Messages

6321

General Mach Discussion / Re: circular interpolation not showing on arc cutting surface

« on: April 25, 2011, 08:17:00 AM »

Not sure I fully understand but most CAD software draws circles as a number of straight lines, the lower the resolution the less the number of lines and worse the appearance. On the other hand, CAD/CAM that uses circular interpolation produces smooth contours without any of these visible straight lines.

Which CAD/CAM are you using to create your toolpaths and does it allow circular interpolation ?

Tweakie.

6322

General Mach Discussion / Re: Mach 3 slowing down

« on: April 25, 2011, 08:03:34 AM »

Seem to remember reading something similar to this when there were documents waiting in the print que and it slowed everything when Windows discovered something connected to the printer port.
It's a long shot but if you are not using it then uninstall the printer and see if this makes any difference.

Tweakie.

6323

FAQs / Re: Behavioural Changes in Mill

« on: April 25, 2011, 07:44:41 AM »

Really glad you have found the problem. 

Tweakie.

6324

General Mach Discussion / Re: OEM codes for buttons, DRO's and LED's

« on: April 25, 2011, 07:15:46 AM »

Hi Rimawi2008,

Not trying to fob you off but you really need to read through some of the Mach manuals to get an idea of the way Mach works and the terminology used. The documentation can be found here http://www.machsupport.com/documentation.php
Then come back with your questions. Doing it this way will save you a lot of time. 

Tweakie.

6325

FAQs / Re: Behavioural Changes in Mill

« on: April 25, 2011, 07:09:16 AM »

Hi Peter,

Could be the cable itself or it could be the connector or a soldered joint etc.
The G0 moves are usually much faster than the G1 and this could therefore sound smoother.

Tweakie.

6326

General Mach Discussion / Re: M11/10 and E1p1/0 problems pls help

« on: April 25, 2011, 07:03:53 AM »

Hi Chris,

The problem resides within Mach3 itself.
The M10/M11 and E1P1/E1P0 command sets used to work just fine but subsequent revisions of Mach have screwed up the way certain VB routines operate and because few people use these commands fixing the problem is just not a priority.
The best 'work around' is to use an axis direction signal where, for example, -Z turns the laser on and +Z turns it off. To avoid conflict within a standard GCode program I have chosen to use the B axis and edit my code accordingly but it is a matter of choice as to which is best.

This thread relates http://www.machsupport.com/forum/index.php/topic,15217.0.html

Hope this helps.

Tweakie.

6327

FAQs / Re: Behavioural Changes in Mill

« on: April 25, 2011, 04:19:16 AM »

The symptoms you describe are similar to what would happen if one wire to the stepper motor was disconnected. Although you seem to have checked every possibility already it may be worth checking the wiring again.
The symptom can also be caused by a bad opto isolator (for the X axis direction signal) on the breakout board (if they are socketed then swap two and see if the problem persists).

Hope this helps,

Tweakie.

6328

General Mach Discussion / Re: axis changes from + to - by itself

« on: April 25, 2011, 02:23:10 AM »

If your controller is not recognizing the direction signals correctly then the motors could rotate in the wrong direction. This situation can occur when the controller is expecting the full 5 volt TTL signals for it's inputs but the computer's LPT parallel port is only outputting 3.3 volt TTL signals. In many cases this depends on the operating threshold of the opto isolators used in the breakout board so it may be a good idea to measure your parallel port direction pin voltage and and if it is not the 5 volts TTL standard (0 volts when jogging one way and 5 volts when jogging the other way) check that your BoB is compatible.

Just a thought.

Tweakie.

6329

General Mach Discussion / Re: Motor chatter

« on: April 25, 2011, 02:01:16 AM »

Sounds like the good old days ? before microstepping. 

I use 1/8th stepping and that is pretty smooth at low speed but with the later controllers 1/16th stepping is not uncommon now and that is really smooth.
Could this be the problem ?

Tweakie.

6330

General Mach Discussion / Re: spindle control

« on: April 24, 2011, 11:09:44 AM »

Groundhog,

Looks like you have already done all the basic checks etc.

The X4 spindle is controlled by a direction signal on pin1 of the LPT parallel port. When this pin is high the spindle will rotate in one direction when activated and rotate in the other direction when the pin is taken low. Therefore you should be able to change the spindle direction from CCW to CW by changing the 'dir active low' config in Mach (as per arrow). Then by entering G0 M3 in the MDI box it will go one way and G0 M4 it will go the other and stop with M5.

I have tried the generic .xml and it all works fine here so if your Mach configuration is correct then it is more than likely a broken wire relating to the LPT pin 1 and its connection to the X4 terminal board. You should be able to check this with a multimeter (positive to pin1 and negative to ground [pins 18 to 25]) using the MDi and commands M3 and M4 to toggle the pin state between 0volts and 5volts (approx).


Tweakie.