serial rs232 cable help?

[BryWY]

Surely this can't mean we cannot put together a cable that wipe work?

 

[BryWY]

I am going to order this and the usb conversion to go with just waiting for some money to come in...

 

[Les Jones]

This is my guess at the way the cable should be wired with the information available


9 pin female end (PC) 9 pin male (Plotter end )

2 (RX) (in) --------------------------- 3 (TX) (out)
3 (TX) (out)-------------------------- 2 (RX) (in)
5 (SG) -------------------------------- 5 (SG)


1 (DCD) (in)
} Linked
4 (DTR) (out) ------------------------ 1 (DCD) (in)
} Linked ............................Linked {
6 (DSR) (in) ....................................6 (DSR) (in)

7 (RTS) (out) ------------------------ 8 (CTS) (in)
8 (CTS) (in) ------------------------- 7 (RTS) (out)

NOTE The minus signs are wires. The dots are only there to space out the text. This site seems to remove the space character (0x20)

Les.

 

[KeepItSimpleStupid]

I agree.

Use the actual pin numbers that are marked on the connector.

 

[BryWY]

OK Les here is what you are suggesting I broke up a new serial cable( in an ttempt to avoid confusion) with the pin out wire colors as follows:
1BRN
2RED
3ORANGE
4YELLOW
5GREEN
6BLUE
7PURPLE
8GREY
9BLACK


Les' suggestion
orange to red 3-2
red and orange 2-3
green to green 5-5
Brown/yellow (pc)to brown/blue (plotter) 1&4-1&6
purple to grey 7-8
grey to purple 8-7

 

[KeepItSimpleStupid]

Les and I are basically ON THE SAME PAGE.

The tool of the trade was the RS232 breakout box. See: https://www.amazon.com/RS232-DB25-B...qid=1460158433&sr=8-2&keywords=rs232+breakout

The one I had was more like this: **broken link removed** but without tr-state LEDs.

Unfortunately
, there are way to many places for things to go wrong.

There is port connections, baud rates, data bits, parity, software flow, hardware flow, messed up signals by the manufacturer: Some used DTR/DSR for flow. Others used RTS/CTS like they were supposed to. Some would get DTE and DCE mixed up.

Nearly all of my troubleshooting was with 25 pin connectors. I did set up a terminal server that used RJ45's. For the most part, you could fix it at the 25 pin end when the IBM PC came out.

RS485 was much much worse and so was mixing Apple's RS422 with a Real RS232 set up.

In this case we are assumeing that the software side is OK.

 

[BryWY]

Cut open a new standard serial cable her is the color pin config

1BRN
2RED
3ORANGE
4YELLOW
5GREEN
6BLUE
7PURPLE
8GREY
9BLACK


Les' suggestion
orange to red 2-3
red and orange 3-2
green to green 5-5
Brown/yellow to brown/blue 1&4-1&6
purple to grey 7-8
grey to purple 8-7

Here is a pic of the old end notice a blob of solder almost looks like it is grouned to a pin also appears to be a bridge between 6 and 7

 

[BryWY]

Here are some better pics of that plug that broke...might help a bit will try to clean it up a bit and take more

 

[KeepItSimpleStupid]

The pic is way out of focus.

Sometimes if you use a flash, you can put a piece of paper in front of it to diffuse the light, but it's best to illuminate the object and not use a flash.

 

[BryWY]

Cleaned up

 

[BryWY]

OK few more with more light

 

[KeepItSimpleStupid]

So you have a bridge between 1 and 6.

SG and the solder blob are likely connected together.

With the cutter turned off, you could measure the resistance from SG to any metal exposed part on the cutter. They should be connected.

and/or

The shield of your cable is connected to the blob on one side.

 

[BryWY]

OK haven't tried last configuration in post #61 yet. Should I go ahead and give that a test or does the close ups of the old plug change things?

 

[KeepItSimpleStupid]

Les's suggestion is essentially the same as what I suggested.

SG really should be connected to chassis ground. Shielded cables are sometimes used, but rarely.

If you just do the 2/3 swap and connect 5 AND set the software to no flow control rather than hardware flow control, you LIKELY (not sure though) can send a really small job to the printer.

That's why it's so nice to have a breakout box.

Confirm again: You basically have pins on the cutter and pins on the PC so your cable is Female to Female. This generally would confirm a null modem cable.

You have no serial port documentaion of the cutter?

Does the cutter by chance use HPGL, G code or is it propreitary?

I'm trying to come up with other ideas, but there's nothing to work with.

A link to a manual even?

 

[BryWY]

Plotter is a Desay Master Cutter xy 380p. Unfortunately I lost the manual but I think I remember reading somewhere that if does use hpgl code.

I remember the manual was just a small booklet not very much information....

definitely female to male cable

 

[BryWY]

So connected green to ground giving continuity to chassis ground tested old cable and found out that was the case but new cable green was isolated

lets hope this works....

 

[BryWY]

NO NOTHING GRRRRRRR

 

[BryWY]

OK I SET PORT TO NO FLOW CONTROL AND SENT TEST PRINT AND THAT WORKED....WE ARE MAKING PROGRESS...

 

[BryWY]

TRIED SENDING A SMALL JOB OVER BUT IT IS CUTTING CRAZY LINES ALL OVER ...SIGNALS MUST BE ALL MIXED UP

I AM VERY ENCOURAGED BY THE FACT WE GOT SOMETHING AT LEAST....

 

[BryWY]

TRIED ANOTHER JOB ...STARTS OUT GOOD BUT THEN GOES WONKEY.....WILL WAIT FOR MORE SUGGESTIONS....THANKS FOR ALL YOUR HELP....