Has anyone out there tried to use the balancing program on the 2500 on anything shaking hard?
I'm not talking pie factory balancing, but real world field balancing.

Dave

What's the problem? Or are you thinking of buying one perhaps?

Ron,

I have walked upon some wild ones (40,000#,1200 RPM, 52 mils) that came loose before the 2500 would take a reading. Stays on "hardware settling", "Ranging" and some other message. Waited 20 secs and it wouldn't take a reading. Bearing broke loose.
Brought DataPac next day, and within 3 secs of hitting speed, I had a stable phase and punched the button.
This was the third time I tried to use the Enpac on something that was wild, and it wouldn't give me a reading.
I have used it on regular "pie factory" balancing (machine not out far) and it worked all right.

I also have some other issues with the program,
but the long time getting a reading is the biggy right now.

Have you experienced this??

Dave

I haven't used a 2500 but from seeing it at a trade show it has similar functionality to an Enpac 1200 which I do have. Some settings are crucial for different applications such as your "wild" machine.

In the configuration screen check these settings:
Fast Averaging; ON
Auto Store; OFF
Auto Advance; OFF
Acquisition; Continuous
Auto Ranging; Aggressive
Mach. Speed; Normal

The other thing to check is whether the filter being used is "OVERALL". Depending on your fmax and LOR, the low cutoff could be too low causing a very long settling time. This is a problem in the dataPAC which may also be in the Enpac 2500 but you'll have to confirm that with Rockwell. Hope this helps.

Ron,

Have checked all of those. I've set everything to be as quick and aggresive as it can be. I even set the settling time down to 1 sec just in case it had anything to do with it.

I have been in contact with ROckwell. It seems I am the only one to complain

This balancing program used in the 2500 was taken from a balancing stand machine. It is NOT the program used in the DataPac. There are some bells and whistles in it (such as different radius weight placement) which I suppose would be handy if you had never balanced anything before, but the way the thing is sit up for a balancing stand is certainly not what you find out in the field.

Oh well, I wa hoping one of the 200 or 300 other users that are balancing with it (or so I was told) had came across the same problems.

I'll bump the post once in a while.

Thanks,

Dave

Dave,
I to use the 1200 program but Under balance options
Advanced setup
filter 10Hz (higher reduce settling time
No.Averages 2
This should reduce it but I agree the hardware settle is painfull

Bruce

Bruce,

hanks for the reply. I had my averages set to 1. Still didn't do any good. I think I was using the 10HZ, but I don't remember now.
I think the Enpac ranges from the bottom (0) up, wheras the DataPac goes from top (100?) down. That is the only way I can reason how the DataPac will see a wild thing so quickly.I still don't know what "Hardware" the thing is waiting on to settle. If it is the transducer, I wish they would negate that. I just want phase on something crazy.

Thanks for the reply.

Dave

Dave; I would like to take this opportunity to make an observation about your problem. Hope you don't mind.
I think Rockwell is making a huge mistake to drop the dataPAC line. The instrument is superb in many respects, all they would have to do is add another "real" channel. When I bought the Enpac 1200B, it was promoted as the latest and greatest and I fell for it hook, line and sinker. The Enpac 2500 is supposed to be the best of the 1200 and the dataPAC combined but I have serious doubts. The screen size alone is going to be problem for a lot of people. Now, I haven't actually used a 2500 in the field but from my playing with it and reading your post (I think there was someone else on here that also had some issues)I would stay clear. It's too bad. I hope to keep my dataPAC running for as long as possible.

Ron,

As a data collector, it's a good box. I have the two channel function, and I like what the box will do. It's much faster than datapac after you punch the button to start collecting.It does seem to have a problem with a ski slope on low freq readings. Analog nor RSS filters help. Don't know what they will do about that. I've reported it and sent a template with example.

However, as a field balancing unit, it sucks.
As I said before, I am afraid the ones in charge have no field experiance, and thought they were doing good by sticking a balancing stand program in it. As you know, with a balancing stand, you can vary the speed, and if it's too far out, just run it slow until you get it under control. In the field, it's a different story. I'm going to tell you that a 40K# rotor shaking at somewhere around 52 mils is a site to behold and hear . I was so disgusted with the Enpac, it almost met an early demise. Wish those that are in charge of the 2500 could have been there.

I agree with you on the DataPac. I am going to use only it for balancing. It's quick, easy to use, and hasn't failed me yet. It's getting old, but with the 5.10 op system, I have not had any card reading problems now. That was/is it's biggest problem, the card reader.

Thanks for your reply.

Dave

Dave,
The other thing you could try is telling the unit that the transducer is more sensitive than it really is. This should desensitise the ranging. You could try changing the measurement type to the raw signal ie Acceleration
Whilst the Enpac balancing does have some issues. It does have one feature that the 2130 and datapac do not two channel balance with the readings taken simultaneously.
The datapac was an excellent instrument but the balancing program on it was crap it had a brilliant phase/magnetude/speed display (which could show real time phase fluctuations in low speed data)which was unused by the balance software.

I hadn't thought of that Bruce, balancing in acceleration. I guess I'm old and set in my ways (mils).
I'll try that on a pie factory demo unit I have here at the house. Certainly not going to try it in the real world

I liked the phase/magnitude/speed display also on the DP. The thing I liked about the DP balance program was it is straight forward and easy to use.

I always wanted the combine/split program on there like all of the pre-datapac instruments used to have. The 2500 has it, but I haven't used it yet.

Perhaps in another year or two it will get straightened out.

Dave