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7201

General Mach Discussion / Re: AutoZero Plate for Z Axis

« on: March 04, 2011, 12:29:53 PM »

Try zeroing your Z axis DRO first.

Tweakie.

7202

FAQs / Re: Grounding question

« on: March 04, 2011, 07:37:54 AM »

Hi Calv,

A few guidelines....

Ideally you should treat earth and ground as two separate circuits.
The screen/shield of the DB25 should only be connected to earth at the computer end.
All exposed metal parts of your machine should be connected to earth (ideally at one common point).
The pins 18-25 of your parallel cable are ground and should connect to all the circuit grounds (ideally again at one common point).
Avoid any ground loops - it has to be a star or string connection which is open ended.
Avoid any earth loops - again star or open ended string.
The connection between earth and ground should only occur at one point otherwise a loop is formed.
Any shielded cables ( limit switches, estop etc.) must only have the shield connected at one end (the controller end).

These are ideal situations and not always possible but should be aimed for.

Tweakie.

7203

General Mach Discussion / Re: Newbie new parallel port question

« on: March 04, 2011, 04:28:35 AM »

If it's any help these are my config details.

Tweakie.

7204

General Mach Discussion / Re: Newbie new parallel port question

« on: March 04, 2011, 04:08:03 AM »

Have you done this ?

Within Mach under motor outputs make sure you have Direction and Step ticked 'Active Low'.

Tweakie.

7205

FAQs / Re: Problem Setting up Compaq Presario woth Windows XP

« on: March 04, 2011, 02:15:25 AM »

Adrian,

If the driver test does not work even after you have carried the optimisation procedure than it perhaps better to cut your losses and go to another PC (with PCI or AGP etc graphics card

) even though the spec of your existing PC looks impressive.

Tweakie.

7206

Mach3 under Vista / Re: Windows 7 config problems

« on: March 04, 2011, 02:07:47 AM »

Hi Jcburn,

Welcome to the forum.

The port address you would then enter into Mach would be EC03 (make sure you enter a zero not an O

) It will then look like 0xEC03 indicating that it is Hex notation.

Hope this helps.

Tweakie.

7207

General Mach Discussion / Re: Hello all .dxf files and GCode

« on: March 04, 2011, 01:56:59 AM »

Hi Classic,

Welcome to the forum.

Good resolution .dxf files can be directly converted to GCode and loaded into Mach3 using the LazyCam program which is part of Mach. There is a basic instructions doc for LazyCam in the downloads or members docs section.

3D stuff is slightly different (.dfx is only 2D) and the file type used is often .stl. You need another program such as MeshCam or DeskProto etc. (free trial versions are available) to convert the 3D into a GCode toolpath before it can be loaded into Mach3.

Hope this helps.

Tweakie.

7208