General operation of Arburg Allrounder 170 CMD 145-50

[Sccoupe]

Hello.

I have acquired a 1987 Arburg Allrounder 170 CMD 145-50 which is supposed to be in working order. Perhaps someone is familiar with the operation of this machine to give some advise before I start tearing things apart. For starters, it would be good to verify that all of the hydraulics work correctly via the manual functions. The machine powers on OK. The start button on the pendent is pressed as requested by the HMI. Machine operation switch is in manual mode. The hydraulic motor start switch is pressed and the motor fires up. However, none of the manual hydraulic movement buttons move anything.


Does the hydraulic oil have to be at an operating temperature before any manual movements are allowed?
Do all of the alarms have to be cleared from the HMI (red light is not lit, but alarms exist) before manual movement are allowed?
Do the heater bands have to be up to temperature before manual movements are allowed?


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Any help would be appreciated.

Regards
Jason

[douginky]

I didn't see where you checked pump motor rotation.
I'm not Arburg literate, but doubt a press that old wouldn't move in manual if the pump is making pressure and the safety gates are closed.

[Sccoupe]

Pump rotation is correct, I checked that first. :)

Safety gates are closed, but I should double check that the switches activate on the screen. Will do that this evening.

I disconnected hoses on the pumps inside the tank and had flow on both. The smaller pump shows ~3000psi at the test port. The larger pump shows almost no pressure, but its a variable pump with electronic control. So, I wondered if there was just condition that wasn't met.

[nemanja]

Hello,

I worked mostly with ARBURGS with SELOGICA operating system. But i assume is more less same principle for older machines. Can you describe alarms?
Also, manual movement is possible when oil is below operating temperature (on newer machines), screw movements are not until is heated and after "enable time" is done.
Most of the time machine wont allow you to do any movements until alarms are cleared.
Also do you have enough oil inside? :)

[Sccoupe]

There are a lot of garbled values on the screen when first powered up. After loading settings from the tape drive, most of the values show something reasonable as far as I know. This is when the 'alarm f911 memory error' shows. In the manual I have only found alarms that start with S, nothing starting with F as far as how to deal with it.

On the I/O screen, it appears that the safety switches are satisfied (again, as far as I know). The mold door and nozzle doors activate and deactivate on the screen when opened and closed. Are these the only two safety switches?

On the same screen, the oil levels are where they should be. I had to add a couple of quarts of oil to get the 'oil level nom.' to activate.

On the hydraulics screen, the only option that the pedant will change is turning the conveyor belt on and off, though there is no conveyor on this machine. The mold holding pump stays on all of the time whether the motor is running or not. No other indicators change on this screen.

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Regards

Jason

[Sccoupe]

Ok, a little progress but still no hydraulic movement. In the first screenshot of my previous post, the error was f911. On the screen in the f911 position is the baud rate for the printer. This is corrupted at startup, so by setting this to 1200, that error went away(no printer installed).

The new error is 's600 machine zero point hydr. ejector'. This error is in the manual and says only customer service can remedy this mistake. Certainly there is a fix without having to go through Arburg? Will they support a machine this old without charging an arm and a leg?

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Regards

Jason

[Sccoupe]

A little further info this morning. The machine was left on with motor and heaters running for a few hours (s600 alarm still showing). The hydraulic oil and heaters come up to temp fine. I can now hear the hydraulic solenoids clicking when pressing the movement buttons in manual mode but still no movement. So, my best guess now is that the alarm is not allowing the main pump to be stroked, meaning no pressure and no movement. Need to get that s600 cleared.

Jason

[Sccoupe]

And little further info... Screenshots were sent to Arburg in Germany. They were very quick to respond via email, but only to send me to Arburg USA. He did say that "You must contact Arbrug Service US so that they calibrates this machine." So, this has been forwarded to Arburg US, but I expect that they are going to want to send a technician out to calibrate the machine. This sounds expensive and not up my alley. Any ideas on how this could be performed without an Arburg technician?

Regards

Jason

[Crabstix]

Perhaps the machine was equipped with a robot/Sprue Picker? Perhaps the machine is waiting for a signal from the robot/Sprue picker, before it will close the mould. Just another option to troubleshoot.

[douginky]

I think that the robot interface would only inhibit mold movements. The only exception would have been the emergency stop (robot interface) and that would prevent motor starting.
If you have a hydraulic schematic, try and see what the function of each pump is. On most hydraulic clamp machines, the small fixed pump keeps clamp under pressure and maybe nozzle forward and maybe set up or slow functions like mold protect.
The larger, piston pump does most of the other chores, ie., open, close, inject, plasticize, etc.
I would track down the ejector valve, and if possible, poke the end where the sol is and try and manually get it to move into "home" position. The small pump "might" move it.

I would also check all connection to the electronics that control the variable pump. It has an amp somewhere, either mounted on the pump or in the cabinet.
It could have a blown fuse.

[douginky]

Was also going to mention that the cost of the service tech might surprise you. It depends on where they are in relation to your shop.
Travel time is usually a big part of the cost.
Since your people are unfamiliar with that brand, a tech visit would be money well spent. You could learn a lot.

[Sccoupe]

I'm all set for now. The backup battery is bad and it looses calibration settings on each shutdown. Arburg was able to help me out via email to get the calibration settings put back in.

All manual movements are now working correctly. The machine will even go into auto now but there is no mold installed.

Thanks all!