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1

General Mach Discussion / Re: Newbie with an issue That doesn't make sense.

« on: March 17, 2013, 12:53:47 PM »

Thanks for the response Ray.

I kind of guessed that so I left it running then came home the next night to try and look for the problem.  The problem with that was we'd had a power out and the PC rebooted, losing where it was.

Is there any history that's save that I could pull back up?  If not I'm not sure if I can find where it was.  What do you thing of the g-code checker/simulator that cnccookbook.com sells?  Have you ever heard of RhinoCAM generating bad code?

Thanks
Billy

2

General Mach Discussion / Newbie with an issue That doesn't make sense.

« on: March 17, 2013, 11:44:26 AM »

New to Mach3, running a retrofitted ridgid ram Bridgeport series one.  It came with an old DOS based software that's no longer supported so bought Mach3.  Since I'm completly new to this I paid a local machine guy to do the basic set ups in Mach3.  Using Rhino3D to design parts and RhinoCAM for code.

Designed a part, moved the knee way down and was happy to find everything went the right direction when I tested.  So far so good.  Got everything ready and started on a part.  Since I'm not sure what it can handle I started slow and kept bumping the feeds.  Getting to where it looked like it should run with the finish starting to look pretty good and disaster.  Fnished a cut, raised for a rapid, sat back down and started on the next cut.  The problem is it hadn't moved and ripped right across the part.  The good side is it was a deep cut and the machine ripped right through with a great finish and no complaints but the part is junk.

Ok, here's where I'm lost.  I first assumed I pushed it to hard, it lost steps, lost track of where it was and went right on it's merry way.  Makes sense except for 2 thngs.  First, when it seems to have lost a line it was a rapid when the tool was in the air with no load.  Second when I finally hit the stop it had moved clear off the part.  Fine except when I then checked the screen for where the machine thinks it was and it showed correctly off the part to one side.

Correct me if I'm wrong but if it missed steps and continued to cut like it thought it was still on path would'nt it show on the screen that it was still on path when in fact it had lost track of where it was?  I'm confused!  Help! What could have happened?

Thanks
Billy