
Hey all, this sucks.

I have a sainsmart provrXL v2.  I know it's a noodle, but it's enough for what I do, toiling wood projects. It's enough when it works....

My Z stepper has failed.  The X stepper failed when I just got it and the company sent me a replacement and a wire.  I swapped the motor and was off to the races, swapping the wire would have taken 10x the time.

Today I did a facing operation on some poplar and that was fine.  Changed end mill and couldn't get a zero, unresponsive Z.

X and Yx2 are fine, so I swapped the X cables over to the Z and it works for 5 seconds then skips, then nothing.  Red light on the stepper flashes. 

I'm out of warranty and wondering what I can do. 

I could order a kit with 4x steppers, a new control box and cables, which is $402 CAD plus taxes and shipping. At least I would have 3 in the hopper for the next time one fails.

Can I order something else and drop it in?  The stepper has no markings at all.  6 wires total, two marked Z motor (blue/brown) and 4 marked Z signal (black/white/yellow/red) I have no idea what the pin out is.

The specs per the marketing materials are closed loop stepper, NEMA23, 76mm, holding torque of 3.5N•m.  The power supply has two channels, 48V 7A and 24V 8A. The specs list the spindle at 0-48V, so I guess that means the steppers are powered by the 24V side.

Do I have to order one from them or can I order something else with similar specs?  Will the pinouts be the same?  Will the box drive it correctly?

I'm sure I can hassle the company to sell me a single replacement stepper, but now that 2/4 have failed after maybe a few hundred hours of machine time, I would like to avoid this happening again.

Other details if required, I cut wood, model in fusion and send to the machine GBRL using UGS.

Thanks for reading, appreciate any advice here. I've got a pile of things I want to cut. 

Stepper is dead, help with options