it and right before it clicks it, it returns back toward the homing position toward the left of the machine and then the z truck takes a dive ramming the drill bit into the board.So the clicking of the "Y" going to the bit plate has me concerned. This is usually a worn out "Y" Gearbox. If it does 3 clicks it is usually the two 695ZZ Bearings that have gone bad. Plus the shaft can wear on the "Y" Gear. AND if the truck does not reach the Bit Flag then sometimes the wires for the right side clear cover switch have moved out of the back corner and are not tucked into the far corner. The truck hits the wires. You can manually push the "Y" Truck over to the bit plate. IF the wires are in the way then you will not be able to get to the bit flag. Has anyone else had such a problem, theres no motor wires, sawdust or anything obstructing the z truck on the rails on right side of machine, changed out circuit board behind z truck when I changed the clear board sensor harness. Still could be a bad FFC Cable... They are really a Consumable and can only flex so many times before the thin copper between plastic snaps. THEN the ENDS touch then don't touch... SO when the "Y" is moving it is flexing the FFC or the big flat cable that carries the voltage to the "Z" Motor AND the Encoder FEEDBACK to the Computer. IF the wires open for the Encoder then the Computer keeps moving the head until the number of pulses it is looking for is reached. IF the wires are open then the head continues DOWN until it smashes into the board. SO... BAD FFC Cable.... Checked all wires to ensure everything is pushed in all the way in circuit board. Don't know why its not making contact to flip out the plate to measure drill bit and don't know why the z truck takes a dive with the drill bit into the board and happens sometimes SOMETIMES... That is a sign of a bad FFC Cable... Sometimes the wires touch and all works well then the ends don't touch and the machine crashes... at start of homing after selecting project and sometimes going toward the plate that flips out and sometimes on the way back. Also, while the one of the wires on the clear board sensor harness was loose going into the circuit board, it messed up 2 of my memory cards to where there is just blocks across the screen nothing else. Normally when you get black rectangles on the LCD Screen it is telling you that the card is not installed. It can also be a bad card. SO.. A look at the underside of the machine is in order... The CW Computer has MALE Pins that plug into the Memory Card. SAWDUST can get wedged into the MALE pins and prevent the memory card from being inserted all the way leading to black rectangles.
Any help is much appreciated.