Messages

1231

General Mach Discussion / Mach Basic - Which Flavor

« on: March 28, 2009, 11:09:17 AM »

What "flavor" of Basic does Mach use?  I've sometimes found useful looking snippets on the web, but they don't always work in Mach....

Regards,
RayL.

1232

General Mach Discussion / Initialization Macro?

« on: March 28, 2009, 11:08:08 AM »

I understand there is some means for making an initialization macro that will be executed either on startup, or perhaps when coming out of E-Stop?  How is that done?

Regards,
Ray L.

1233

General Mach Discussion / Re: Servo with Gecko320 blowing fuses

« on: March 25, 2009, 10:29:10 PM »

5 amp. Thats all I ran on steppers in the past. I forgot the Servos take bigger fuses.  
Its working now with the 5am and limit is turned all the way up. No load though. The Servo is a Home Shop CNC Nema 34 8.6 amp cont. So yeah 5amps was to low. Its hard to get back into this when one has been away so long.

Donny

Donny,

    Sounds like you've fused the DC power lines into the Geckos?  Bad idea.  If the fuse blows under load, you stand an excellent chance of blowing the Gecko.  Fuse the AC line into the power supply, not the DC into the Gecko.  The Gecko will protect itself.

Regards,
Ray L.

1234

General Mach Discussion / Re: Servo with Gecko320 blowing fuses

« on: March 25, 2009, 10:23:28 AM »

Move the suspect Gecko to another axis.  If it still blow fuses, then send it back to Gecko for (free) repair.

Regards,
Ray L.

1235

General Mach Discussion / Re: VB Is Laughing At Me....

« on: March 23, 2009, 06:23:05 PM »

Brett,

    Here's something to get you started - the macros I wrote yesterday.

Regards,
Ray L.

1236

General Mach Discussion / Re: Spindle Speed Control

« on: March 23, 2009, 05:40:27 PM »

Gosh, I think that might be over my head right now. I still don't know what the "increment" does on the speed control panel?? When you increase or decrease it what does it change??

I think when you click on the up and down arrows, that DRO defines how much the S word changes.

Regards,
Ray L.

1237

General Mach Discussion / Re: Spindle Speed Control

« on: March 23, 2009, 11:43:34 AM »

Bob,

    Or, do what I did - customize the post for your CAM software.  I wrote a post-processor to manage the spindle on mine.  The CAM program spits out G-code, with spindle RPM in the S words.  My post-processor parses the G-code, finds the S words, and figures out the best motor speed (I have a 2-speed motor) and pulleys to use to minimize the number of pulley changes, then adds code to prompt me to change pulleys/motor speeds when necessary, and changes the S words to the proper values to make the VFD run at the correct speed.  Doing that would allow you to have a linear command value in the S words in your CMA program, but generate non-linear S words in the actual G-code you run on the machine, so it works the way you want it to.  With a simple relationship like you seem to have, you could easily do the translation directly in the CAM post processor.

Regards,
Ray L.

1238

General Mach Discussion / Re: VB Is Laughing At Me....

« on: March 23, 2009, 11:38:42 AM »

HIYA RAY, No I use the get/setVAR     Or some call them Gcode Vars or some call them System vars. Last I remember there are about 10,320 of them out there. Some are used for Gcode, some for SYSTEM functions and some are persistant( user use) some are for retaining fixture settings etc.

I'll try and find a listing of the Param & Vars available for us. That way we can at least write it down somewhere.

I use macros a lot myself to automate functions  such as Bolthole circles, probing, Cord rotation, S/n engrave (consectutive), Cutting circles, thread milling, etc.

There is also a side of GCODE call parametric programming that you would probably like as well.

It would be NICE to start a MACH TOOLBOX online to store usefull macros for us to swap ideas.  (IF you are interested) (;-)

Just a thought (;-) TP

Terry,

    I'm always happy to share what I've done.  I've sent many of my drawings and DXFs out to lots of people.

    I kinda like the macros I did yesterday.  I made them hierarchical, so there's virtually no duplicated code.  I have a single edge finder macro, that provides the core functionality for all the others, then higher-level ones that use that one to perform all the other functions, so most are just a few lines of code.  So, for instance, I have 5 macros for edge finding (X+, X-, Y+, Y-, Z-), then one that finds the mid-point between two edges, and one that uses that one for doing center-finding in holes and pockets.  Lots of very simple, very small files, but lots fo good functionality.  Most important of all *NO* frickin' button scripts!

Regards,
Ray L.

1239

General Mach Discussion / Re: Spindle Speed Control

« on: March 23, 2009, 01:00:59 AM »

Hello All,

I am trying to get program speed control for a Chinese mill. The mill presently uses a potentiometer. I have a CNC4pc Speed control board and have it working on PWM. Here's my problem. I cannot find the right settings to give me good speed control. I can get it tuned from 500 to 2000 rpm and then from 2000-4000 is way off. If I get it tuned from 2000-4000 then the 500-2000 is way off. Also, I am not sure what function the "Increment" setting plays and I can't find anything in the manual that explains it. But, it does effect the speeds.

Can anyone help me with this? I am beginning to get frustrated after a week of "cut and try".

Thanks for your help in advance.

Bob Keyes
Kentucky

Bob,

    It may be the nature of the beast.  The CNC4PC board will put out a linearly scaled voltage (voltage directly proportional to PWM duty cycle), while the motor controller may have a non-linear control voltage to RPM relationship.  Have you checked the voltage required to achieve specific speeds?  If it's not linear, then you're kinda stuck.

Regards,
Ray L.

1240

General Mach Discussion / Re: VB Is Laughing At Me....

« on: March 23, 2009, 12:57:12 AM »

(;-) Ray the syntqx has been modified over the years to fit some purposes only known by ART.  Maybe one day he will take time to write the wizards manual for MACH.

UNless you need to SEE the dros on a screen I do NOT use them to store values. I use SYSTEM Vars instead. We also have VARs 500-600 that are persistant if needed.

What I found using DROs is somewhere that DRO may end up being used by something else as well  AND IT WILL MAKE YOU PULL YOUR HAIR OUT trying to figure out where the phantom values keep coming from.

I have had it happen enough to know better know.

Let me know if you can't get it to work correctly .

Just a thought(;-)  TP

Terry,

I'm confused about what you call "System Vars".  You mean using SetParam/GetParam?  The documentation makes it sound like those are limited to pre-defined variables.  Is that wrong?

Regards,
Ray L.