Messages

21

General Mach Discussion / Re: SIGNALS REALLY MIXED UP??? Please help

« on: September 04, 2011, 09:03:50 PM »

If 15 in pulse width doesnt help or totally solve it you may need to enable Sherline mode, it seems some people need that with the G540's while others dont, likely its computer dependant.
Hood

RE: Sherline Mode. This problem described in this thread is very close to what I'm experiencing getting my Taig mill, Mach3, Gecko 540 system unpacked and running again after being packed up for 9 months for a move. Each axis stops for a split second either by jogging or under code - and not always in the same place. Code tells the z axis to go down .01 in. but it comes down about 1/8 in. Strangest of all, I'm sure Ports & Pins/Motor Outputs Dir Low Active were all checked and green for the x,y and z before I moved. Now both the y and z axes have to be unchecked/red to move in the proper direction. No bad connections that I can see. I tried separating the motor cables from power cables. I can't find anywhere in the config sections of Mach3 to change pulse width.

But simply checking Sherline Mode in Port setup and Axis Selection fixed the problem! Anyone know why? What does Sherline Mode do and why didn't I need it before the move? With similar systems, are the Dir Low Active cells checked and green for all axes? The only changes I made were to replace a crashed PC running XP with a faster Vista one, added a parallel port and upgraded to R3.042.020. Strange behavior.

22

General Mach Discussion / Taig steppers not running

« on: June 24, 2011, 09:16:30 AM »

After a move and putting my Taig mill back together, I found the steppers didn't move even though the system worked perfectly when I took it apart 6 months ago. Mach 3 shows the movement, the motors give the normal slight "clunk" on starting the controller. Recently I was given a newer machine running Vista Basic and replaced the old XP machine. I bought a parallel port card and new cable, installed the Vista patch and ran drivertest.exe (Excellent, then OK). Same problem. The motors even heat up a bit as before.

I assume the problem is not the new parallel port address, AC00. I put AC00 in Ports & Pins as 0xAC00 instead of the typical 0x378 and so Mach 3 should recognize the port. Right? So, I'm down to power supply or Gecko controller and have no idea what to do next. There are no loose wires. I took the controller and the X axis motor off the Taig and tried them separately with the same lack of movement.

Any suggestions? BTW, I always seem to have a problem downloading Mach. The downloading either stops a few seconds into the downloading or downloads instantly but Windows says the file didn't complete. I finally got version 030.

23

General Mach Discussion / Re: Subroutine doesn't repeat

« on: February 17, 2010, 08:17:55 PM »

My Mach is haunted. I tried #3 to move one inch and the X axis moves in one inch and 2 inches out. Then I replaced the G90 with G91 and tried to fake it out by putting -.5 there and it worked - the axis went out 1/2 inch. Then finally I changed the -.5 to 1 and now the table moves in and out the same distance. The second G91 is probably not needed. Anyway it works. Thanks for the help. Why the code should need G90 to move toward the cutter and G91 to move away is beyond me but as I say, it works, kludgy, but it works.

N5 (File Name = Cut teeth on wheel on Saturday, February 13, 2010)
   G90
N55 M98 P1 L60 (M98 Calls a subroutine, P is the Routine and Letter O is subroutine label number, L for number of times)
N60 M5 (Program end)
   M30
o1 (the subroutine)
   G90
N70 G1 X1 F5 (move X axis for cutter to pass through wheel at feed rate 5)
N75 G91 G1 X-1 F5 (Move X axis back)
N80 G91 A.016666 (rotate table clockwise 60/360 for 60 teeth in one revolution)
N85 M99 (1 Return from subroutine)

24

General Mach Discussion / Re: Subroutine doesn't repeat

« on: February 16, 2010, 07:34:50 PM »

Thanks for the help. The subroutine repeats and everything else works - almost. The X axis feed into the cutter moves, say one-half inch, the movement out from the cutter moves twice that - one inch regardless of the code. For the second pass after the rotary table turns, the X axis moves toward the cutter only one-half inch - not enough to move the wheel through the cutter.

I've not had this problem before and can't find anything in the code to explain it.

25

General Mach Discussion / Subroutine doesn't repeat

« on: February 15, 2010, 08:02:18 PM »

I've just installed a Sherline rotary table on a Taig mill and it appears to work fine manually with jogging. Now the next task is to write G code to cut clock teeth. The basic plan is to move the cutter mounted on the spindle in toward the wheel mounted in a chuck mandrell on the vertically mounted rotary table to cut a tooth, move it out to the starting position and then rotate the table. The code includes a subroutine to do this 60 times to cut a wheel with 60 teeth. The problem is that the subroutine doesn't repeat. In addition, the movement back out from the wheel is twice the distance it moves in. I had to add an 1 to the end of the subroutine, Mach wouldn't accept just an M99 or an O1 - it gives a "return called with no sub in effect" and there is a window tha opens with "Please wait, generating path." What am I missing in the following code (disregard the completely commented lines, I just borrowed an existing bit of code). I've also had to reduce the distance the X axis travels - it seems the scale goes out of whack after adding a rotary table.

