So...a few weeks later and we're still troubleshooting the Compu-Dobby.
I'm waiting for the arrival of the new Keyspan adaptor to come (due to be delivered tomorrow). I see that a lot of people who use these explain that they break not infrequently and that some people who have used one for a couple of year mentioned that they worked well and then stopped working.
I have a gut feeling that it's not an issue with the Keyspan adaptor, but it might be. But I think that since we were able to connect to the computer using a serial port, i.e. without the need for the adaptor, and it didn't work then, it's likely that it is not the issue. Still, a new one can't hurt, and if somehow it turns out to be that, then that's a nice fix.
AVL helpfully mentioned that it might be that, or it might be a problem with the port in the Compu-Dobby. They also mentioned that it might be the sensor box, but again, since the Compu-Dobby is working fine with the tabby, I would be surprised if it turns out to be that. Again, gut feeling...port.
I'll try the new adaptor when it arrives tomorrow, but I doubt very much that that will be the issue. Maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised. But I suspect that I will need to get the two Compu-Dobby boxes back to AVL for a look-see. Hopefully it won't be that much to repair. If I end up needing a whole new Compu-Dobby, I wonder whether I can just go ahead and get a Compu-Dobby IV (they do have a 16-harness version; dunno whether it would fit my loom or not, but I think it does. The loom itself is in excellent shape; in the worst-case scenario I might have to finance a whole new Compu-Dobby unit.
I've been thinking a lot about this and going in and out of feelings. I am very comfortable with the mechanical dobby and its vagaries; I'm not so bad at good old analog technology. The digital stuff is the next great step, but I suffer from imagining that it's all magical. It's good to be reminded that it is a problem WITH A SOLUTION.
Monday, August 31, 2015
Monday, August 24, 2015
Confounded
So we troubleshot the Compu-Dobby Saturday before last.
The good news is that the Compu-Dobby does function as far as I can tell, and so do all sixteen solenoids in the solenoid box. However, I have been unsuccessful in efforts to get the weaving software on the laptop to talk to the Compu-Dobby. So the Compu-Dobby can weave tabby, via a setting on the box itself, rather than from the computer, and that works fine.
I'm in the middle of diagnostics. Thought it might be the RS-232 cable, so we got a new one, only to find that they had sent a 15-pin rather than a 9-pin; but they express-mailed the 9-pin replacement yesterday and I tried it out. The computer *does* see that there is something connected to it as a peripheral, but it doesn't know what it is and cannot seem to 'talk' to it. Now that I can pretty much confirm that it's not the cable, it's onto the next diagnostic.
Possibilities I've thought of:
1) System software on the laptop.
2) Something to do with the licensing of the weaving software, though Tien downloaded the demo of WeavePoint for me and that should work, but doesn't...so it's likely not that.
3) Might be something to do with the 9-pin port on the Compu-Dobby itself. Ugh...
4) Might be something to do with the settings on the program that I have overlooked.
5) A missing driver of something.
6) Maybe WeaveMaker or another software will work on the laptop instead of WeavePoint.
There are probably more possibilities I haven't thought of, or haven't thought likely. I tend to fall victim to my own magical thinking, and it helped when Tien reminded me that there is surely a cause, and causes can be found and fixed. It's easy for me to fall back into old thinking like "It's broken somehow, don't know why, and that's that". I had a quick little pep talk with myself this weekend to remind me of this and also to caution myself against being too hasty to give up, which has always been one of my bad qualities.
Tonight I may try to load the software onto another PC laptop and test it. If it turns out I have to buy new software, then I'll do so, though it would be an expense.
I may have to call AVL for guidance. Hopefully that won't be too expensive either!
If the Compu-Dobby itself is somehow broken, I may or may not be able to fix/afford to have it fixed. Worst-case scenario would be that I just can't get the Compu-Dobby to do anything other than tabby, in which case I will have to re-attach the mechanical dobby. That's not so bad, as more than a year of weaving on my wonderful AVL has shown me. But even that - I feel a small kernel of protest in my gut about even imagining a worst-case scenario, because I feel do a hunch under it all that whatever is wrong with the Compu-Dobby set up is a fixable problem.
