To make jogging easier (doing this with the keyboard sucks) I decided its time to build a remote pendant for my Mill. From ebay I ordered a Device with a MPG (Manual Pulse Generator) and two rotary switches. Its prebuild with a case and cable. Like most china-ware, there was no documentation. But I could open the case to check the wiring and cable-colors.
The USB-Interface is a BU0836A device. It allows 8 analog inputs (unused) and 12 switches.
To make the MPG work one needs to configure a pair of inputs of the BU0836 for quadrature encoder. Fortunately there is a config utility for linux. The acutual connection was done by soldering female headers to the open cable ends of the pendant (as seen in picture 1). The pinout is as following:
- Encoder +5V -> +5V
- Encoder GND -> GND
- Encoder A -> SW5
- Encoder B -> SW6
- COMM -> GND
- LED- > GND
- LED+ -> +5V, with 470R in series
- X1 -> SW4
- X10 -> SW3
- X100 -> SW2
- AxisX -> SW12
- AxisY -> SW11
- AxisZ -> SW10
- Axis4 -> SW9
The BU0836 PCB was build into a PVC for protection.
Not only the software-part ist left. To make it work in linuxcnc only a few lines of HAL code are required 🙂
Download it here: pendant.hal