Sensor Based Motor Troubleshooting (5.3.2)

Modified on Fri, 25 Oct at 1:51 PM

Sensor Based Motor Troubleshooting

If you have Sensor Based Motors, a sensor and coupler will be attached to the side of the motor which appear like this:

If your motor arm is out of the natural/level position it should be reset.
To re-calibrate the motor arm, you will need the small Allen Wrench/Hex Key provided in your hardware kit.

Over time the motor-sensor coupler bolts may get loose and the neutral motor position can get misaligned from normal (often the arm moves just a bit higher than horizontal). If this is the case perform tests (see section 5.4) to make sure the motor is moving correctly first or consult DOF Reality Support.

Please review the video of the calibration procedure:

Before starting, fully exit everything else on the PC possible, especially Sim Racing Studio and SimHub. Check the Windows task manager to ensure the programs are closed.

Download https://dofreality.com/tools.zip, unzip all contents into any local folder on your PC. RunTools app. There are no viruses or malware there.You can ignore antivirus warnings. Follow on screen instructions and click the “StartSMC3Utils” Button.
Only if you can’t get previous step to open SMC app without error:
Open with notepad file SMC3Utils.ini and set COMM_PORT= to proper COM port number from your Windows Device Manager (see 5.1) Each control box has a specific port number. Test one box at a time. Start/run SMC3Utils.exe. If you are getting error messages about the COM port communication, you haven’t set the port number properly in the previous step.

Make sure the DOF Reality control box power is OFF (make sure motor connections and the USB remain fully plugged in).
Using a wrench and the large allen wrench, disconnect the silver threaded “motor arm” from the motor that needs to be re-calibrated. Disconnect only from the motor side and leave hanging freely. If you have a damper attached, you will need to disconnect that as well. The motor needs to be free to move.
On the side of the motor pointing towards the center of the platform,use a small allen wrench to loosen the “coupler” (silver tube like roller). You only want to loosen the two small allen screws on the MOTOR SIDE. The other side is the “sensor” that connects to the plastic cover. Do not touch the sensor side allen screws.
On your PC go to the SMC3 application. With a computer screen-shot (or your phone) take a picture of the SMC3 screen with the current settings and values (IMPORTANT).
At top left of SMC3tool now click “ON” the motor that needs calibration.
Click the “step1” buttons to say “step10”
Click “KP” down to “60”
“PWMmax” to “60” and “Ki” to “0” (zero).
At this point the “Max Limits” and “Clip Input” should also have adjusted down to 0 as well. If not,then click them both to“0”.
Power ON the DOF REALITY control unit.
By hand, slowly rotate the “coupler” (silver tube like roller). It will move the green graph line in the SMC3tool. Make sure this is happening.If not,start over.
Now slowly rotate the coupler until the small black motor arm is positioned at the “2:30” position as on a clock (pointing forward, AWAY from the black portion of the motor). If you are calibrating the rear yaw/traction loss motor it should be left at a 90 degree angle.
Disconnect only the Motor power cord from the Control Unit. The Control Unit must be ON.
Now looking at the SMC3 program tool, slowly rotate the coupler until the green line sits in the middle of the graph slightly below the blue line.
Now take the allen wrench and without moving the “coupler”, properly tighten ONE of the allen screws we previously loosened (as you do this make sure the green line stays in position on SMC3 with the blue line).
Tighten then the second allen Screw.
Now in the SMC3 application, turn all values back to original settings(from your earlier screen-capture picture).
Default setting on screen below:

Connect the Motor power cord to the Control Unit.
Onthe SMC3tool at the bottom left area, click “Sine”.
If we have been successful the green and blue line on the SMC3 will start moving up and down almost together with the black motor arm we just re-calibrated.
Exit SMC3 tool and you are ready to go.
If this is not fixing your problem, please review and repeat these steps very carefully. If you are still not able to re-calibrate the motor arm to a horizontal position,contact DOF Reality support.