Replacing the broken Nowforever E/A100 with something else

Hello

I have a Carving CNC X6-1500GT that has the Nowforever E/A100 VFD connected to a 1,5KW 400Hz 24000RPM spindle.
Nothing out of the ordinary here, and it has been working rally good for quite som time.

But I got some error that didn't make the VFD boot up so to speak.
It showed some wierd errors on the display, and the relays refused to click on.
Probably something in the self test that isn't as it should be.

I got a hold of a proper ABB 1,5KW ACS550 VFD, that is suppsed to handle the frequency without a problem.
The thing is that I set up everything correctly, ramps and frequencys ....the works.
And it justs make a shudder and goes into over current directly.
Tried many different settings, none are working.
We tried with one phase and 3 phases, no change

I tried an old 3 phase ABB VFD, and with that one it worked just fine.
But it's 3 phases and not enough frequency.
But that confirmes that the Spindle is fine.

So it's probably something not compatible in the drive, because it works fine with a 50Hz motor.

If anybody has any ideas of either VFD I am all ears.

Or I thought about bying a brand new VFD, but what brand?
I think that Nowforever is out of the question, I'm really convinced that the huyanyang ones are that good either.
Hitachi maybe?

All suggestions are welcome.

Best regards
Patrik

slaith

The Carving CNC X6-1500GT that has the Nowforever VFD is not correctly wired, that it why it failed, you will find, that they had not used a ground wire, from the VFD to the spindle, Plus no Ground wire from the VFD to the mains AC supply input, this is why they fail, there may also be some parameters not set correctly as well

The Nowforever is quite a good VFD, compared with other VFD Drives

IF the ABB VFD has the right spec, (400Hz) then you are not setting the correct parameters to get it going

You can not run your spindle on anything other than 400Hz or you will damage the spindle, which you may already have done

Yeah I know it wasn't properly wired, but nothing went bang in any way.
But maybe that's not the way they die?
Saw somebody who posted that his blew fuses, that is not the issue here.

Could well be that it is some silly parameter that hasn't been set properly, we went over the manual and all other settings several times.
I just can't find the proper setting, it just shudders a little and the goes into overcurrent.
And yes it is capable up to 500Hz, so that will work just fine.
We tried another ABB drive with just the same issue unfortunetly

No the windings are not shot, they are all 1,5ohms each between all of them.
So the spindle is fine in every way.

It doesnt have to run at 400Hz, the frequency and voltage follow each other from bottom up.
That is why we are using a VFD after all isn't it?

The older ABB VFD we used was a 3 phase one, but since we didn't run it up to 400V there was no overvoltage at the windings.
It ran great, sounded good.
No issue at all.

It's a really wierd issue.
It should just run.

My bad!

Was a little to quick with the voltage frequency response.
But the frequncy does vary.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by slaith

Yeah I know it wasn't properly wired, but nothing went bang in any way.

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They are not going to go Bang, They are extremely dangerous to run, the VFD will self destruct when it has had enough, No Ground wire means Death

Quote:

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Originally Posted by slaith

Saw somebody who posted that his blew fuses, that is not the issue here..

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His was wired incorrectly, that is what caused his problem

Quote:

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Originally Posted by slaith

Could well be that it is some silly parameter that hasn't been set properly, we went over the manual and all other settings several times.
I just can't find the proper setting, it just shudders a little and the goes into overcurrent..

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Overcurrent is you have the wrong Parameters set,there are only around 5 or 6 important parameters to set, they are very simple to do really

Quote:

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Originally Posted by slaith

It doesnt have to run at 400Hz, the frequency and voltage follow each other from bottom up.
That is why we are using a VFD after all isn't it?.

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Your thinking is not correct,the settings ( parameters ) in the VFD Drive must be set to 400Hz, if not the Drive or the Spindle will be damaged, for the lowest speed setting parameter in the VFD,100Hz would be about right for your spindle, all the other Frequency settings need to be set at 400Hz for the spindle to run

Quote:

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Originally Posted by slaith

It's a really weird issue.It should just run.

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It will if it is wire correct, & has the right parameters set, for it to run, trying to run your spindle with incorrect settings, will only damage the VFD or the spindle

Ok let's see

Yes that could probably be it when it comes to wiring, I really have no idea.
Anyhow it's dead now and the new cabinet I'm working on will be grounded and using proper Ölflex cable.
So that will not be and issue in the future.

We set all the parameters correctly.
220V, 400Hz, 24000RPM, 1.5KW and so forth
Ramp up and ramp down 5 seconds.
The guy that helped me works on these on a almost daily basis, and he couldn't really wrap his head around the issue either.
Because the VFD worked just fine with a 50Hz motor.

Yep we did set it to between a hundred up to 400Hz, independant of where the frequency was when we started it still went to overcurrent.

It's was wired correctly.
You can't really mess that up with a 3 phase motor, since it will run either direction.
And yes we did try to swap to leads and it just changed direction before shutting down again.

I'm a litlte bit at a loss here.
Just don't know what to try next.

Manual for VFD if anyone is interested

Quote:

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Originally Posted by slaith

Manual for VFD if anyone is interested

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I will take a look I think I already have that manual, I have most VFD Drive information

If the Drive ran with a 50Hz motor, then he did not set the Base Freq to the correct setting for your 400Hz spindle, you need to start at around 12 seconds for ramp up Ramp down, sometimes it better to even go higher when setting up for the first time, this is related to the overvoltage alarm

Yes, it ran fine
But all the choices in the menus where there was 50Hz was changed to 400 and it still did not work.

12 seconds is totaly unacceptable for me, by that time my program will have started running and ruined the end mill and material.
We did try with 10 seconds, but it shut down at once. There was really not that much time difference between 5 and 10 seconds

I used 2,5 seconds on the old one without any overcurerent alarm at all.

I shouldn't have to insert sleep states in the program just to get it to work.

Very much appreciate your input, if you have the time please have a look and feel free to come with suggestions.

slaith

There is more than one parameter that needs to be set to 400Hz

That time was just to get going, You adjust the Ramp up Ramp down once everything is running

2.5 seconds for stoping is going to damage the drive, without a Braking Resistor installed, then you could most likely get down to about 1 second,for Stopping

For Ramp up, you have to remember you are going from zero rpm to 24,000, it does not matter how good your system or Drive is, it will still take time to get up to that speed, & it will be more than 2.5 seconds for these spindles to get up to max RPM

If you are using Mach3, you can set a hold time in the control, for spindle Ramp up, nothing is needed in the program

Yeah I suppose there is.
I just looked through all the menus hunting for frequencys, probably missed something.
There is no obvious menu that says core frequency, just nominal frequency.
And that menu is the first thing I adjusted, but to no avail unfortunately.

Ok, yeah it's better to have a higher ramp and adjust it down from that of course.
The 2,5 second was up ramp, down was around 5 or more I think.

Yes I am using Mach3, will have the check the setting for program delay.
But first I need to get the spindle running manually.

Has anybody else made a more comprehensive list of what to change? I have a NowForever D100 VFD with an 800w spindle. Seems like everything is good but when I go to run it the motor spins at what the machine says .11 RPM. Asjusting Hz does nothing. I was pretty sure I got all the settings right so I'm a little confused. Swapping a wire just gives the same result. Voltage seems to be correct coming off the VFD when running and the spindles has about 1.3 Ohms across all the phases. Is there a factory reset P code for this particular VFD? Perhaps I just need to start fresh.