From the attached image, there are a few columns which are not explained properly:
Reversed: this means that the axis travel is reversed? But why I want to have this axis reversed? In the tutorial (home limits & offsets) he only has the X axis reversed.
If your axis travels the wrong direction you can physically swap motor wires or you can reverse this setting and it will reverse the Dir signal. You can also change the Active Low setting for the direction signal to do this but some drives are particular about whether that is active High or Active Low so the reverse option is best.
Soft Max & Soft Min: I understand the soft max is the max travel of the axis but why the soft min is 0?
SoftMin for X and Y is zero and Z Max is zero, this is because this is the extent in machine coordinates when you home the machine. You want X and Y zero to be at the lower left of the table as it would be if you were looking at a X Y graph on a piece of paper.
Home Off. Is this Home Off or Home Offset? If it is Home Off, why I want to have it Off?
Home off is a value you can set if your home switch is not at the above location, it could be at the opposite end of the table or even in the middle of the travel. You would then set a Home Off value so that Mach knows the real machine coords zero is that amount away from where your home switch is.
For example on my lathe my switch for the X axis is midway on the travel (have front and rear toolposts) so when I home the tool is sitting at 270mm dia in relation to the centre line of the lathe. Obviously I want my master tool (Tool1) to be at 270mm dia when I home so I tell Mach that the true zero is 270mm dia away from the home point by entering that value in the home off box. If I didnt do that then the machine would have the X zero set where my home switch is.
Home Neg: What is the meaning of this? How the Home position can be negative?
You will want to home negative on the X and Y axis on a mill so that the axis moves in a negative direction to your Home switch, if you dont then you can use the Home Off as above to tell Mach where the real zero is. You may have to mess with this depending on the way you have the motor wired and the reversed setting.
At the bottom left of this window there is “G28 home location coordinates” What is the meaning / purpose of this?
Thank you
Nicolas
G28 location is where you can enter numbers for X Y Z etc and when you command a G28 it will go to them rather than the true machine zero.
Hood