Had a lightning strike. Now need some help troubleshooting.

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Deezl Smoke
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Had a lightning strike. Now need some help troubleshooting.

Post by Deezl Smoke »

I'll try to be direct and brief.

We had a lightning storm. Unusual to be that strong and so close.
Bolt hit one of the 3 phase high voltage wires before the transformer. Nearly severed the wire and blew out the transformer.
Out of habit, I unplug the control cabinet from the 110 wall socket after each use. However I do not cut power to the plasma head. Hypertherm 105.

After storm, computer fires up no issues. Plasma head comes on as per normal, hypertherm runs across the screen, then 85 appears as the default amp. However no motor movement, and a DC fault light on at the controller. Consulted Arclight, and determined it blew out the DTHC card and possibly the PWM box at the plasma head. So bought new, installed. Good motor control.All good there. No fault lights.

But,...the torch will not fire. Tried the usual turn it off then back on again with all components. No result. Rechecked all connections, all correct and proper lights on.

The "torch on" icon lights up, but no fire. Also, the g-code program from Sheetcam should send the amp settings etc., to the torch upon clicking on the "run" icon. It does not appear to be sending or getting the message. I think it's sending the message, but the plasma is not receiving it. I think there's a way to check for recorded codes on the Hypertherm, but I forgot how.

Any other ideas and help diagnosing would be appreciated.
tcaudle
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Re: Had a lightning strike. Now need some help troubleshooting.

Post by tcaudle »

We have a monitored support forum, a direct Request For Support (RFS) form and a website email Meaasge . You need to use those resources.
Lightening strikes can cause damages in several parts of a system and take out more than one module/card.

You start with confirming you CAN fire the torch from the CPC connector (short pin 3 to pin 4) and work back. Obviously if you can fire the torch form the CPC connector nothing you do in the controls is going to fix it. In the RFS you will be asked about the model and versios of software you are runniong. If you put " Dont know" then the answer is "we don't know" since troubleshooting is different for different models.

There are manuals for different systems on the website.

We have worked on a lot of systems than have had lightening strikes and some we suspect had them and we were not told. In most cases it destroys the entire chain of cards that handle things like torch fire . If the trans former blew it not only vaporized one led of AC it most likely sent huge surges though the other two legs and maybe even the building ground.
Deezl Smoke
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Re: Had a lightning strike. Now need some help troubleshooting.

Post by Deezl Smoke »

There's a CandCNC program on the home screen that list devices. I am supposed to have 3 devices shown, I have none. It appears "arc sync" may be responsible.
Went through the troubleshooting guide in the ArcLight manual and I need to contact Arclight tomorrow about it.
Deezl Smoke
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Re: Had a lightning strike. Now need some help troubleshooting.

Post by Deezl Smoke »

tcaudle wrote: Sun Oct 01, 2023 12:21 pm We have a monitored support forum, a direct Request For Support (RFS) form and a website email Meaasge . You need to use those resources.
Lightening strikes can cause damages in several parts of a system and take out more than one module/card.

You start with confirming you CAN fire the torch from the CPC connector (short pin 3 to pin 4) and work back. Obviously if you can fire the torch form the CPC connector nothing you do in the controls is going to fix it. In the RFS you will be asked about the model and versios of software you are runniong. If you put " Dont know" then the answer is "we don't know" since troubleshooting is different for different models.

There are manuals for different systems on the website.

We have worked on a lot of systems than have had lightening strikes and some we suspect had them and we were not told. In most cases it destroys the entire chain of cards that handle things like torch fire . If the trans former blew it not only vaporized one led of AC it most likely sent huge surges though the other two legs and maybe even the building ground.
Ok, I found the support stuff you are mentioning. Pretty cool stuff over there.
tcaudle
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Re: Had a lightning strike. Now need some help troubleshooting.

Post by tcaudle »

"Arc Sync" is their name for the RS495 hypertherm . it does not fire the torch BUT if you run the Hub Utility and see no devices than you have (most likely) a bad 4 port hub OR the USB port on your Control PC is blown. While it doe snto fire the torch , it CAN keep the torch from firing since it has a "watchdog" signal that the hub sends telling the control its working . No WD Good, no torch fire
DMoneyAllstar
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Re: Had a lightning strike. Now need some help troubleshooting.

Post by DMoneyAllstar »

I had a lightning strike take out my Bladerunner in summer '22. Everything was unplugged EXCEPT for the ground to the 45XP and table. Surge backed in through ground rod. Fortunately my business insurance covered the replacement cost of the G5 bundle. Lightning took out every LED TV and light-bulb in my shop and house plus fried a couple of trickle-chargers and LED ceiling fans (all of the standard filament light-bulbs survived unscathed).

I had CandCNC repair the old unit and it's on my back-up gantry. Replaced the PWM, UBOB, DTHC, Table I/O and the Hub. At the time, it was ~$1k repair plus shipping. I've been using this repaired unit recently and it still works great.
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