Fuji Frenic Mega won't send output - either from console or keypad

Hi folks,
I've successfully installed simpler VFD's like Altivar's a few times. I got a good deal on surplus Fuji Frenic Mega VFD's and am trying to install one on my drill press. I have a big step-pulley DP that, because of laziness and access beside the machine, basically lives permanently on the lowest speed. I'm trying to VFD the other DP I have to more easily change speeds for smaller holes.

The Fuji's have many more features and complications than that Altivar's I've worked with, and also more quirks, it seems, haha...

I thought the units were dead until I realized they didn't have a required jumper between P+ and P1. After jumping those, I've at least got data on the panel and can adjust settings. I configured the whole thing for my motor and to use keypad input. In run mode on youtube demo's, you can hold the "up" key to set a base frequency, hit go, and the motor turns. No matter what mode I put mine in, the up key never increases the display from zero. Go doesn't do anything either (predictably, with a frequency of zero).

After that, I thought I might not be understanding the keypad controls correctly, so I change the settings to accept analog freq. control from a pot and a push-button "fwd" button. The control recognizes the input from these (checked in the I/O menu), but still won't actually change the freq. displayed or start the motor when pushing the button.

I read in the manual that some models need the PWM pin shorted to the enable pin (EN), but I can't find an EN pin on mine anywhere, so I assume my model doesn't have it?

It's a FRN1.5G1S-4J. I have the line (400v 3ph) on L1/2/3, the motor on U/V/W, P1 jumped to P+, the pot on 11/12/13, and the fwd button on CM/FWD.

Anyone know the magic trick to coaxing these to work?

Oh, and the internal resistor is wired between DB and P+. Those are all of the current connections.

Whenever you use a VFD that has been previously owned, ALWAYS start by finding the parameter that clears all programming back to the factory presets. If you don't do that, you have no idea what kind of gremlin you are chasing.

If it is surplus it may not be a bad idea to just power it up for a few hours with no motor attached and then disconnect power. Then let it sit idle for 24 hours. During that time you can study the manual.

If this is the manual then maybe some forum person can pick out what you need:

https://www.clrwtr.com/UserFiles/CT/Documents/Fuji/FUJI-FRENIC-Mega-Manual.pdf

Jraef said:

Whenever you use a VFD that has been previously owned, ALWAYS start by finding the parameter that clears all programming back to the factory presets. If you don't do that, you have no idea what kind of gremlin you are chasing.

Click to expand...

+100

You need to be able to use the manual to set it up, and the manual normally assumes that the programming is the standard default. Used units may have anything at all programmed, even something so wrong that it will not work. So ALWAYS reset to factory default FIRST, before trying to program the thing.

Thanks all. Factory reset was my first inclination as well, but I had gone looking for it in the top level menu. When I didn't find it, I moved on to trying to reset everything, but probably missed some stuff.

After I posted, I downloaded the Fuji software (my VFD's came with the fancier keypad that can connect via USB for programming and status) and while looking through the table of options there found the H03 data initialization setting.

I didn't have a mini usb cable at work the other day, so I'll give that a try tomorrow - hopefully wiping it clean will give me a better result - or if not, at least having the USB connection will hopefully give me some more status information than I've been getting from the 7 character display and lead to a solution.

Thanks all, I'll report back tomorrow when I have some progress, hopefully!

Success! Immediately after initializing by setting H03 to 1 (which took more reading, you can't just press the up and down keys to set H03 like everything else - you also have to simultaneously hold the STOP button), I immediately had the "keypad control" LED lit for the first time. After putting my settings in, it fired right up!

I'm now left with one question. I have it wired for 3 wire control (momentary push button FWD, REV, and STOP). However, in my application on a DP that I sometimes use for tapping, it would be desirable to be able to configure the VFD to "plug" like a regular drum switch can. It has a braking resistor which I've configured, so it does come to a pretty quick stop, after which I can hit REV to pull the tap out, but it would be faster if you could hit the REV button while in FWD motion and reverse the rotation. It appears that you have to first stop it, then reverse it.

I can't find a config option to allow or prohibit this kind of behavior.

The other option, which would be even slicker, is if you could wire an additional input whose pulse would change the direction. That could be wired to a foot switch. Then, you'd press FWD once, run the tap in, tap the foot switch to reverse out, tap the foot switch to go back to FWD, reposition the workpiece, tap, foot switch to reverse direction and pull the tap out, rinse and repeat. Anyone see a way to do that?

Thanks for all of the help. Even if I don't get this last little thing figured out, what I already have will have breathed tremendous new life into my old drill press.

"Plug" reversing with a VFD is a good way to pop the transistors in the VFD. If you need it to stop faster, use the braking capability it already has to the fullest extent.

JasonPAtkins said:

The other option, which would be even slicker, is if you could wire an additional input whose pulse would change the direction. That could be wired to a foot switch. Then, you'd press FWD once, run the tap in, tap the foot switch to reverse out, tap the foot switch to go back to FWD, reposition the workpiece, tap, foot switch to reverse direction and pull the tap out, rinse and repeat. Anyone see a way to do that?

Click to expand...

