Messages

11

General Mach Discussion / Re: Wait on Hypertherm XFER output?

« on: November 16, 2007, 12:00:59 PM »

I did not find much information on how to use the SystemWaitFor function in the customization.pdf. Can you post an example for me since I am not  too good of a programmer ? I have a Thermal Dynamics plasma cutter with a similar pin to sense when the torch is lit.

12

General Mach Discussion / Re: Corel Draw Trace and Plasma cutting

« on: May 21, 2007, 01:10:43 PM »

Thanks  everyone for the suggestions. I guess I am going to hand trace everything from now on and try to get faster at it.

13

General Mach Discussion / Re: Corel Draw Trace and Plasma cutting

« on: May 17, 2007, 07:31:02 PM »

The tracing method in another layer does work however it is time consuming and I thought this great program would have a solution. They sell it with the power trace function but it seems to want to make a closed object which ends up making a plot that goes around the object twice. Once on the inside and once on the outside.


Thanks

14

General Mach Discussion / Corel Draw Trace and Plasma cutting

« on: May 14, 2007, 04:40:31 PM »

I have some paper templates that I have used over time to create curved wall sconce's  for outdoor lighting. I want to input them into Corel Draw in order to make a plt file and then gcode files for my plasma cutting setup. This is a question on how to make Corel Draw give me what I need for the plasma cutting. I traced the template with a sharpie pen and then scanned the image into the computer. The pattern is a floral design which contains a number of petals. A petal would be cut with the torch leaving a part of it attached to the base metal so it can be bent out a little. In terms of shapes, it is a open curved object, ie is not closed. When I use the trace feature, it does create the trace however when I export it to a plt file, the cutting path is going to go around the inside and the outside of the lines making up the petal. I do not want it to double cut, just make it do one cut path for each shape. Can anyone help me ? I have done other images by using Corel and one of the irregular tools to lay a new object over the scanned image but it takes forever to do. It seems the trace tool should be able to give me a single trace for a line. BTW, I used line art as a selection on the trace setup. Also tried others to no avail.

Thanks for any assistance.

15

G-Code, CAD, and CAM discussions / Re: Having Trouble with G4... Not Behaving as I think It should

« on: February 08, 2007, 09:47:46 AM »

Thanks Graham, but I am confused. Mike has this line   "X3. Y3. Z-1.5 F5 G4 P1500."  that I think says P1500 and Brian says "You may hve gone past what we have  for a value that can be set...This is the longest dwell that I have ever seen" . From what you said, this should only be 1.5 seconds --  correct ?

Thanks

16

G-Code, CAD, and CAM discussions / Re: Having Trouble with G4... Not Behaving as I think It should

« on: February 07, 2007, 08:07:00 PM »

What are the units of time for the 'P' parameter ? I set the dwell to P12.0 and it does not wait 12 seconds. I need at least 2 seconds for my plasma to start.
Thanks for any help

17

General Mach Discussion / Re: Plasma turns on --- Computer stops

« on: January 30, 2007, 08:53:29 PM »

I have a L-Tec PCM 750i plasma cutter that is now supplied by ESAB. I bought it new in Nov 1994 for a little more than $2100 so I am motivated to get it to work. Sometimes it does not kill the computer and it works really well. I hope someone has experience with this machine and can offer some suggestions to get it to work. Are you saying that the steel on the table should be islolated from the stepper motor grounds, etc ? I think I can try this fairly easily.

18

G-Code, CAD, and CAM discussions / Re: CorelDraw DXF export file does not load in Lazycam

« on: January 29, 2007, 04:13:17 PM »

Thank you for the suggestion. I will look into it when I get my hardware working better. My plasma torch is acting weird. At the moment, I am having success with exporting hpgl plt files. They load into LazyCam with no problems.

19

General Mach Discussion / Plasma turns on --- Computer stops

« on: January 29, 2007, 03:03:37 PM »

I finally got my stepper motors working, x y and z. Attached my hand held torch and cut a few shapes. Sometimes, when the torch comes on, the G code stops, the computer is locked up. Even alt, ctl, Del does not work. Seems there is electromagnetic interference. I wrapped copper window screen aroung the printer cable and grounded the screen to the computer and it seemed to work sometimes. I have an Lteck plasma cutter with a high frequence start (that does not seem to work anymore since I hooked it up to the breakout relay for the switch. Any help or recommendations for the plasma machine type for use with Mach3 cam setup would be appreciated.

Alex

20

LazyCam (Beta) / Re: New LazyCam has lots of problems

« on: January 14, 2007, 01:08:48 PM »

Thanks, I have to try to figure out what I am doing wrong.