I recently had a hard drive controller failure on my CNC computer and had to decide to either replace the motherboard or get a new computer. Most new computers don’t have a printer port anymore so it is getting difficult to find a replacement computer. The old CNC computer used a parallel port (printer port) for Motion Control. You either need to purchase a separate Motion Control add-on card for the computer or you had to try to make a USB adapter work.

USB converters by themselves don’t work with Mach3. Mach3 needs to be able to control the computers interrupt system at a low level which USB simply does not allow. When you also add in the fact that Mach4 will be released soon and will require a motion control card to work,  it seems a dedicated motion control device was the only logical way to bring my CNC machine into the 21st century.

The motion controller card I decided to buy is the SmoothStepper Motion Control board from Warp9td.com. The SmoothStepper is offered in two versions, USB and Ethernet. Either device plugs in between your motor driver and your computer to convert Mach3 commands to pulses for the motor drivers. In my opinion the Ethernet SmoothStepper had better features than the USB SmoothStepper, so I contacted the folks at warp9td and ordered an Ethernet SmoothStepper (ESS). I also ordered a couple of spare parallel port ribbon cables. These would allow me to directly connect the ESS to my HobbyCNC stepper driver board.

ESS Motion Control Card.

What is a ESS anyway? The Ethernet SmoothStepper (ESS) is an external motion controller for Mach3 and Mach4. It has connectors that conforms to the Parallel Port standard, it integrates with most devices that the Parallel Port driver of Mach interfaces with. It accepts commands from Mach and produces Step & Direction signals that are compatible with nearly all step & direction motor drivers. It is a dedicated hardware device that is able to run on any current flavor of Windows, both 32‑bit and 64‑bit. Mach will run under 32-bit or 64-bit, but an external controller is needed for 64-bit editions.

My current old computer connected to my motor drivers via a printer cable. Printer cables had to be short in order to function properly and not drop bits. With the ESS the cable could be up to 328 feet vs. a USB cables max length of 16′. This will allow me to mount my controller box under the machine bed and just run one cable to the computer. this will definitely reduce the trip hazards in my shop. Additionally the ESS has 3 parallel port connectors so there is room to add additional Motor drivers in the future.

Installation

When the ESS arrived I stressed over how hard it would be to install the new motion Control card and get Mach3  configured to work with it. In fact I hestitated for about two weeks before I actually took the plunge. Those two weeks were wasted because the installation was really pretty trivial.

I connected the Ethernet Smoothstepper Motion Control Card to my HobbyCNC Controller.

What had me concerned? Well I use a HobbyCNC driver board and even though I scoured the web I couldn’t find anyone who documented using an ESS with the HobbyCNC controller. I found lots of examples of folks using one with the Gecko G540 so I got worried. Let me put your fears to rest, the SmoothStepper works quite well with the HobbyCNC board.

I opened up my controller box and removed the Printer cable from the HobbyCNC Pro board. Then I plugged an Ethernet (LAN) cable into the computer and also into the ESS. I loaded the drivers on the computer and tested the ESS board. I mounted the ESS board into the case, plugged in the parallel port ribbon cables into one of the ports on the ESS and then into the port on the HobbyCNC Board. Next I attached a 5V, 1amp power supply  (I got it at Amazon) to the ESS and ran the configuration program.

It took me a couple of times to get the configuration program set correctly. I wasn’t reading the directions closely enough and set the IP address incorrectly. Once I got that ironed out the program ran without a hitch.  Windows treats the ESS just like any other network device, it sends it information and the device deals with it from their.

RUNNING IT

Running Mach3 using the SmoothStepper was a non event. The program worked better than expected. Mach3 does a great job of moving the CNC gantry around by itself but it actually does a better job using the ESS. I noticed that the machine jerked less when changing directions and that the edge cuts on my parts had fewer machining marks. I am very happy with the results so far. If you are thinking about making the switch to a dedicated motion control card like the SmoothStepper, I highly recommend you just do it.

CONS

Nothing is perfect and the Ethernet SmoothStepper is no exception. I found the online forum to be inadequate when I had questions about setting up the board. It took me several days to get an answer to my questions. However, I did get those answers eventually. Also the documentation for the ESS is still a rough draft, probably because the designer is so busy innovating and adding  new features that he just doesn’t have the time to finish it. Neither of these problems were deal breakers for me, just be aware they exist.

PROS

It works just like it’s name implies. The steps are smooth and nearly eliminates jerky motion  when my CNC machine changes direction, resulting in better cuts. The Ethernet cable allows me to move the computer further away from the controller box and gets those pesky motor cables up off the floor where I can trip on them. Lastly I have room for expansion.

First Cut using ESS to plane the face of a cutting board.

 I hope you have found this explanation helpful. Based on my experience so far I would recommend using the SmoothStepper Motion Control card with your existing Mach3 3 controller.  Once the drivers are properly installed the ESS is invisible to the operation of the CNC Router. The only exceoption is that the CNC Router table is now ….Smoother.

Please feel free to ask me questions about my setup. If you would like to know more about Mach3 or the ESS, why not subscribe to my free CNC Information newsletter?