Messages

6871

General Mach Discussion / Re: Mach 3 slowing down

« on: April 25, 2011, 11:24:24 AM »

Hi Kevin,

I was referring to the software printer driver not an actual printer.   (Start, Control panel, Add/remove programs, ? printer)

It would be wise to have power cables routed separate to stepper drive cables but this is more likely to cause electrical noise problems and erratic behaviour rather than just slow the whole system down.

Tweakie.

6872

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.

6873

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.

6874

FAQs / Re: Behavioural Changes in Mill

« on: April 25, 2011, 07:44:41 AM »

Really glad you have found the problem. 

Tweakie.

6875

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.

6876

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.

6877

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.

6878

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.

6879

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.

6880

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.