Preventive and Scheduled Maintenance

Diagnosis and troubleshooting help resolve the root cause of the problem, avoiding unnecessary replacements and “temporary” fixes. A proper diagnosis:

• Reduces downtime by identifying the actual cause more quickly.
• Avoids unnecessary costs by limiting “trial-and-error” component replacements.
• Makes the repair more reliable by addressing the root cause of the problem.
• Improves technical traceability, with logs, measurements, and reports that are also useful for the machine’s history.

An intermittent problem is often the hardest to identify because it doesn’t occur every time. Effective troubleshooting relies on method and data collection.

• Gather precise information: when it happens, what the machine was doing, and what signals it produces.
• Try to make it reproducible: recreate the same conditions, changing one variable at a time.
• Proceed by process of elimination: power supplies, wiring, sensors, drives, and machine logic.
• Look for correlations: temperature, vibrations, workload, possible interference.
• Document everything: date and time, conditions, tests performed, and results.

An alarm is a message indicating what the machine has detected at that moment. To determine the cause:

• Note down the alarm code and text, the date and time, and what you were doing when it appeared.
• Check the alarm history and details available on the machine.
• First check the simplest causes: safety (doors, emergency), pressures and levels, temperature, connections.
• Reproduce the situation in a controlled manner, changing one variable at a time.
• Record tests and results: this helps reduce diagnosis time and costs.

Per aiutare il tecnico a capire subito il contesto e arrivare preparato:

• Dati macchina: marca, modello, numero di serie (se disponibile), tipo di controllo (Heidenhain, Fanuc, Siemens) e versione software se visibile.
• Descrizione del problema: cosa succede, da quando succede, con quale frequenza, e se blocca la produzione.
• Allarmi: codice e testo, meglio con una foto dello schermo. Se ce ne sono più di uno, indica quale compare per primo.
• Contesto: cosa stavi facendo (lavorazione, cambio utensile, avvio mandrino), e se hai notato rumori, vibrazioni, odori, perdite.
• Prove già fatte: reset, riavvio, prova a vuoto, riduzione velocità, qualsiasi intervento eseguito.

It depends on the type of control unit and what those batteries power. In general, the alarm indicates that a battery is nearing the end of its life and needs to be replaced.

• If possible, don’t turn it off immediately without thinking it through.
  On some control units, the batteries are used to retain important data in memory when the machine is turned off. If the battery is very low, turning it off could cause some settings to be lost.
• What to do immediately (practical tips)
  Take a photo of the alarm (code and text) and note the date and time.
  If the CNC allows it, perform a backup (machine parameters/data*, programs, offsets, macros), or ask a technician how to do it.
  Check whether the alarm concerns the CNC or the drive/encoder (sometimes they have separate batteries).
• So, can I shut it down?
  If you absolutely must shut it down, do so only after gathering the information and, if possible, after performing a backup.
  The safest option is to contact support and schedule a replacement as soon as possible, ideally following the correct procedure (in some cases, the battery is replaced with the machine powered on to prevent data loss).