Messages

201

General Mach Discussion / Re: 4th axis question

« on: December 20, 2010, 07:07:50 PM »

My understanding is that the feedrate correction will update with each line of code.

It's possible that my understanding is not correct.

I have not seen this issue but that might be because I do not machine jobs like cams.

Zip up your code and post, and I will run it here to see if I get the same result as you.

Greg

202

General Mach Discussion / Re: 4th axis question

« on: December 17, 2010, 02:47:12 AM »

Looks like fairly poor code but that may be because we are only seeing a small section.

Try some basic code like this and see if you get a better result as far as A axis feedrate is concerned

G21
G1 Z25 F500
A90
Z50
A180
Z75
A270
Z100
A360

A axis feedrate should decrease as Z height increases.

I made this in metric because I think you said that is your native units.

Greg

EDIT:  I reread your posts and maybe your native units are medieval english.  

If that is the case then try this code instead.

G20
G1 Z1 F20
A90
Z2
A180
Z3
A270
Z4
A360

203

General Mach Discussion / Re: 4th axis question

« on: December 15, 2010, 11:03:52 PM »

Setting it at any radius other then 0.0001, just slows it down all the time.

Mach3 has a long standing bug in the "Use Radius for Feedrate" feature.    That is, setting a value of zero in the "Rotation Radius" DRO will disable the feature.

.......if I set radius to 0.0001 to use Z as radius, the feeds speed up as the radius increases (which seems backwards)

Sounds a bit odd that the rotary axis feedrate speeds up as the Z axis DRO value increases.  It does not do that here.

Are you sure you have the Z axis travelling in the conventional direction?  Up is positive and down is negative.

Greg

204

General Mach Discussion / Re: Constant Velocity doesnt' work anymore?

« on: December 03, 2010, 01:11:18 AM »

 From what you're telling me, CV can only truly be turned off on the General Configuration page. I will check that out tomorrow.

Yes it can be turned on and off on the Config page.  It also is turned on with G64 and off with G61

Greg

205

General Mach Discussion / Re: Constant Velocity doesnt' work anymore?

« on: December 02, 2010, 10:42:53 PM »

Nos

The advise is turn all options off,  that means the options on the settings page also.  These are often overlooked.

Greg

206

Brains Development / Re: Execute Button Script - how do you use it?

« on: November 26, 2010, 01:13:31 AM »

Thanks for that info Scott

I presume that button press is   "1034 - Execute Button Script"

Greg

207

General Mach Discussion / Re: Swarf in Keyboard and Mouse!! Ahhhh!

« on: November 24, 2010, 03:37:17 AM »

Those things work, but the feel is HORRENDOUS! 
 Maybe OK for pushing the occassional key to control the machine, but typing, even a little bit, on one is just awful.

Been using a silicone keyboard for years.  Can't imagine using anything else.  $10 chicken feed.

Only control a machine with it, not writing a novel. 

Greg

208

SmoothStepper USB / Re: If you have noise issues this might be worth a try

« on: November 22, 2010, 02:40:14 AM »

When I first installed a SS I had hangups every time I started my VFD.  I fixed this  by making some alterations to my grounding system.

This involved bringing computer and VFD ground to a common point.

Out of curiosity I removed the before mentioned resistor and capacitor and reverted my grounding system to what it was when it used to hang.

I could not get it to fail.  Seems this fix was enough to rectify my original issue.

Greg

209

General Mach Discussion / Re: Slaved Axis pitch diameter difference

« on: November 21, 2010, 03:05:19 PM »

If the pitch diameter on 1 of the pinions wears a few thousands more than the other and you have 10’ of
travel the gantry ends up out of square the farther you get away from the home switch.

Any error due to wear that you have described will not accumulate along the length of the rack.  Unless miraculously, it wears in a way that it has one less tooth.  

In simple terms, the rack determines how far it will travel each revolution of the pinion, (for a given tooth count)  not the pinion itself.

By nature the rack will wear much slower than the pinion, provided all the machine use is not in one small spot.

The reason being that as the axis travels the length of the rack, each rack tooth will be engaged once.  Each pinion tooth will engage many times.

If you are concerned about slave travel discrepancies then put your racks side by side and make a careful comparison.  Worry less about your pinions.

Greg

210

General Mach Discussion / Re: Turn on an Output? Shamefully simple?

« on: November 20, 2010, 04:54:12 PM »

The code works great, I also added a polling routine to my macro pump that watches
for any outputs in an "on" state and it lights up an LED button for me if it sees anything. 

Rather than running a macro pump, try adding a LED for each output on your screen and adding these lines to the example code.

If IsOutputActive(OUTPUT4) Then
DeActivateSignal(OUTPUT4)
SetUserLED(XX, 0)
else
ActivateSignal(OUTPUT4)
SetUserLED(XX, 1)
end if

Greg