N5 (File Name = Cut teeth on wheel on Saturday, February 13, 2010)
N10 (Default Mill Post)
N15  (G91.1)
N20 (M5 M9 Stop spindle, Coolant off)
N25 (M6 T1 TOOL Change Sixteenth)
N30 (G43 H1Tool Length offset)
N35 (G0 Z0.0000 Rapid positioning Z axis)
N40 (Rotate Spindle clockwise at 400 M3 S400)
N45 (Positioning of X and Y – rapid because of previous G0)
N50 (G1 Z-0.0100 F10.00 Linear Interpolation of Z axis)
N55 M98 P1 L60 (M98 Calls a subroutine, P is the Routine and Letter O is subroutine label number, L for number of times)
N60 M5 (Program end)
N65 O1 (the subroutine)
N70 G1 X.5 F5 (move X axis for cutter to pass through wheel at feed rate 5)
N75 G1 X-.5 F5 (Move X axis back)
N80 A.016666 (rotate table clockwise 60/360 for 60 teeth in one revolution)
N85 M99 1(Return from subroutine)

26

General Mach Discussion / Re: New guy with new Mach3 and new controller

« on: November 10, 2009, 09:01:46 PM »

Welcome from a slightly less new guy. The path to a finsihed part is:
Draw it out in CAD, export to DXF format
Import the DXF file into Lazycam or other CAM program that will convert your DXF to G code. This is another learning curve. This is where you set your tool diameter, offsets, cutting speed, total depth of cut, depth of cut per pass, etc. Lots of tool sizes can be created and saved here.
Post your G code to Mach3 and more or less hit start.

There's a lot more to the process of course. The top of material is determined either by jogging the cutter down right on top of the material or jogging it down to a feeler gauge and setting the gauge's thickness in Mach3.

None of this is rocket science but there are a number of learning curves to go up and you've got to put the whole thing together. I'd recommend going through your G code and see if you have included all the variables from Lazycam. Run Mach without the mill on and see what's happening. Did you set up an inside offset when you meant an outside? Did you forget to put a minus for depth of cut in Lazycam? Finally, practicing on some soft pine for your cuts is a good idea.

I hope this is a help. I've had lots of questions answered here. I'd really like to create a FAQ or crib sheet on all that's required from start to finish but the clock stops at 24 hours a day - can't get 25.

27

G-Code, CAD, and CAM discussions / Mill a straight line

« on: November 10, 2009, 08:28:28 PM »

They say there's no such thing as a stupid question but this one is close. I need to mill a simple straight line the width of whatever diameter cutter I have at hand. Basically I'm milling some elliptical holes inside of a rectangle 1 in. by 8 in. from a 8 in. x 8 in.  brass plate. I just need to "part off" the 1 in. x 8 in. piece when the ellipses are milled. I could do it manually but that's no fun. I could draw a rectangle, import it into Lazycam and use outside offsets but that means the cutter will be cutting air on 3 sides. That's no fun either.

I've got a 12 in. x 12 in. piece of aluminum that I'd like to cut up to make a tool plate so the ability to have the Taig mill a simple straight line seems like a very basic task. Any thoughts?

28

LazyCam (Beta) / Re: LazyCam connects unconnected elements

« on: August 22, 2009, 08:19:20 AM »

If you are using Vista, there's a bug that prevents Microstation V8 from working. Microsoft decided to omit an XP driver. There's a patch available.

29

LazyCam (Beta) / Re: LazyCam connects unconnected elements

« on: August 21, 2009, 08:44:34 PM »

It's V8 XM, the next step up from V8. Supposedly it's the version that will work with BIM (Building Information Management) but I'm not directly involved in that at work. This is a home-only version that disappears when I leave the company.

When I save a DGN, there is no choice whether to save it in V8 or XM so I assume the file structure is identical between the versions.

30

LazyCam (Beta) / Re: LazyCam connects unconnected elements

« on: August 21, 2009, 03:51:50 PM »

Thank you for the reply. The only difference in settings was that I had the Connection Line Tolerance set for .1 and this must have caused LC to think the sections were connected. When .001 was used, the image was perfect.

There's still a nagging problem - off and on - with this and other DXFs. For this particular DXF, LC says "Loop sensed as Open" for the center circle, which can't be correct. It's chain 1 here and it has two entities. But then the perimeter circle has two entities and an outer offset is created.

If I exit LC and start all over again, I can get an offset for the inner circle. Strange.

In any case, thanks for the setting!