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Messages - joeaverage

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1501
Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 stops responding
« on: May 02, 2020, 08:30:12 PM »
Hi,
couple of points.

First:Mach4's Gcode interpreter converts all Gcode alphanumerics to lowercase, strips out leading zeros and strips out whitespace.

For example:
G0 X0.09 Y  95.6 Z 0.004 F150    becomes:
g0x.09y95.6z.004f150

and:
M 30    becomes:
m30

In most cases the Gcode you write or is produced by your post will be correctlty interpreted, that is to say leading
zeros, whitespace and capitals don't affect the execution of the code.....but every once and a while they do. Faults like
that are devilishly hard to pick and diagnose. For this reason I would recommend you write all Gcode in lowercase
and without leading zeros. I often leave whitspace in to make Gcode more human readable, but otherwise try to present
Gcode to the inerpreter EXACTLY as the interpreter expects and thereby circumvent any translation faults.

Second: MessageBox is a wxWidgets function and is used typically to display results on your PC. It is not as such
part of Mach4 at all, but rather a whole suite of functionality imported to it. In your situation you have two choices:
1) Go to your m6() macro and remove the wxMessageBox call....or
2) Research the properties of wxMessageBox (wxWidgets is open source) and apply a 'pin to the top' property to it.

The later option is probably best but wxWidgets is for Geeks, written by Geeks and in pure Geekese. Not an easy proposition
for CNCers!

Craig


1502
Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 stops responding
« on: May 02, 2020, 06:14:23 PM »
Hi,
try making the last M30 into lowercase m30 and try again.

Craig

1503
Mach4 General Discussion / Re: Mach4 stops responding
« on: May 02, 2020, 05:21:17 PM »
Hi,
it sounds like the Gcode interpreter is gettig hung up.

Does it happen on every Gcode program?

May I suggest running a part program that you know triggers the fault but edit the program such that the last
two lines are:
m30
%

Note that m30 is the last instruction but it must be followed but a LF and/or CR, and it is common practice
to put  a '%' to ensure the m30 is fooled by a LF at a minimum.

Craig

1504
Hi,
Machs GUI cannot display fast signals, it is possible that the index signal is operating properly just that it is so fast
that it does not show on the diagnostics screen.

I have heard that some people have found that it is neccessary to make the slot in the disc as wide as possible so that
the index pulse has greater duration.

Craig

1505
FAQs / Re: Incorrect working space
« on: May 02, 2020, 08:50:10 AM »
Hi,
do you have home switches on your machine?.

From what you have described you are not referencing or homing your machine, and note that is different
to 'zeroing the work coordinates'.

Craig

1506
Hi,
see attached.

Craig

1507
Hi,
yes, if you use a belt drive it not only needs to be 1:1 but it can have no slip, ie it has to be a toothed 'timing belt'
type otherwise successive thread passes will result in disaster.

Just as a matter of interest how are you driving your servo, step/direction or 0-10V analogue?

I ask because if you use 0-10V analogue, which is by far the most common control methodology for hobby spindles,
then the ESS plugin for Mach4 offers a subtle but powerful advantage over the ESS and Mach3.

In particular the ESS can execute a PID control loop over the spindle motor with the PWM (effectively the 0-10V analogue)
as the controlled variable. This allows for marginally powered and/or low inertia spindles to be precisely and acitvely
speed controlled resulting in more accurate threading.

Note that this speed controll still requires a 'once per spindle revolution index signal' for thread synchronisation.

Craig

1508
General Mach Discussion / Re: Best way to Pause a Mach3 job
« on: May 02, 2020, 12:50:30 AM »
Hi,
to pause a job in such a manner that it can be restarted without losing steps you must use <FeedHold>.

If you use <Stop> the machine will crash stop and the contents of the motion buffer are aborted and so if you attempt
to restart the result will be inaccurate due to the loss af motion commands that were in the buffer at the time you <Stop>.
Typically the motion buffer will have anywhere from 100ms to 500ms of motion commands therfore any loss of those
commands will usually result in lost steps.

<FeedHold> on the otherhand will carry on exexcuting the buffered motion commands, typically 100 to 500ms worth of movement,
until the motion buffer is drained. If you then <Stop> no motion commands have been lost.

To restart a program at some point within the program is perfectly possible but the procedure is demanding and exacting.
It relies on Mach doing a 'dummy run' to the point in the part program that you wish to restart so that Mach knows the
correct mode in which to restart and then it will make a preparatory move to the restart location. More jobs have been wrecked,
tools broken and machines crashed with this preparatory move than any other operation in Mach3.

If you are prepared to study the RFH, Run From Here documentation, and follow it precisely it works fine.
It takes a few practice runs and disasters before the procedure sinks in and woe betide you if you get distracted duing a RFH
procedure.

It may be possible that if you <FeedHold> a program you can walk away from your machine and come back several hours
later and hit <CycleStart> and the job will restart without all the palava of RFH. Some motion controllers, and some PC's
do not like sitting around idle for any great length of time and  so it might transpire that after an absence of several hours
you HAVE to do a RFH.

I use an ESS and Mach4 and run it on a very low-power dual core Atom single board PC and I can happliy leave my machine
for hours or even days in idle state and suffer no loss when executing <CycleStart> after the absence.

Craig

1509
Hi,
you can't directly import a .dxf file into Mach, or in fact any CNC software solution.

Mach consumes Gcode which is a sequence of movement instructions. The program that converts a design,
say a .dxf file, to Gcode is called CAM, Computer Aided Manufacture, and that file is
further post-processed by a what has been shortend to ' a post' to adapt it to a particular machine Gcode dialect.

May I suggest that you download a free copy of Fusion 360. You should be able to import a .dxf file into Fusion rather than doing
the CAD directly in Fusion and thereafter Fusion should produce a toolpath as represented by Gcode which can in turn
be consumed by Mach.

Craig

1510
Hi,

Quote
Could I use feedback from my servo? Sorry for the stupid questions just trying to put things in language I understand.

Yes and no. You could use the servo encoder to Mach and that would allow Mach to correctly calculate the spindle rpm.
What Mach, or rather the motion controller, requires in addition is an index signal ONCE PER SPINDLE REVOLUTION.
The motion controller uses the index signal to start the thread. If multiple passes are required to cut the thread to the target
depth then the index signal is critical to get succesive passes synchronised.

As you have a belt reduction between the servo and the spindle the index pulse of the servo encoder will not suffice for
an index signal for thread synchronisation. You either have to ensure that the reduction is exactly 1:1 so that the srevo encoder
index pulse occurrs once per spindle revolutio OR you need to add an index pulse genertor to the spindle.

Craig

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