Messages

7261

General Mach Discussion / Re: Need help with basic understanding

« on: February 21, 2011, 08:20:51 AM »

Dont know if it's any help to you but attached is the GCode file (thanks to Sam) I used for initially testing my laser. (it is Inch units so you may need to scale it)

http://www.cooperman.talktalk.net/laser1a.wmv


Tweakie.

7262

General Mach Discussion / Re: Need help with basic understanding

« on: February 21, 2011, 07:52:58 AM »

Apart from the obvious it came out very well.

On the 'R' you have a vertical shift and on the 'A' a horizontal shift so the problem is occuring on both axis.

Surely that gap is too large for missing steps (how many steps would have to be missed, consecutively, for a gap that large?) so something loose on your machine ? or your PC multitasking ? or drive belt jumping a tooth ?. I think you need to be extremely methodical in testing this to discover the cause, just try one thing at a time until you find it.

Best of luck.

Tweakie.

7263

General Mach Discussion / Re: CAM recommendation, other than CamBam

« on: February 21, 2011, 07:39:32 AM »

Thanks Rich.

If CNC was the only thing I had to spend money on it would be great but my responsibilities have increased with age and my family now takes priority. So, somewhile ago, I set a limit on my annual software expenditure (just managed to squeeze in Art's Gearotic Motion last year - really glad I did that) but Vectric Aspire at $2000 is just too steep for me at the moment.
Not sure if Cut3D is any better than DeskProto (which I already have) or Meshcam, perhaps Gerry has tried a comparison on this one.
PhotoVCarve has many rivals and once you get the hang of it Art's Mach1filter makes a pretty good job for free.
I may just buy Cut2D as this seems useful and easy to use and at a price I can afford. I tried the SheetCam trial version and the jury is still out on this one at the moment.

Incidentally, a buddy of mine has more money than he can count and he said to me the other day "don't you ever get bored" ? he was genuinly supprised when I said "no, don't haye the time to get bored". Perhaps the moral here is to have almost just enough money but never too much.

Tweakie.

7264

General Mach Discussion / Re: Need help with basic understanding

« on: February 21, 2011, 06:24:51 AM »

This logo has just been downloaded from "Brands of the World".
Loaded in Lazycam and toolpath produced.
GCode and dxf attached - see what you can do with it.

(this has been set up for my vinyl cutter so you will need to edit the Z in the GCode  and scale etc. to suit your machine)

Tweakie.

7265

General Mach Discussion / Re: Need help with basic understanding

« on: February 21, 2011, 05:11:37 AM »

So not really sure what else could be wrong with it now, apart from software.

Dan,

Which software do you think is causing the problem ?

Tweakie.

7266

General Mach Discussion / Re: Need help with basic understanding

« on: February 21, 2011, 03:22:52 AM »

Don't rely too heavily on Sketchup it was never designed for CNC and may not be doing the best job.

Tweakie.

7267

General Mach Discussion / Re: CAM recommendation, other than CamBam

« on: February 21, 2011, 03:04:12 AM »

Spot on Guys, right on all counts, money's all gone, be lucky if I can affort the wood to make another tiger anyway    

I think Hood summed it up when he said that the software depends on the type of parts you wish to produce. I think VCarve is great for a router making wood or plastic parts but I don't think it would be my first choice for a milling machine making metal parts. It is perhaps all a matter of personal choice and making the best from what you have.

Tweakie.

7268

General Mach Discussion / Re: CAM recommendation, other than CamBam

« on: February 20, 2011, 08:27:43 AM »

I just got some 1/32" router bits, so I may need to cut another one. Smiley

You still wont get as much detail as I got 

Tweakie.

7269

General Mach Discussion / Re: CAM recommendation, other than CamBam

« on: February 20, 2011, 08:11:51 AM »

This is 2.5D really but quite a few of us made these with 3 axis machines last year.

Tweakie.

7270

General Mach Discussion / Re: Mach3 motion control over two LPT ports?

« on: February 20, 2011, 07:16:27 AM »

Hi Brad,

I use a seperate 'stand alone' psu and controller for my 4th axis which connects to a second PCI card configured as LPT2. Mach has no problem with sharing the tasks between ports #1 and #2.

Tweakie.