Jog Box "Not Supported"

[[Ro...]]

I'm getting an err in my Jog Box when i hit the "Line & Circle" (Activate Drives?) button, the Lcd screen says "Not Supported".
The display also doesnt show the probe picture like normal, just the floating Zeiss emblem
I have 5 bars of air pressure, all the connections seem to be solid, nothing seems unusual.
I've powered it up & down 4 times now
1 thing i notice is that usually when you turn on the cmm, but before you activate the drives you can grab the cmm and move it in all 3 directions as its just sitting on the air bearings, but right now my machine is rigid like a rock, it wont move.

anyone have this problem before?

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[[De...]]

That doesn't sound good.

You have probably done this, but make sure the main and the switch on the controller is on prior to hitting the drives button on the 'jog box'

If you have already done that and its giving that error next step is to get on the phone to Zeiss if you ask me.

[[Cl...]]

The jog-box may have lost it connection with the controller. Have you tried Shift-lower return simultaneously, let go, and push the "X" button?

[[Ro...]]

Quick update, Zeiss tech support was called first thing in the morning, monday morning.
It appears we are dead until a tech comes out late this week.
It appears something is Toast.......

Clarke
I tried that Shift + Lower return + X, it didn't do anything to remedy this issue.

[[Cl...]]

You can try one more thing. If your control box is the old style (p/n 608426) the eprom (Sguare computer chip) might have come loose from it's socket. You can open the box an re-insert it.

[[Ro...]]

Where is that located at?
Tech support had my first shifter inside the big box, but he was just looking for LED lights and weather they were on or not.

FYI, the sooner i get my Zeiss back the sooner i get to stop moving programs over to PC-Dmis!!!!!!
(I guess i do need the practice, its been a while since i've written a real program of any significance)

[[Ow...]]

Just thinking out loud and it's probably not what's causing but, are you sure the CMM isn't setting on a limit switch?
The z axis on most Zeiss bridge CMM's have a release button that has to be pushed to enable the column to be moved down enough to get it off the limit switch that turns drives off when activated.

[[To...]]

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On Contura machines, if you're on the Z limit, you should be able to just pull it down. Make sure to shut the machine all the way down. Start it back up. When controller has completed the POST, then grab the quill and it should pull down without too much effort. If it is not on the Z limit, a brake will be holding it.

[[Cl...]]

Sorry I didn't notice that you have the newer box. The eprom is soldered in place in the newer one.

[[Ro...]]

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No its not on any of the 3 limits.
It was working fine and parked in its usual spot on saturday evening by the 2nd shift guy. but its probably 8-10 inches from the nearest limit.

[[No...]]

Another thing you could try:
Some controllers (the CPU unit, not the Jog Box) have a reset button somewhere. Sometimes it can resolve problems. But better don't press it more than once. A tech once warned me that repeatedly pressing that button could cause the CPU to crash completely. Use at your own risk.

Is the drives LED even supposed to blink? I never saw it blinking before. I have a feeling your CMM really needs a Zeiss tech.

[[Ro...]]

Yeah Norbert, Zeiss is all over it now.
We took delivery of a box containing 2 components late yesterday, a hard drive and a case of some sort.
The tech believes the problem is in the hard drive, but if that doesn't solve it then the case will need to be swapped out.
these are the guts inside the power box, not the PC.

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[[Ro...]]

So in the end the tech changed the hard drive and the motherboard & case.
CMM is back up and running with no issues and several parts checked prior to the failure were rechecked and came back with nearly identical numbers.
This cmm is 6 years old.

I do not know how much the service cost, or weather it was covered by our service agreement.

[[Ro...]]

1 year and 1 month later, im having the exact same problem again on the same CMM.
Will update as i get more info.......

[[Ro...]]

So it took a several weeks to resolve, and during that time the cmm was up and running for all but 2 shifts total.
The end result is we had to get motherboard & case replaced again.
for whatever reason our computer (the one in the white box behind the cmm) was shutting itself down and not talking to the controller.
This of course was the most expensive possible failure, so we should have known all along that this was the problem.

[[Ja...]]

Hey this looks familiar!

I appear to be having a very similar issue on my Duramax machine.

At first turning the joystick box on and off seemed to work for a few days but now it is very much stuck on the startup screen with the floating Zeiss logo and blinking drives light and when I try to turn on the drives it states "Not Supported", working through the issue with Zeiss support now and referenced this thread hoping it may answer some questions. Error logs didn't show anything and the cable that connects the joystick box does not seem to have any issues.

Will update once issue is resolved in case they come up with another solution.

Update: I believe it is the motherboard in the back of the CMM.

We have two identically set up CMMs so I did an experiment, I took the jog box off the faulty CMM and put it on a working one and it immediately downloaded the firmware to match the CMM (V35.05) and then was good to go and is running without issues just as it should ... but when I took the jog box from the working CMM and tried it on the CMM that has not been allowing us to fully boot up the drives it is stuck at the floating Zeiss logo screen. It is simply not communicating with the CMM for some reason, it won't update the firmware (should be V38.06 based off what it was at before swapping boxes) and it will not allow me to turn on the drives at all not matter how many times I try to reboot it. Is anyone aware of a way to update the firmware on the jog box manually?

So unfortunately I think I have gone as far as I can without an on-site visit, probably looking at upwards to $14k to get this up and running again, pretty much worst case scenario. At least the other CMM is still running so production isn't at a total bottleneck.

Update 2: After about 8 hours of trying periodically to reboot the CMM the jog box finally decided to let me turn on the drives and I am up and running again. Still bringing in a Zeiss tech though because there is definitely an issue, but at least I can keep this one up and running in the meantime. Small victories.

[[Ja...]]

Quick follow up:

Zeiss tech came out and it was concluded a section of our CMM hard drive had gone bad, specifically the section that deals with booting everything up as he was able to bypass it with a boot drive as a temporary fix. He then went ahead and replaced the whole motherboard section and we have been running fine for a week now. Our CMM is over 10 years old so it was probably due for an update, the new motherboard included a solid-state hard drive so this particular problem shouldn't occur again.