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Jim, I never thought of that, so tonight when I get home, I'll check the leveling roller.  I don't think there's any way to adjust it on my machine and I don't think there is a clearance problem, but it never hurts to check.  Thanks for the idea.

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Lora,

I don't know....maybe some sort of cleansing ritual is required....you know to scare away the quilt ogres .....just kidding.....but it is frustrating....I couldn't figure out why my machine would "bounce" when it was close to the leveler bar...Kare McTavish was here checking out stuff...and she just said...I'll fix that....and loosened my handles...hughhhh?????  said try that...I did ...and it worked!!!  I was putting some downward pressure on the handles when I got the head back there....so now when I did that...the handles moved not my machine....I had been lifting the back of the machine up just a bit.....so now I know not to do that and what causes it when I do.....

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Lora,

I don't know....maybe some sort of cleansing ritual is required....you know to scare away the quilt ogres .....just kidding.....but it is frustrating....I couldn't figure out why my machine would "bounce" when it was close to the leveler bar...Kare McTavish was here checking out stuff...and she just said...I'll fix that....and loosened my handles...hughhhh?????  said try that...I did ...and it worked!!!  I was putting some downward pressure on the handles when I got the head back there....so now when I did that...the handles moved not my machine....I had been lifting the back of the machine up just a bit.....so now I know not to do that and what causes it when I do.....

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Lora,

I don't know....maybe some sort of cleansing ritual is required....you know to scare away the quilt ogres .....just kidding.....but it is frustrating....I couldn't figure out why my machine would "bounce" when it was close to the leveler bar...Kare McTavish was here checking out stuff...and she just said...I'll fix that....and loosened my handles...hughhhh?????  said try that...I did ...and it worked!!!  I was putting some downward pressure on the handles when I got the head back there....so now when I did that...the handles moved not my machine....I had been lifting the back of the machine up just a bit.....so now I know not to do that and what causes it when I do.....

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Ugh!  Well I just went through all the tests on the IQ support page related to the obstruction detected error message.  What I found is that I think the Y motor is causing the problems.  I am able to move it when I hit the obstruction, but not able to move the X motor.  Also when I try to calibrate the motor strength, the X motor sets at 5-6 and the Y motor goes all the way to 20.  Yikes! 

I just sent in all the pertinent info along with the logs to Zoltan.  Hopefully, I will hear something soon. 

Question -- do you think it would be wise to send back both motors and have Zoltan test and refurbish both of them?  Or should I just send the one that I know is bad.  

Does anyone know how long the warranty on the IQ system is?  I got my system installed in Nov 2014, so I don't know if it's still under warranty or not. 

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Lora, unless the problem was caused by you (which I know it wasn't), Zoltan won't charge you anything.  Customer service is very important to him.   I had my IQ over 5 years and he replaced the wheels free.  I would do whatever Zoltan tells you to do.  Those are some crazy settings for the Y-Motor.  Zoltan can tell what's wrong by going through the logs.  He's fairly quick with getting back to you but remember it's "show season". 

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Show season.  Ugh.  That sounds like it's going to take forever to get my stuff looked at.  Hopefully I'm wrong, but I know when they're doing shows they have other priorities, understandably. 

Did I mention that this all happened in the middle of a customer quilt that has to be done before May.  It's a gift for her adult grandson's birthday and he's moving away soon so she wants to give him this quilt first. I'm not sure if his birthday is early May or if that's when he's moving away.    I'm sooooo close to finishing it -- just one and a half passes left.  I tried again, but the machine refuses to stitch anything now.  All I could do would be to finish the quilt manually and that would definitely not look like the IQ perfection, so that's not really an option.  Option 2 -- rip out everything I've already done (picture me pulling my hair out) an then print off the pattern she wanted and stitch it manually -- again, won't have the IQ perfection, but at least the imperfections would be consistent.  ;)

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Connie, I would love to take you up on your offer.  Sadly, I'm not close enough.  Ugh. 

I still haven't heard anything back from the folks at IQ.  Even if Zoltan is out on road shows, you would think that there would be someone at IQ who could respond to my plea for help.  I am literally dead in the water right now.  My IQ won't stitch anything.  I've got to get this fixed, so I can get the order backlog dwindled down.  Not to mention that I have a few (okay three) of my own UFOs that I would like to get finished.  (I'm so proud of myself for completing three UFOs.  Okay, admittedly, I did convert one of the queen size quilts to a large lap quilt, but I'm still counting that as a win!  :))

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Just one clarification -- when I said that I was dead in the water, that's just relative to the IQ.  I could still quilt manually with my machine.  It at least is working fine (as far as I know).  Since my IQ went on the fritz, I've had to quilt two quilts with paper pantos and my laser.  Boy did that feel strange.  It took me a while to get back in the groove again.  Of course every time (without fail) that I was in the groove and smoothly sailing through a design, my son would come in an interrupt me.  Then I had to relax and let go all over again.  I think I should have opened a bottle of wine. 

