Messages

6431

General Mach Discussion / Re: Current release not compatable with year old machine

« on: September 18, 2010, 01:28:33 PM »

Hood was there a change in the XML between older and newr versions? That sounds like the problem.  You may have to do a manual config of mach??

Just a thought(;-) TP

6432

General Mach Discussion / Re: How to recover from power interuption?

« on: September 18, 2010, 01:12:08 PM »

IAN many years back this is how we did it in mach. I dug up part of the discussion. It was a very simple approach back then. It does assume you had accurate home switches.

Re: Power outage macro –


We call it the ARF ( Auto Restart FUnction)

It is a piece of code that runs in the Macropump

Every () minutes open the Restart file and write the Program name AND current
line. Close file


If you need to restart press the ARF button which

REFHOME the machine, Retreives the LAST notes from the restart file, Loads the
program by name, Then update the RUN FROM HERE line # DRO and restarts the
program run by use of the "RUN FROM HERE" function.

The only thing the operator has to do is when the RFH screen pops up is verify
there is a clear path for the machine to return to the restart position and
press Cycle Start.


***********

http://www.machsupport.com/forum/index.php/topic,15042.0.html
THis is the link to the stop restart function with the plasma.   NOTE plasma does NOT require you to use the RFH feature so it may NOT apply to very situation. In plasma all you need to do is set next line and fire the torch then RUN.

Also note that teh RFH does not work worth a hoot with plasma when using the Zref routines for THC.


IF you have some more ideas throw the  bone on the porch and us old dawgs will chew on it for a while


Just a thought, (;-) TP

6433

General Mach Discussion / Re: How to recover from power interuption?

« on: September 18, 2010, 12:43:57 PM »

IAN , if you want to work on a mach PORS (power outage recovery system) It would be GREAT new Mach feature for the mach tool box.

You are the VB code geewiz,  (;-) TP

6434

G-Code, CAD, and CAM discussions / Re: What purpose does this gcode serve

« on: September 18, 2010, 10:31:44 AM »

THE F1 is a safety to protect the operator or machine , in the event of something weird happenning it will be at F1 not F2000.

The M6 tool change is just a hold over. The post was developed from a generic post that included tool changes. Then extra code was not removed from the post.

The Z height should be a SAFE Z position. You may want to check your sheetcam setup to make sure it is correct.  When you started up the machine do you REFHOME the machine so MACH knows where it is on the table?? (;-) IF not then mach does NOT know where it is and that value would be incorrect.

Just a thought, (;-) TP

6435

General Mach Discussion / Re: Exactly how are home switches supposed to work?

« on: September 18, 2010, 10:18:11 AM »

"Let's say you have a microswitch as your home switch and it's operated by a cam, the home point
on the left side of the cam, may be in a different place to the home point on the right side of the cam."




The part I think you missed is if approaching from the correct side, lets say right side. It moves left untill it trips the switch then back s off to the right untill it untrips.

NOW if you are to the left of the switch. It moves right untill it trips then KEEPS going right until it untrips the switch. So the untrip points should be the same point as it occurs in the same direction AND the same point on the cam ,going right.

Just a thought, (;-) TP

6436

General Mach Discussion / Re: How to recover from power interuption?

« on: September 18, 2010, 09:54:24 AM »

Stirling Not Hardly, you are still invited to the party  I very much admire you for your programming skills. That is something I cannot do, don't have the logic gene it takes to do it.

(;-) TP

6437

General Mach Discussion / Re: How to recover from power interuption?

« on: September 17, 2010, 10:58:37 PM »

Stirling just make sure you explain what happens during an outage IF you get caught in the bad cycle where the Gen is spooling down after resyncing to the grid and a power outage reoccurs and the transfer attempts to transfer BACK to the Genset with it spoiling down. Especially IF you are below 10hzs on the genset.

(;-) TP

6438

G-Code, CAD, and CAM discussions / Re: G CODE TO CUT PARAMETRIC CURVES.

« on: September 17, 2010, 04:45:59 PM »

There is also a parametric side of Gcode that you may want to look at. It has most of the math processes you may need such as sin cosin,etc

Just a thought, (;-) TP

6439

General Mach Discussion / Re: How to recover from power interuption?

« on: September 17, 2010, 04:18:10 PM »

AH Stirling if you had only walked in my shoes for the last 40 years.(;-)

Seems to me the OP was asking general questions so he got general answers. Sorry they did not agree with yours.

Capacitor based??? Every CNC i have ever worked on is capacitor based including the computer. SO yes the answer was appropriate. The caps will keep the machine alive for a very short time including the drives. So if you have enought capacity you can RIDE through Blinks and never miss a beat.

BUT without a UPS running you will NEVER have time to capture the positional and program stop data before the caps drain and ALL is lost.

As far as capturing the stop/restart data that is a piece of cake AND I gave an example of what we do it with on a daily basis running a plasma cutter.

nOW is there a type machine I have not used/ ran/ worked on/ rebuilt  NOT MANY. I spent about 40 years in the trenches USING/fixing  those machines. Sorry you missed out on that experience.

BUT I tell you what, you seemed to be a smart fellow I will just sit on my experince and let you handle all the technical parts AS I am probably not qualified or experineced enought to handle MACH stuff after all it IS fairly complicated with all that Gcode stuff (;-)

BUt i would suggest spending about 5 years learning Mach inside and out before you sugar coat and try to convince people that Mach can do anything. It can't it has it limitations. YOU of all people should know that seeing the things you have tried and did not work as you thought it should. YOu need to push EVERY button try EVER code Try every possible combination of code and hardware. Then scratch your head a figure out WHY all teh things that SHOULD work DON'T

Yous guys are a HOOT, and some of the worlds best armchair quaterbacks ,  

Have a good one, (;-) TP

6440

General Mach Discussion / Re: How to recover from power interuption?

« on: September 16, 2010, 06:49:13 PM »

OK Lets look at the resolution and expected accuracy. This tells me that he is working on extreme detailed parts. AND the time to run tells me it is an expensive part.

I have never seen a machine cutting a finish cut at that resolution that IF you did a feed hold you would not mar, ding, scratch, gouge a finish cut.

Also With certain Material you cannot interupt a cut and have the bit rub the same spot it creates a hard spot which will never finish cut correctly

NOw as the outage events are random we have to assume the worst case senario, it is in a finish cut mode. Experiance tell us IF you plan on the worst case senario the rest will take care of itself(;-)

Try it and you will see what I mean.

 The only way out would be to RUN continuously or wait FOR a point in the program that the bit is NOT cutting material. That could be hours into a long program. The only way to be absolutly sure is to STOP in a tool change senario. OR use built in hold routines throughout the program AND the programs may not  HAVE either.

SO where do you stop?      IF you are just cutting cheap plywood on a router please disregard the above

The generator is just a replacement for a large battery bank same thing only different name. Still a stored energy source(;-) He mentioned a UPS so they need a battery and it is EASY to add more capacity, add more batteries. LONG outages yep he has the answer UPS and a backup generator

Now from past Power company Power Quality Tech experiance you need to run the generator for at least 30 minute AFTER the outage event occurs. AS they bring the system back on line there could be cascade failures that will trip the system back off again. So give the system plenty of time to stabilize before you transfer back to grid power.

As to the stop restart part that would very simple to do ONCE you have the machine stopped. We do that all the time in plasma to stop and check the consumables in long cuts. There is a routine to start restart on this forum somewhere that we use to do it.

That is just my experience in outage recovery technics, Your mileage may vary (;-)