Unfamiliar Error Message

[gcatron9]

Hello, I operate a PRSalpha 144-90 Full-Size, and recently had an issue.
Here's the scenario:

Yesterday I was running a fairly long duration cut, and about 2.5 hours into the cut the machine stopped itself and gave me a message that read, "If you click 'resume' all limits will be disregarded for the duration of the cut" and after searching this error message for some time unsuccessfully, I decided to click resume. It was as though the feed rate had been multiplied by 5 and started tearing through material (foam). When I stopped it, I asked the machine to return to the zero point which unknowingly had located itself somewhere in the middle of my material mass, point being the origin was no longer correct.

This was the first long duration cut we had done and I have been suggested by ShopBot tech support that it might be related to these things:

1) In the computer itself, power saving settings for "USB Selective Suspend" might have cut off communication with the machine after a long period of time causing the machine to lose track of the origin.
2) The software (I use ShopBot3) might be out of date although I don't think it is.
3) I might not have set the Z3 or other Zeroing commands properly at the beginning.

Does anyone have any thoughts to add to this troubleshoot? Thank you!

[Brady Watson]

At first 'glance' it sounds to me like one of your proximity switches got triggered during the cut. This could be from high voltage static electricity from the material you were cutting or dust collection. This is more of a problem now that we are into Winter than other times of the year. You want to make sure your DC is properly grounded with a BARE copper wire running THROUGH the dust hose from where the foot attaches to the hose all the way to the dust collector. NOT on the outside of the hose & the spiral wrap on the hose is NOT adequate. Tie off the one end to the dust collector chassis or electrical ground. Just leave the other end folded over the foot to hose junction & secure with hose clamp.

The other thing that could have happened, is that you were doing a large outside cut, near the extents of the machine and a prox switch did get triggered - if this was the case, it would ignore prox switches until the file was complete. Not sure why it 'freaked out'.

The first thing would be to ground the DC system if it is not done already. The second thing would be to turn off the limits (they will work for the C3 command [not Z3] - but be off for everything else). Run the VN command and turn limits OFF. Then see if the problem persists.

-B