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I can't understand why you're not getting a response, this isn't like IQ at all.  There are several of Zoltan's beta testers on the IQ group, hopefully they will help you.  I know some of them, I'm going to see if I can get you some help but I don't get off work until 4pm EDT.

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Lora,

I have IQ on my machine and I have been thinking about you as I quilt today...you mentioned that when you tried to reset your Y motor resistance that it went all the way up to 20.  That makes me curious as to whether or not your Y motor drive wheel is even coming down to the track.  I have had my IQ installed since August 2016 and have the super motors as I think you have.  I had the pulley crack on my Y motor which in turn created a motor lift error message and I had to manually lift and lower my Y motor until Zoltan got me a new part...actually it took two new motors (x and y) and two new pulleys until we got it all figured out.  Anyway, long story short...when I was manually lifting and lowering my y motor wheel I would get the obstruction error until I got the y motor wheel lowered.  You said that you could not even get through much stitching at all until you got the obstruction notice.  Could your stitching possibly go fine as long as it is on the x motor axis and when it gets to a place in the pattern where the y motor is supposed to kick in and go another direction that you are getting that message??  Just for the heck of it, check and make sure that your y motor drive wheel as actually down on the track, and if it isn't, take your y cover off and take your little belt off of the pulley and check it out.  My pulley would just turn loosely on the spindle and not get any traction at all as it had a fine crack on it.  Thus the wheel would not come down on the track when it was supposed to.  If this is the problem, you can manually turn that spindle to get the wheel down and continue with IQ until Zoltan can get you a new pulley part.  If that is the problem it will save switching out motors and going through all of that for nothing...just something to check out.  If the part cracked when the y motor drive wheel was in the raised position maybe that's why you didn't get the motor lift error as I did????  Hope this helps...

Robin in Montana

 

P.S. I agree it is really unusual that you are not getting a response from Zoltan...Did you contact your dealer?

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Update .....

I went on the yahoo IQ forum to see if there was anything I could glean from that.  Posted my questions and description of the problem there as well.  I got one email from someone who said I should go back to the IQ page and resubmit my support ticket with "THIRD REQUEST" in the subject line.  So I did just that.  I finally got a response.  A support technician (Cheryl or Cindy, or something like that) sent me an email stating that I needed to run a few more tests and report back with the results.  Okay, I did that.  Then Zoltan began sending me emails with more tests he wanted me to run.  Coincidentally, my dealer called me and walked me through all the tests and exactly what to look for.  According to my dealer, he thought the Y-motor just went out.  He said I shouldn't have the problems that I'm having, but that IQ would probably send me a new replacement motor.  Then I get another email from Zoltan which made me a little angry.  He basically said that the problem wasn't with the motor it was with the fact that I was not properly cleaning my machine wheels and rails until the cleaning cloth came back with no residue at all.  What!  Are you kidding me?  I clean the heck out of the entire machine both before and after each use!!!!  {see steam coming out of my ears yet?}  Anyway, there were yet more tests he wanted me to run.....so naturally I did. 

After yet more tests, more cleaning, and more and more again.....I ran the machine in preview mode.  It worked fine for about 30 seconds to a minutes.  I thought, Yea! it's fixed.  So I threaded up the machine because I am soooooo close to finishing the quilt I have on the frame right now, I just want to get the darn thing done.  Guess what ---- OBSTRUCTION DETECTED  AGAIN!!! :angry:  Now the machine won't do anything but stitch about one inch horizontally then BAM! "obstruction detected".  It does this in preview mode too.  It seems like it doesn't even try to engage the Y-motor any more. 

After sending Zoltan this description of the problem, he wants me to run the logs again and take a picture of some set screw thing (glad he sent a picture of the screw he wants to see).  Ugh!!!  Anyway he did state that he will be sending out new motors tomorrow.  FINALLY!!!  Hopefully they will come in very soon, so I can keep working. 

This has been a terribly frustrating experience for me.  I know a lot of you said that you got a response from Zoltan right away.  That was certainly not my experience.  Some said that because he was away at MQX, that was the reason for the delay.  Still, there should have been someone left in the support department while he was off at the show.  Also, for those of you who have had problems with your motors, have you had multiple requests to run tests and logs and then more tests and more logs.  I just want to get an idea of "normal" just in case this ever happens again. Thanks. 

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Lora,

I assume you did check to make sure the Y motor drive wheel is actually making contact with the rail when you get the obstruction detected error message.  If it's not down on the rail you will get the obstruction error message because the machine isn't moving on the y axis as it's supposed to.  It sure sounds to me like you are having the issue that I had.  But you must have ruled that out after reading my post.  Just trying to save you the hastle of replacing motors when it is only one little part that could be the problem??