I would study the manual and get to know what controls forward and reverse. If a simple state change circuit needs to be built in front of the VFD control pins, their is not much difficulty building that. For example, if the fwd control = 0 and the rev control = 1 then a signal will just change logic state on every pedal switch closure. One logic IC could do that and be installed into the foot switch.

Jraef said:

"Plug" reversing with a VFD is a good way to pop the transistors in the VFD. If you need it to stop faster, use the braking capability it already has to the fullest extent.

Click to expand...

It really should not be, but that possibility does exist. Just depends on exactly what approach they took designing the thing, how much margin they assumed, plus what the response times are in the circuitry.

Since you (the OP, and the rest of us, most likely) obviously do not know any of that, it is probably better to assume that plug reversing is a poor idea unless it can be done within the normal operating area of the VFD, which would mean the VFD is a LOT larger than it has to be, in terms of HP rating and current capability. That way you stay out of current limit as much as possible.

Do I not recall that you are operating from a solar setup, with three linked inverters used to produce 3 phase? Since plug reversing is a large current draw operation, that represents a strain on them as well, and they will have current limits also. Probably best avoided when the entire operation is out in the sticks, and replacement parts are not easily obtained.
I

Thank you all so much for the helpful responses.

I maybe should've been more clear about what I was asking. I don't need it to plug in that I require instant reversing. The VFD braking is very effective (it's a 2hp vfd on a 1hp motor), especially at lower speeds like when tapping. The behavior I desire is the following: I'd like, while the VFD is driving the motor forward, to be able to push the REV button (which I could also parallel wire into a foot pedal, I suppose, because that's the part of tapping that needs the 3rd hand), and I'd like the VFD to do it's normal braking to stop the spindle, then follow it's normal accel curve to spin it back up in reverse. What I'm describing and desire is exactly the way the VFD is currently behaving, except that to get it to do this, I have to first hit stop, then rev. I imagine there's a setting to allow the REV button to "interrupt" an existing FWD command. That's what I'm after. If I can't figure this out, I'll wire the foot pedal in series with the NC STOP button, which will let the foot pedal at least brake-stop the tap, then I can push the REV button.

I LOVE the ability to program a custom line RPM factor into it and have the VFD display the exact DP spindle speed rather than the motor RPM. Awesome!

I have a few more questions now that I've been messing with it. The motor is an old (60's?) open 1hp motor. It obviously was designed in the good old days but with no concern about VFD's. What's a safe max/min to spin it? I saw several people on other posts when I searched suggesting 125% is no problem and 150% is probably even fine. How about the low end? I realize I'll lose torque, but I plan to leave this for higher speed stuff (<5/8" drills) and my bigger one for the heavier stuff, so torque shouldn't be too big an issue. Can I run it down to 20hz and expect the motor to cool itself? In this respect I imagine the old school open motor is better than a modern TEFC motor?

Finally, I'm trying to decide what pulley to choose on the DP to key the spindle speed multiplier to. I'd like the lower end speed to be around 600rpm, but obviously the torquier pulley that I choose, the lower the ultimate top end speed will be (assuming that the belt will never be changed.) Off the shelf, the fastest of the 5 pulley combos had a spindle speed of 2200rpm. Any bets on how fast I can safely spin that to drive smaller drill bits? Or should I even care? Most of my work is mild steel, so 2200rpm for a 1/8" bit is fine and I don't drill much smaller than that with any frequency anyway. If I set min at 20Hz and max at 75hz (125%) then on the 2nd to fastest pulley I have a spindle range of 500rpm to 1900rpm. Seems like a decent happy medium to me, if the purpose is drilling and tapping around 1/2" and less? Even slower for tapping would be nicer, but I imagine the torque under 33% would really be lacking, esp for tapping. I can mess around with this question, just wondering if anyone's already thought this through so I can think about something else, haha...

Thanks again!

Ok, well, no free lunch, haha... On the 2nd to fastest pulley, 20hz vfd output to get 500rpm at the spindle, it can't push a 1/2" drill through M.S. Even bumping up to the 3rd pulley, it still stalls if I'm feeding like I normally would.

So I guess at this point, I either need to accept that it's a ~3/8" dia or less machine, step further down the pulley trading top speed for torque (though I can get some top speed back if I can overspeed more than the current 125%), or swap the motor for a 2hp motor to match the VFD, to pick up more low end torque.

What HP is that VFD?

If you want RPM then install a photo-interrupter with a slot on a piece of aluminium and mount to the left motor clamp (with the black knob). Then glue a piece of plastic on the top of the largest pulley. Every revolution a pulse will occur.

The above picture is for a BP mill. The same thing can be done with a drill press. A LED display with a pulse counting circuit can display the RPM.

rons said:

What HP is that VFD?

If you want RPM then install a photo-interrupter with a slot on a piece of aluminium and mount to the left motor clamp (with the black knob). Then glue a piece of plastic on the top of the largest pulley. Every revolution a pulse will occur.

Click to expand...

Sorry rons, what I meant to say (but apparently didn't clearly) was that I was impressed that functionality was already built into the VFD. Using settings E43, E44, E48, and E50 (if I remember correctly) you can have the VFD display show a calculated output shaft RPM (motor rpm x shaft multiplication factor), so I programmed the pulley step factor into E50 and now the display constantly reads the spindle RPM (not accounting for slip/stall, which your more elaborate setup does factor).