I *can* say that a lot of the potential issues I had earlier dreaded turned out to be fine, such as all the dobby fingers working, all the solenoids working, finding the proper optimum distance for the solenoids from the dobby fingers; whether the Compu-Dobby would work at all (it does!), whether the cables would be any good, etc. Those are good things to remind myself of!
The good news is that the Compu-Dobby does function as far as I can tell, and so do all sixteen solenoids in the solenoid box. However, I have been unsuccessful in efforts to get the weaving software on the laptop to talk to the Compu-Dobby. So the Compu-Dobby can weave tabby, via a setting on the box itself, rather than from the computer, and that works fine.
I'm in the middle of diagnostics. Thought it might be the RS-232 cable, so we got a new one, only to find that they had sent a 15-pin rather than a 9-pin; but they express-mailed the 9-pin replacement yesterday and I tried it out. The computer *does* see that there is something connected to it as a peripheral, but it doesn't know what it is and cannot seem to 'talk' to it. Now that I can pretty much confirm that it's not the cable, it's onto the next diagnostic.
Possibilities I've thought of:
1) System software on the laptop.
2) Something to do with the licensing of the weaving software, though Tien downloaded the demo of WeavePoint for me and that should work, but doesn't...so it's likely not that.
3) Might be something to do with the 9-pin port on the Compu-Dobby itself. Ugh...
4) Might be something to do with the settings on the program that I have overlooked.
5) A missing driver of something.
6) Maybe WeaveMaker or another software will work on the laptop instead of WeavePoint.
There are probably more possibilities I haven't thought of, or haven't thought likely. I tend to fall victim to my own magical thinking, and it helped when Tien reminded me that there is surely a cause, and causes can be found and fixed. It's easy for me to fall back into old thinking like "It's broken somehow, don't know why, and that's that". I had a quick little pep talk with myself this weekend to remind me of this and also to caution myself against being too hasty to give up, which has always been one of my bad qualities.
Tonight I may try to load the software onto another PC laptop and test it. If it turns out I have to buy new software, then I'll do so, though it would be an expense.
I may have to call AVL for guidance. Hopefully that won't be too expensive either!
If the Compu-Dobby itself is somehow broken, I may or may not be able to fix/afford to have it fixed. Worst-case scenario would be that I just can't get the Compu-Dobby to do anything other than tabby, in which case I will have to re-attach the mechanical dobby. That's not so bad, as more than a year of weaving on my wonderful AVL has shown me. But even that - I feel a small kernel of protest in my gut about even imagining a worst-case scenario, because I feel do a hunch under it all that whatever is wrong with the Compu-Dobby set up is a fixable problem.
I *can* say that a lot of the potential issues I had earlier dreaded turned out to be fine, such as all the dobby fingers working, all the solenoids working, finding the proper optimum distance for the solenoids from the dobby fingers; whether the Compu-Dobby would work at all (it does!), whether the cables would be any good, etc. Those are good things to remind myself of!
Friday, August 14, 2015
Wish me luck!
My friend Tien is coming up tomorrow morning to assist me with troubleshooting the AVL Compu-Dobby. I'm excited! I'm also nervous, because because because what if...???!! Software will be loaded onto the PC I'm planning to use for the Compu-Dobby, the Compu-Dobby itself is all mounted, most of the cables are in place (there are a few I'm not totally certain about; seems that some of the cables from the huge pile of cables that came with the Compu-Dobby are duplicates. Hopefully we will figure all that out tomorrow. Doesn't seem overly-complicated, though before me lie the learning curves of the software, and of the behavior of the Compu-Dobby; I already well know the way the mechanical parts of the loom work (how the cables work, the dobby fingers, etc, and I've had more than a year of troubleshooting those parts) so that will help.
And if for some reason we can't get the Compu-Dobby working again, I can always remount the mechanical dobby, and switch to the new system of plastic strips holding the wooden bars together, which will allow me to purchase more wooden bars and thus have longer chains of a repeat.
Crossing fingers!