Hang in there...

Robin in MT

 

 

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Lora,  I am so sorry for what you are going through.  Glad you found the IQ group, the majority of the info on there is good.  Thank goodness, you finally got an answer, I was about to go knocking on Zoltan's door.  I can understand why you were angry with Zoltan.  Cleaning is the first thing that comes to mind when they get questions from us APQS quilters.  Our aluminum rails (older machines) do cause  havoc with the motors if not cleaned.  However, Zoltan should have been nicer.  I've only had (knock on wood) one problem with my IQ since buying it in 2009 and mine was obvious the old motors wheel rubber came off.  I have seen others on the IQ Group talk about testing and sending logs to Zoltan to solve problems.  Hopefully, you will get your new motors quickly and that's the last of the IQ problems.  Keep in touch.

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Robin,

The y-motor wheel runs on the rail just fine.  Makes good contact with the rail when the machine is doing the "clean rollers" test.  However, I did notice that when the motor was in manual mode,  I could pass a credit card under the y-motor, but could not pass the same credit card under the x-motor as easily.  My dealer said that this isn't optimal, but it shouldn't keep the IQ from working properly.  

Guess I'll wait to see how the story unfolds.  Seems like every night when I get home there is another email that says do this or that test and send in this or that information.  I think I'm going to pour myself a nice little glass of wine before I go to my email tonight.  ; )

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Well it was worth a shot.  I know how frustrating it was for me when that pulley cracked on my y-motor. Then I got new motors and it happened again within a couple of weeks.  Then I was sent a new aluminum pulley instead of the plastic one.  All has been fine since then.  Oh, I hope I didn't just jinx myself!   

Yes, go pour yourself a little glass of wine and just wait for the new motors.  Please let us know how it all works out so we can live and learn right along with you.  And remember, this too shall pass!

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Update -- I just got a text from USPS that I have a package going to be delivered today around noon.  It's new motors!!!!  The text said "Note to customer:  new motors".  :D:D:D:D:D!

If I didn't have a bunch of meetings and data calls to get done today, I'd just go home now and park at my front door until the USPS guy showed up.  Remember those old Mervyn's commercials where the lady is peering into the store saying, "open, open, open".  I feel like that. 

So tonight I will take the quilt that I've been working on off of the frame (zipper leaders -- gotta have 'em, gotta love 'em), and load a practice piece.  I'm guessing that I am going to have to calibrate the machine after the new motors are installed.  Any tips, tricks, things to avoid I should know about? 

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You should get instructions with the new motors.  You probably already know this article by heart http://www.intelliquilter.com/iQpedia/Motor-Alignment.php  You will have to recalibrate after getting everything set.  I actually check my motors to ensure they are level once installed (I have a small level).  If you have any doubts, get ahold of your dealer, support or the IQ yahoo or FB group.

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Well, I FINALLY have the new motors installed on the machine.  Yea!!!  Not without the headache of getting them delivered.  I swear my life should be on a tragic sitcom!

I got an email notification on Monday that said my motors would be delivered on Tuesday by noon.  I left work an took an early lunch and arrived home (40 minute drive) at 11:40; plenty of time to get there before USPS delivered at noon.  When I arrived at home I found a "delivery attempted" sticky attached to my front door.  They were there at 10:59.  Ugh! 

So I went on-line and set up a redelivery for Wednesday.  Got a confirmation that my redelivery request was received.  Took off work Wednesday morning and waited.  Fiance came over shortly before noon to relieve me so I could go to work.  At 1:30, he got tired of waiting so went home.  I called my son and asked him to drop what he was doing and go home to wait for the delivery.  He did, but didn't get home until 2:00.  With my luck I thought that the delivery would have occurred between 1:30 and 2:00.  Fortunately, it didn't.  I got home from work around 5:00 and relieved my son.  I thought seriously about going to the post office on my way home from work, but didn't want to miss the delivery truck, so went home instead.  Stayed up and waited until after 9:00 PM and still no delivery. 

Got the new motors installed Friday after work.  They feel much stiffer than the older motors.  Maybe that's normal; I don't know.  Ran the motor engagement strength and X was set to 5 and Y was set to 6.  Calibrated the motors and IQ and crossed my fingers. ............... {drumroll}................ I very carefully loaded the customer quilt back on the frame and started where I left off.  I closed my eyes to say a quick little prayer and heard a "beep".  Dagnabit!  I was sure it was going to be another obstruction message and then I was going to be completely lost.  Nope....I ran out of bobbin thread.  hahahaha.   :lol:

Well, I FINALLY got this customer quilt finished with no problems.  I just loaded a new quilt on the frame and am just on the first pass now, but so far so good. 

THANK YOU ALL for all of your words of encouragement, tips, tricks, and sage advice!!!!!!!

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