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General Mach Discussion / Re: dual toolpath displays for 4-axis foam cutter?

« on: April 16, 2009, 06:32:53 PM »

If Mach3 has some way of synchronizing two different CNC processes, I suppose you could run two separate controllers. The second tower display would be a "nice to have" not "need to have" feature, so I don't think it would be worth going to that sort of trouble to get it.

As for foam advice, I'm still very much in the trial and error phase myself, so my advice would be to find a foam cutting forum to ask

Rusty

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General Mach Discussion / Re: dual toolpath displays for 4-axis foam cutter?

« on: April 13, 2009, 03:55:45 PM »

Correct. Pretty typical hot wire. The left tower is XY and the right tower is AB.
Rusty

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General Mach Discussion / dual toolpath displays for 4-axis foam cutter?

« on: April 13, 2009, 02:28:24 PM »

Greetings,

This is probably wishful thinking, but I have a foam cutter that's using XYAB g-code. The XY profile shows up on the toolpath display with no problems. The question is whether it's possible to have a second display that shows a toolpath for AB at the same time? I haven't found any way to do this, and I suspect there probably isn't a way, but it doesn't hurt to ask.

Thanks,
Rusty

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SmoothStepper USB / Re: SmoothStepper Rocks!

« on: April 09, 2009, 09:54:46 PM »

Quote from: Jeff_Birt on April 09, 2009, 06:20:45 PM

Whoo Hooo! Glad it is working for you. It is amazing how much the smooth pulse train helps things out...

Indeed! Now if it would just work for my foam cutter, which isn't running Mach3...

Cheers,
Rusty

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General Mach Discussion / Re: new computer can't jog faster than 50 ipm?

« on: April 09, 2009, 05:51:46 PM »

SmoothStepper saves the day!

http://www.machsupport.com/forum/index.php/topic,11152.0.html

Thanks,
Rusty

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SmoothStepper USB / SmoothStepper Rocks!

« on: April 09, 2009, 05:50:01 PM »

Greetings,

After days of pain and suffering trying to get Mach3 to work well with the parallel port on my new computer, I finally gave up and ordered a SS from Jeff. It got here in just a couple days, and I hooked it all up a few minutes ago. All I can say is WOW! It's smooooooth, and FAST

The old fossil of a computer used to be able to run at 220 ipm on my router, but the new one wouldn't go over about 50 ipm due to timing issues with all the new stuff they put in motherboards these days. The SS runs 400+ ips! The best part is that it's so smooth. With the parallel port, I used to hear rhythmic sounds as it was moving, as if the speed was changing periodically. Now, it's just one even tone.

I'm sold. Thank you Jeff!!!

Rusty

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General Mach Discussion / Re: new computer can't jog faster than 50 ipm?

« on: April 07, 2009, 04:17:43 PM »

I had to go to a meeting today, and found myself about a block from a decent computer store. For the sake of ruling out everything, and to satisfy my curiosity, I picked up a PCI to parallel adapter card. As expected, it didn't make any difference, and it makes sense that it wouldn't. The driver test shows the problem, and doesn't actually use the parallel port for the test. No harm done trying it, since I can always return it.

Cheers,
Rusty

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General Mach Discussion / Re: new computer can't jog faster than 50 ipm?

« on: April 06, 2009, 01:43:40 PM »

Both computers have just under 5V on the parallel port pins.

I spent quite a lot of time on this over the weekend, including using a logic analyzer to watch the step pulses. It's clear that the new computer's timing isn't as stable as the old computer was, and there's nothing that can be done about that. The only part that bothers me is that the driver test says my timing is "excellent", so I presume the Mach3 folks consider this OK. I have to wonder if the timing issue isn't more of a problem with my Probotix controllers. Perhaps they're just not forgiving of slight timing changes.

Since I ordered a SmoothStepper from Jeff, it's not such a big problem now, but I don't like to be beaten by something like this, so it still bugs me a bit.

Thanks,
Rusty

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