Misumi motorized stages

[gintree78]

Hi, I'm trying to get a handle on some potential changes to an x-y motion platform.  The system uses 2 of the Misumi RS1 linear stages with the C1 type controllers.  My Misumi P/N is RS102-C1-N-3-200 for reference.  The current set up uses a joystick for manual positioning, but I want to add LabVIEW position control of the 2 stages. No coordinated motion or anything, just going to a specified location and then waiting for a new position command.  

The controller manual says you can operate the stage via RS232C communcation, but I haven't had any luck finding examples using these motors/controllers.  I've got a request in with Misumi to see if they can provide any sample code.  Before bringing the system offline, I'd like to get an idea of what I'm in for.  Any examples using this hardware would be awesome!  

Thanks!

[tolltroll]

Hi gintree78,

I took a look around the forums and the web, and unfortunately I couldn't find much by way of LabVIEW examples for the Misumi platform. Sorry about that 😞

To get a general idea of how to go about this, could you tell us more about your overall application? Some helpful details would include:

• What is your complete hardware setup?
• What version of LabVIEW and OS are you using?
• What is your experience level in LabVIEW? Have you ever done serial or motion control in the past?
• What is this xy stage meant to do? How does it fit into your project?

Hopefully with some more context, we can at least point you in the right direction!

Nick B.

Applications Engineer

National Instruments

[gintree78]

Thanks for the reply Nick.  So, this is a pretty weird controller.  It turns out the version of the controller we have does not allow for serial communication.  For each stage you can pre-program 255 different locations and then you use 8 digital inputs to tell the controller which point you want it to go to.  There are a bunch of other I/O signals to start/stop motion, etc.  I've never used a controller like this and it's pretty cumbersome to say the least.  Here are the answers to your questions.

• What is your complete hardware setup? - For the XY stage, it's just 2 of these stages and controllers.  It is currently being controlled with a joystick and some push buttons.  No computer control.  The manual controls put the stages into a "manual" mode which allows the user to jog the stages around with the joystick..
• What version of LabVIEW and OS are you using? - I have LV2015 and LV2016, OS is windows 7 professional.
• What is your experience level in LabVIEW? Have you ever done serial or motion control in the past? - I've developed half a dozen or so machines using LabVIEW.  Most systems had some form of motion control.  I've inherited some systems that use serial communication and modified them, but never written one from scratch with no examples.
• What is this xy stage meant to do? How does it fit into your project?  - The XY stages move a fixture around to align a light source with a part feature.  Verification of the correct position is done visually by the user.  

Thanks.

[tolltroll]

Hi Gintree,

If you have a DAQ device available, you could use LabVIEW to program your logic and digital I/O to send commands to the stage and control it that way. Is this something you have on hand?

Unfortunately this does seem like something that would have to be built from the ground up, based on the amount of documentation we've both been able (or rather, unable) to find on the web. Hopefully this wouldn't be extremely complex.

What is the scope of this project? Is it a place that you plan to expand in the future? If so, it might be worth it to look into the motion control options that NI has to offer. SoftMotion is a super powerful tool that can interface with many different types of motors, is relatively easy to use, and has tons of documentation out there to scour.

Nick

[gintree78]

Hey Nick,

I was able to do a little testing and confirmed we could send commands using VISA in LabVIEW which is great. Turns out the application engineer at Misumi was incorrect.  We are considering using something like a USB-6009 to manage the I/O to the controller rather than using physical switches as it is currently set up.  Thanks for the help and I'll be back if I run into any trouble.