Mach4 - couple of quick questions for Art.

[nicad]

Art-
As I understand it, Mach4 outputs "curves" at a rate (1/64 sec?) that results in prominent vectoring of the curve at anything above a slow feedrate. If I am post-processing all my curves into very short line-segments (~0.002"), will Mach4 + Grex be able to output this smoothly at a quicker rate?

Also, The Grex has a USB and an Ethernet port. The USB is for flashing of the firmware only and the ethernet is for motion control commands (correct?). Will this always be true? It would seem that a direct USB link would be more "fail proof" than an ethernet network.. but I am just thinking out loud here..

Thanks-
Colin

[nicad]

Hello...?
Can any one answer the vectoring question?? it is the main deciding factor on purchasing a Grex...

[ynneb]

Nicad Art is on holidays for a week. You may also be able to get help on the gecko forum too.

[Brian Barker]

USB (1) is about 6Mps and the Ethernet is 10/100Mps so you are going to get Much faster data in ethernet.  as for the small moves Art is going to be working on that when he gets back. We are thinking about blending the small lines into curves but I don't know how that will go...

Hope that is a little help

[nicad]

so if I were to break up a circle into 1000 very short stright line segments in CAM, and then tell mach4->Grex to cut that path.. what would it do?

[ger21]

so if I were to break up a circle into 1000 very short stright line segments in CAM, and then tell mach4->Grex to cut that path.. what would it do?

It would cut the path.   I thought I read that Mach4's segmented arcs is only temporary, and will be corrected when it's finished.

[Brian Barker]

It better be fixed... I just got my mill in that is going to be the testbed! I will be mounting the 1KW servo this weekend and putting in the GRex. This mill is going to have about everything that I can add VFD 4th axis and air everything. The only thing that it will not have is a tool changer O well that is next