Messages

1

General Mach Discussion / Win 7 and Win 10

« on: August 24, 2015, 03:20:07 PM »

I am aware that it is a forlorn hope that Mach 3 will work with win 10 when expecting to drive motors etc.   Will mach 3 work in win 10 as it does now in XP and WIN 7 without connection to any ports?  I use my office computer (WIN 7) to verify tools paths etc, it has no connection from Mach to the outside world. It works well in this configuration. I would like to run Mach 3 in WIN 10, is there any hope of doing this?

An extra. Can a win 10 install be reversed to a previous win install?

Mike

2

Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / Re: wood carving Golden Retriever (anja)

« on: November 19, 2010, 09:27:31 AM »

I used DesckCNC it has a basic greyscale/raster conversion to Gcode. I use DeskCNC for most of my DXF to Gcode  (2.5D) operations.

Mike

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Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / Re: Very small parts of another kind

« on: November 15, 2010, 08:06:39 PM »

Can't show the actual cutter because I can't find it! I made it three years ago. What I can try is to show a drawing which might actually be better than trying to photograph the cutter any way.  I hope the drawing will show OK

Mike

4

Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / Re: Very small parts of another kind

« on: November 15, 2010, 10:27:49 AM »

HiTweekie, I used DeskCNC, although there are other readily available softwares that will convert BMP to Gcode.  You need to massage the grey scale image to get the best results for the lettering. Just take the BMP and make the image as contrasty as possible, sharpen up the edges etc, there are several choices of photo packages to do this. Once the image is processed then you just pass it to DesckCNC and set the parameters.  With really small cutters I found that exceeding 0.003' depth is asking for trouble, so take more than one pass if you want more depth.  When I did the plaque I had my machine as tight as possible with back lash <0.002 so if you have good ball screws and no backlash you're in business. I had cheap all thread 1/2" X 20.  My table runs on linear bearings.

If you look at the "Golden wedding anniversary gift" topic you can see 3d relief images done also using DeskCNC.

Mike

5

Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / Very small parts of another kind

« on: November 13, 2010, 06:33:23 PM »

Didn't want to hi jack some one elses post on small size engraving but thought this might be of interest to any one wanting to see how small one can one go with the inverse of engraving (embossing?).  I'm sure with the right equipment it is possible to go smaller but what I am showing is about my smallest limit.

The picture shows an embossed (raised lettering) of a plaque for a 1/2" scale model of a steam loco I am building.

I made the cutter from 1/8" round tungsten carbide. I ground the stock down to a 60 deg point, with the point as dead center as possible. I then changed the angle of the stock from 30 degs from the diamond stone surface to 60 degs. As carefully as possible I moved the tip into the grinding surface to a depth of 0.001" (not really sure if I achieved the 0.001" depth, I don't have the tools to be sure. I did try 3 times!). This puts a flat surface that retains curvature at the tip of the point with a slight offset. In effect it produces a very small round nose cutter. The cutting is done using a raster cut with Gcode derived from a high contrast image of the lettering on the plaque.  With an X step over of 0.001" and Y resolution of 0.001"  and 3 passes to a depth of 0.005" the result is quite surprising.

Mike

6

Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / wood carving Golden Retriever (anja)

« on: November 06, 2010, 09:20:49 PM »

This is a CNC carving 7" by 7" Routed out in light Oak. The colour was a pretty good match for the subject colour.
Made from a grey scale image much modified to make sure that the depth of cut was consistent with how deep or high the surface
should be to properly represent the relief.

It was an early attempt to use my newly fabricated machine which at the time had  utiility 1/2" by 20 lead screws.

Mike

7

Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / Re: What size is it?

« on: November 01, 2010, 04:49:09 PM »

The dime is 0.7 inches diameter


Good call Jeff


Mike

8

Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / What size is it?

« on: October 31, 2010, 03:02:01 PM »

Would anyone care to guess the size of this item?

Mike

9

Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / Re: A golden anniversary wedding gift

« on: October 31, 2010, 02:00:29 PM »

I forgot a few technical details....The raster movement was programmed to have a step over of 0.002 in both Y and X direction. To Z cut was 0.030" in three steps of 0.010". The X and Y distance is 2".

Mike

10

Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / Re: A golden anniversary wedding gift

« on: October 31, 2010, 01:57:36 PM »

Actually it was my wife and I who celebrated the anniversary...

I did not do the casting myself, I've never worked directly with gold so I left that tothe experts.