And if for some reason we can't get the Compu-Dobby working again, I can always remount the mechanical dobby, and switch to the new system of plastic strips holding the wooden bars together, which will allow me to purchase more wooden bars and thus have longer chains of a repeat.
Crossing fingers!
Tuesday, August 11, 2015
Compu-Dobby II !!!
For a while I've been considering the idea of re-mounting the Compu-Dobby II that my vintage AVL came with. The solenoid box was still fixed to the dobby box when I received the loom in February of 2014, but I removed it, stored it carefully with the other Compu-Dobby components, and re-attached the mechanical dobby mechanism and have been using that since. I thought to buy a whole lot more of the wooden bars so that I could have dobby chains with very long repeats, but this did not work out, namely because AVL only sells the wooden dobby bars that are made differently from the old and cannot be used together in a chain. Another option was to buy all new dobby bars and just do it that way, but to do so would have been prohibitively expensive - those bars are not cheap!!
So I decided that at some point in the future I would re-attach the Compu-Dobby mechanism back on the loom, and this past Sunday I removed the mechanical dobby, stored it, and have put all the parts of the Compu-Dobby back on, and connected the cords. I haven't tried running it yet, because I have to reload the software on another laptop. A friend who is way more tech-savvy than I am is coming over this Saturday to try and help me get it running. I'm worried that between the older-model electronics and the older connection cords, and the older software version, that it might just not work anymore. But I had that same feeling about the mechanical dobby, mostly just from doubting my own ability to figure things out, which turned out to be groundless, and it worked well. Perhaps I will be able to get the Compu-Dobby to work. I'm pretty good at working with computers, but I'm MUCH better with analog technology than I am with digital; hence the need for help.
What's the worst scenario? That the software will not work, or the cables will need replacing but are so old and possibly obsolete that I won't be able to get any, or that there will be other mysterious problems. All I need to happen is that the solenoid box obeys the commands I want it to, and I'll be fine. But there are unknowns right now that bother me. That's kind of my pattern, to worry, but if the Compu-Dobby ends up not working, I certainly can't currently afford a new one, or a new AVL. What I'll probably do then is to once again look into the idea of buying a whole lot of new wooden dobby bars and to reinstall the mechanical dobby. So there is Plan B. But I really would like this to work out and to become a viable system for harness choices for me; with the Compu-Dobby you can change the lift plan instantly, interject a few rows of tabby if I like, and such. These are not easily done on the mechanical dobby since each iteration is connected to an actual metal peg in a hole. Not insurmountable, but not expedient either. So I'm crossing my fingers.
So I decided that at some point in the future I would re-attach the Compu-Dobby mechanism back on the loom, and this past Sunday I removed the mechanical dobby, stored it, and have put all the parts of the Compu-Dobby back on, and connected the cords. I haven't tried running it yet, because I have to reload the software on another laptop. A friend who is way more tech-savvy than I am is coming over this Saturday to try and help me get it running. I'm worried that between the older-model electronics and the older connection cords, and the older software version, that it might just not work anymore. But I had that same feeling about the mechanical dobby, mostly just from doubting my own ability to figure things out, which turned out to be groundless, and it worked well. Perhaps I will be able to get the Compu-Dobby to work. I'm pretty good at working with computers, but I'm MUCH better with analog technology than I am with digital; hence the need for help.
What's the worst scenario? That the software will not work, or the cables will need replacing but are so old and possibly obsolete that I won't be able to get any, or that there will be other mysterious problems. All I need to happen is that the solenoid box obeys the commands I want it to, and I'll be fine. But there are unknowns right now that bother me. That's kind of my pattern, to worry, but if the Compu-Dobby ends up not working, I certainly can't currently afford a new one, or a new AVL. What I'll probably do then is to once again look into the idea of buying a whole lot of new wooden dobby bars and to reinstall the mechanical dobby. So there is Plan B. But I really would like this to work out and to become a viable system for harness choices for me; with the Compu-Dobby you can change the lift plan instantly, interject a few rows of tabby if I like, and such. These are not easily done on the mechanical dobby since each iteration is connected to an actual metal peg in a hole. Not insurmountable, but not expedient either. So I'm crossing my fingers.
Sunday, August 2, 2015
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