Messages

901

General Mach Discussion / Re: Stupid Questions re: Touch Probe Alignment

« on: November 15, 2009, 01:05:04 PM »

Hood,

Thought I'd confuse things by posting to the correct thread....   

Do you have drawings of your probe?  I have no desire to re-invent the wheel....

Regards,
Ray L.

902

General Mach Discussion / Re: Replicating Parts

« on: November 15, 2009, 12:52:59 PM »

You need to read up on fixture offsets - G54-G59, and G92.  Probably G92 is what you want in this case.  You setup the existing code as a subroutine, set the fixture offset with G92, then call the subroutine.

Regards,
Ray L.

903

General Mach Discussion / Stupid Questions re: Touch Probe Alignment

« on: November 15, 2009, 12:49:41 PM »

I'm thinking about building a touch probe - the kind with the three little arms, and ball-bearing contacts.  I've been using a rigid probe, but Mach keeps randomly screwing up, and about every 3 months breaks it off.

So, the question is, how does one go about aligning the probe tip to the spindle centerline?  I want to use this for machine setup, so it needs to be very accurate.  Seems to me it must be a huge PITA to get it precisely aligned and centered, I assume by using three screws to tilt the PCB, or similar arrangement.

Regards,
Ray L.

904

General Mach Discussion / Re: Viewing Parameters

« on: November 14, 2009, 04:42:06 PM »

IF you don't need an on-screen DRO, then Vars are really a better place to store things, and they are accessible both to VB and G-code.  DROs are not accessible in G-code.

Regards,
Ray L.

905

General Mach Discussion / Re: Probing questions, Help!

« on: November 14, 2009, 04:38:55 PM »

Z is DRO 2002, A is 2003, etc.

Regards,
Ray L.

906

General Mach Discussion / Re: feed rate behavior

« on: November 14, 2009, 12:01:44 PM »

There is absolutely *nothing* to be gained by running the Mach3 kernel speed any faster than the fastest step rate you require.  All it does it eat up CPU bandwidth, and potentially create problems.  Few machines seem capable of running reliably long-term above a 45kHz kernel rate, regardless of what the driver test indicates.  If it works at 35kHz, and gives you the rapid speeds you need, then run it at 35kHz.  Going faster buys you nothing at all.

Regards,
Ray L.

907

General Mach Discussion / Re: Anybody running Intel Atom's on MiniITX boards?

« on: November 13, 2009, 10:06:02 PM »

Hmm - I think that the drive voltage or current capacity that the parallel port is putting out is just marginal for that gecko... you might try swapping the gecko module for one of the others, and/or a buffered breakout board.

Many, if not most, parallel ports are incapable of properly driving the opto inputs of a Gecko.  A buffered breakout board is a necessity.

Regards,
Ray L.

908

General Mach Discussion / Re: Keeping informed on Vis Basic

« on: November 13, 2009, 10:21:51 AM »

You *can* put variables on the message line.  Use Message(), rather than writing a G-code comment.  For example:

Pass = Pass + 1
Message("On Pass " & Pass)

Regards,
Ray L.

909

General Mach Discussion / Re: processor speed

« on: November 11, 2009, 05:43:12 PM »

Just try it and see how it works.  I ran for a year on a 544MHz machine with no problems.  I ran my X2 for a while on a 166MHz PC, and never had a problem.

Regards,
Ray L.

910

General Mach Discussion / Re: Need HELP Steppers Stalling on Shallow Moves

« on: November 11, 2009, 02:25:57 PM »

Do NOT ground any signal wires coming from the VFD - that may blow up the VFD.  That supply should be floating.
Cable shields should be grounded to the device driving the signa wires.  So, cables coming from the BOB should have their shields grounded to the BOB ground terminals.
Not sure I'd bother shielding stepper cables.  The power supply wires to the stepper controllers should tie directly to the power supply terminals.  The - connections can go to your common ground point if that is very close (no more than a few inches) to the power supply.

Regards,
Ray L.