Experimental Physics and
Industrial Control System

"Pearson, Matthew R." <[email protected]> · Fri, 6 Jul 2018 18:29:18 +0000

Hi,

Is the PROBLEM bit only set for a single axis or all the axes on the controller?

I’m rusty with PMACs, but looking in the PMAC driver, the PROBLEM bit is set for all axes based on if any of these controller system status bits are on:

PMAC_GSTATUS_NO_SYS_CLOCKS
PMAC_GSTATUS_FACTORY_DEFAULT
PMAC_GSTATUS_SYS_FILE_ERROR
PMAC_GSTATUS_HWARE_CHANGE_DETECTED
PMAC_GSTATUS_SAVED_CFG_LOAD_ERROR
PMAC_GSTATUS_PROJECT_LOAD_ERROR
PMAC_GSTATUS_POWER_ON_FAULT
PMAC_GSTATUS_WATCHDOG_BIT1
PMAC_GSTATUS_WATCHDOG_BIT0

These are the driver descriptions, but they would roughly correspond to what the PMAC user guide uses.

If it’s only a single axis, then the only bit used to set the PROBLEM bit is:

PMAC_STATUS1_AMP_FAULT

So there may be an amplifier fault for some reason. 

Cheers,
Matt

> On Jul 6, 2018, at 11:13 AM, Mark Davis <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> Working with some new equipment here and having some problems getting things working correctly and hoping someone can give me some tips on what to look for.
> 
> We have a couple of new Delta Tau Power Brick LV-IMS controllers that I need to get working ASAP.
> 
> Here is where I am at the moment:
>    - I have an EPICS 3.14.12.2 IOC running the following:
>        - The powerPMAC driver from http://www.observatorysciences.co.uk/deltatau_downloads.php,
>        - The ssh2 library as described in the manual for the driver
>        - Version 6-9 of the motor module
>        - Version 4-23 of the asyn module
>        - The records included in the example/test IOC config included with the driver (which includes a motor record)
>    - The latest PowerMAC IDE application from Delta Tau running on a Windows 7 computer
>    - A FESTO stepper motor (Model EMMS-ST-57-S-SEB-G2), which includes a brake and an encoder
>    - The appropriate power supply from Delta Tau to provide the power for the controller and (through it) the motor
>    - A very basic configuration/program running on the Delta Tau (one which I was told is basically a copy of one of the examples provided by Delta Tau) which includes definitions for 8 open-loop axes (where the reported position is based on the # of steps) and 8 read-only virtual axes that report the position based on the encoder counts.
> 
> Both the IOC and the IDE application can connect to the Delta Tau, and I can open a command-line shell to it via SSH (the controller runs some version of Linux)
> 
> If the IOC is not running, when I use the IDE application to jog the motor it will move until it reaches the the specified position.
> 
> When the IOC is running, if I change the setpoint for the motor record, the motor moves a bit in the correct direction but quickly stops.  This is presumably because the PROBLEM bit in the motor record's MSTA field is always set so the motor record is in the major STATE alarm state, causing the record logic to stop the motor movement.
> 
> The brief description of the PROBLEM bit simply says "driver stopped polling, or hardware problem".  But fields in the motor record are frequently updating, showing any changes in the position of the motor, so I wouldn't think it would be a polling problem.  And the fact that everything appears to work fine when using the IDE application would seem to imply that there are no hardware problems.
> 
> I will be digging through the code trying to trace this back to some identifiable cause, but if anyone has any experience with this controller and has some tips on what I might check or should be looking for, that would be much appreciated.
> 
> Mark Davis
> NSCL/FRIB
> 
> 
>    - The ssh2 library
> 
> 
> I have this driver installed on a Linux box running EPICS 3.14.12.2 and (as explained in the doco for this driver) installed the libssh2 library it needs to open an SSH connection to the controller.
> 
> I know almost nothing about the controller itself, but was provided with a very basic "project" with some code that I was told is mostly a copy of some example from Delta Tau.
> 
> I have

Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System

Experimental Physics and
Industrial Control System