My EA just stops trading. Why?

I have an 'always in' EA built right now that I'm testing just to make sure it is building trades appropriately before I add any signal generating parameters. For some reason the EA will just stop trading at some point. Thankfully, it stops trading after a winning trade and I haven't had a losing trade not get closed out.

I don't have any time settings on. I don't have any code saying end sequence after a winning trade is hit. In fact, it could have traded fine for the past 40 trades and then now it decides to just stop. It won't enter any new trades even though it should have.

Anyone have an idea as to why this is? My broker is IBFX.

Is it perhaps because of my slippage setting of 10? If a trade isn't entered immediately and price moves 10 pips past the initial point where it should have entered does that mean the EA just shuts down? Then, since the EA begins by just entering a long position automatically with no real signal, the EA believes it shouldn't begin again? What's going on? Is that the case? Wouldn't it do that for trades after a loss too?

Thanks,
Matt

What does the journal say?

Here are the last journal entries:


06:09:21 '5302956': instant order buy 0.01 EURUSD at 1.2836 sl: 1.2786 tp: 1.2837
06:09:21 '5302956': order buy 0.01 EURUSD opening at 1.2836 sl: 1.2786 tp: 1.2837 failed [Invalid S/L or T/P]
06:09:31 '5302956': instant order buy 0.01 EURUSD at 1.2836 sl: 1.2786 tp: 1.2837
06:09:32 '5302956': request was accepted by server
06:09:32 '5302956': request in process
06:09:32 '5302956': order buy 0.01 EURUSD opening at 1.2836 sl: 1.2786 tp: 1.2837 failed [Common error]
06:10:32 '5302956': instant order buy 0.01 EURUSD at 1.2836 sl: 1.2786 tp: 1.2837
06:10:32 '5302956': request was accepted by server
06:10:32 '5302956': request in process
06:10:32 '5302956': order buy 0.01 EURUSD opening at 1.2836 sl: 1.2786 tp: 1.2837 failed [Common error]
06:13:18 '5302956': connect failed [No connection]
06:16:25 '5302956': login (4.00, #2B833288)
06:18:18 Publisher: error opening the file


I don't think I lost connection. Price continued to move as the next trade was supposed to be triggered.

06:09:31 '5302956': instant order buy 0.01 EURUSD at 1.2836 sl: 1.2786 tp: 1.2837

I dont have too much experience with EA's. Infact just learning to code.

But, Is this order right...?
This means the ea is trying to place an order for 1pip profit with a stoploss of 50pips.

Can orders like this be placed?

Now what I notice when I am placing manual order is that the tp or the sl must be at least 3 pips away from ask... if I am right.

So could that be the problem???

Yes the order values are correct.

I would imagine the order can be placed considering it placed many similar trades previous to the one that wasn't triggered. I don't think TP needs to be 3 pips away from the ask. It doesn't trade within the spread. Price must still move 1 + spread for the trade to close.

Do you know your broker's minimum stop/tp?

Do you know if your broker changed price perimiters? For example, I'm with Fxpro, who took over NorthFinance, and my EA wouldn't work until I changed SL and TP from .00 to .000 , so what used to be a 20 pip SL now had to be changed to 200 pip SL, to work, just because of the added 0, although it still closes at 20 pips

Just spoke with a rep from IBFX, my broker, and he said they have a 3 pip minimum for SL and TP. I'll try it again tonight to see if it still shuts down.

I still don't understand why they wouldn't just flag the trade immediately as under the minimum requirements rather than placing several of my 1 TP trades and suddenly not placing any more trades.

The journal says it attempted to place those trades. There was one instance where it said "failed"

Yea. Still not sure. The person I'm developing it with has similar problems, except I know he is not looking for small 1 TP. He is testing it with larger values on longer time frames.


Could it be an issue of slippage? I have the slippage setting at 10.

I just checked the expert log. It shows 'Error 130: Invalid Limit'

I'm at work and don't know if it says invalid limit, but the error is error 130. What it does is try 10 times to reenter at the same price, but price has moved away and thus it won't do so. Can you guys please confirm, deny, or offer other suggestions as to what may be the problem?

I believe the problem is the EA is trying to place buy stop limits and sell stop limits. Thus, price moves in our direction, but quickly gets out of the range. Sometimes it will retrace back into our purchasing range to fill the order. Eventually it does move too quick for any retracement to come back in the entry range and the system just stops trading.

If you'd like to look at the EA go to http://www.forexfactory.com/showpost...7&postcount=44

Please note that EA doesn't trade how my system trades because there is a bug in it. The order entry types that are coded in that EA should be the same though.

Anyone have any other ideas as to what's going on?

Should all EA orders be market orders?

The question is, why did it fail? If you're willing to PM your email address Ron, I'd like you to take a look at the code and see if you can find the error in the code.