Chinese Laser issues

[Mike Galea]

I was wondering if anyone out there could possibly help me troubleshoot some issues with my Chinese laser engraver. I purchased an 80 watt engraver from Hurricane Lasers (which is no longer in business). I recently went to turn it on, and I only get display message.jpg. The laser head does not move at all, and it just sits at this message. I have a flash drive with the firmware, which I have tried to boot up from, but it will not read it at all and does nothing. I replaced the x and y limit switches , still nothing. I am suspecting that somewhere in the chasis,pic of silver box in top left corner.jpg a wire or something may have come loose, but I really have no idea where to start troubleshooting, or even who would supply parts for these.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Dave Sheldrake]

2 possibles

On the underside of the control pad there is a wire that connects to the mainboard, if that comes lose the machine fails-safe so won't move. It has a habit of being knocked by the cable chain on Weike machines (Hurricane are weike)

Second option, the pen drive is not bootable.it is used to reflash the machines firmware. If the pad wire isn't lose let me know and I''ll post instructions for flashing the firmware

[Mike Galea]

Thanks for the info.... I will try that tonight.

[Mike Galea]

I went home last night and could not find any loose wires to the control pad.

[Ray Beaty]

I have a 60 watt from Hurricane (gweike laser) that the x,y and z axis just suddenly quit working while back and still not working. You can get parts from Ray at Rabbit Laser as his lasers are gwekie brand. Check out his web site Rabbit Laser.com

[Ray Beaty]

rabbitlaserusa.com

[Dave Sheldrake]

Rabbitlaserusa sell HX Lasers not weike

[Ray Beaty]

Sorry my mistake, I was told I could get parts for my gweike at rabbit laser therefore I just assumed thay sold this brand laser!

[Dave Sheldrake]

90% of the parts are the same

Controller card, HT Power supply, Step drivers, low voltage PSU's Cable chain, lens's etc

In general though HX are much higher standards of manufacture, weike have improved a lot of late but still have some problems with after sales

[Dave Sheldrake]

NO lose wire means flashing the firmware

1) Copy the two files ********.FMW and ********.HDW to the root of a USB Mass Storage Device. The Device must be formatted as FAT16. It's better to remove any other files from the root of the Storage Device. (use the memory stick they gave you as it's ready to use)
2) Power on, then the indicator D1 in the mainboard of MPC6515 will flash two times instantly.
3) Insert the USB Mass Storage Device into MPC6515. (direct into the card, not via the cable, unplug the cable and use the USB port on the card)
4) The indicator D1 will light for 2 to 10 seconds depend on the size of the firmware files. It means downloading. Don't remove the USB Mass Storage Device.
5) Once the indicator D1 flash frequently, the downloading is end.
6) Remove the USB Mass Storage Device, and the MPC6515 will load the new firmware. Repeat the steps if the MPC6515 not work after downloading

[Mike Galea]

Dave,

I tried to flash the firmware, followed the instructions, but does not even recognize the USB drive (the Drive is correctly formatted FAT16). I even tried to rule out the USB port and plug the USB drive in directly to the Mainboard (I just unplugged the USB cable from the motherboard, and plugged in the flash drive, still nothing. Would this mean that I need to replace the Motherboard ? Here is a pic of the board (I am a little confused on the location of all of the Indicator lights (I think D1 is the middle light, which blinks), I have a video of the board and what the lights are doing, I am not really sure how to upload it here, but I could email it to anyone that thinks it may be helpful to troubleshoot the issue.

motherboard lights.jpg

[Dave Sheldrake]

MPC6515-IO-1.png

D1 position

[Bill George]

How old is the machine? If it was me, I would check every connection with a screwdriver... looking does not count. Its going to take you a while, but unless your machine has taken either a power surge or lightning strike I find it hard to believe that just out of the blue your controller is bad. The replacement of the controller and keypad is not the big deal, its getting ALL those settings back in correctly. Cables, plugs and screw connections, check them all.

[Dave Stevens-Vegas]

It's not out of the realm of possibility the controller board has failed. Components often fail on power up when they see inrush current and it doesn't necessarily mean the main chip has failed but that another part of the circuit could have failed.

These sorts of control boards basically all work the same way, there are just different implementations. In my experience with control electronics like this when it won't boot and won't flash it's usually time to replace the board. In some cases when the bootloader or ROM doesn't respond nor does the USB work you can get the firmware on the board by using an in system programmer but most of the time the circuit is smoked and needs to be replaced.

If you don't have it the manual for the 6515 is at http://www.leetro.com/english/down/p...anual-V2.0.pdf There is a legend for the row of D lights on the main board that can display an error message though if you have a hardware failure that might not help.

[Mike Galea]

I have literally spent hours upon hours checking every single connection in the system, and they all seem to be connected. After reading Dave's post on where the d1 light was located, I turned the system on and watched the d1 light. It does not blink at all, just stays solid green, even when trying to flash the firmware. In Chapter 8, it says that the d1 light should flash green quickly. Would this lead me to believe that it definitely is a motherboard issues, or would a faulty wire still possibly cause the d1 light to stay a solid green ?

Thanks again for all of you guys and your help. I guess this is what I get for going with the Chinese system and not spending the few extra bucks on a better system. That will never happen again.