Error Message: "Shopbot No Longer Being Recognized"

[chubb]

Hi all,

Shopbot PRS Alpha ~2012

So my shopbot has been throwing up an error message that reads "Shopbot No Longer being Recognized" non-stop.

What generally happens; machine will cut along happily and suddenly stop in motion, pause for a couple seconds, error message pops up on screen, spindle shutsdown shortly after. I could restart the file and it will do the same thing. It can happen as rarely as every 2-3 hours, and as frequently as 3-5 mins. There really is no predicting it and it will stop randomly anywhere on the same cut file.

I've unplugged and checked all cables, checked grounding, decluttered and optimized the control computer to no result.

I've noticed a couple of particular conditions for this to happen;

- It happens mostly (~99%) when cutting a 3D file.
- It mostly (~99.999%) happens when the machine is running in a raster pattern along the X axes.
- When the error message comes up and the spindle shutsdown, it does not lose location in any axes and can be restarted without resetting any axes.
- The X axes motors are super hot at shutdown.
- It can happen on a light cut or a heavy cut i.e load doesnt seem to be a factor

It's been manageable with smaller files (running for less than 30mins).

But I've been cutting a large panel in 3D. I always try to do the finishing pass along the grain of the wood just for a cleaner cut. Because of the size of the work, it can only fit along the X axis. Tried cutting it along the X and it stopped 13 times before it had completed even 30mm of a 1500x800mm panel.

I eventually had to cut it along the Y axis which took ~57 Hours. The finish quality is not great and probly looking at another day of hand finishing just to get it up to an acceptable finish.

I'm starting to think that it might be a bad motor on the X-axis but have no idea on how to check that (though i am finding an over voltage at the drivers of 4.6v and it draws power even when at standstill).

Would really appreciate any ideas of what the problem could be or any suggestions on how to figure out the problem. I can only think of it being down to bad motors but would love to hear other opinions.

I've attached photos of the work-in-progress and also of it finally finished.

Regards,

Mark

[Chuck Keysor]

Hello Mark. I'm sorry you have had this type of problem. As no one has answered your question by now (I would if I could), I would recommend that you contact Shopbot service. It is free. Please let us know what the problem was if you can get this resolved. Good luck, Chuck

[chubb]

Hi Chuck,

Thanks for the response.

Already in touch with tech support. We're now going through the motions of identifying where the problem actually lies. So far we can rule out the motors and are now looking at the control computer and comms cables.

The whole process is taking a bit long because of the time difference but will definitely report back on the thread as we make progress and hopefully find a solution.

Regards,

Mark

[dlcw]

Mark,

One thing to take a look at is your grounding setup. Make sure EVERYTHING is properly grounded. That issue has reared it's ugly head on many occasions and has caused all kinds of heartache for many, many people, me included. As you stated in your last post, also check all your cabling. Make sure there are no loose connections anywhere. Also, if you have any cables on the ground that can be walked on, check these for continuity by disconnecting them at each end, putting an ohmmeter to the ends and wiggle the wire really good where it is being walked/stepped on. The pressure of feet on a cable can start to break down the tiny wires inside causing intermittent blackouts. These can be tough problems to track down. I hope tech support is able to get your through it.

[chubb]

Hi Don,

That was one of the first things we checked and it all was well. Checked all the cables and switched out a couple to no avail.

However the problem has been resolved as of today:

Tech support were convinced that the issue was with the computer.

We switched out several other control computers that run other cnc machines and even tried office computers. But we kept getting the same errors no matter what we did or how we set it up.

We by chance had a new computer lying around waiting to be paired with a CNC machine we're currently building and decided to test that. We set it up and it ran like a dream :D

We think that there might have been a virus/trojan/malware/e.t.c that was deeply hidden and spread through an infected USB flash drive across all our computers.

After doing a clean install of windows on all the machines and setting up SB3 again on the shopbot control computer, everything ran perfectly.

So the issue seems to have definately been the control computer.

Took a while to respond to this thread because I wanted to be sure that this was the solution. Run a 36 hour file and we never got one single error at all. So we're calling this solved.

Thanks guys for all your input. Hope this can help someone down the line.