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Messages - Mike K

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11
Are you referring to the P.4? I thought that was a pause of .4 seconds duration. Is that not true?

12
When a program stop (M1 or M0) comes up, the pendant displays "Stop?". The only way to get past it is to click through with the pendant button. It then displays "Start?". You must then click through again, at which point the program resumes. My problem is that all feed moves from then on are rapid moves.

So, it sounds like your feed moves did not turn into rapid moves like mine do. That points to an issue with the plugin corrupting Mach3. Does that sound right?

M3 is generally spindle on, forward.
M8 is generally coolant on.
For my laser welder it turns on the beam and shielding gas respectively.
M5 and M9 turns them of.

I'm not moving during the stop commands.

Thanks for responding!

13
Here is what has happened since my last post. I'm hoping that somebody (please) will be willing to try to duplicate this problem. Tech support at Artsoft doesn't seem to be having much luck so far.

The Vista P2S pendant requires that you toggle through "pause" to get to "start". On a whim, I decided to do the same thing while operating from the Mach3 screen. The same problem occurred!

So does Mach3 have a bug that causes this problem that I happened to trip over because of the way that the pause/stop feature works on the pendant, or did the plugin for the pendant corrupt Mach3? I don't know because I never tried that stop/start sequence before installing the pendant.

Would somebody be willing to try to duplicate my problem on a version of Mach3 that doesn't have a Vista plugin so that I can tell where the problem is?

The program is below. Note that it uses G54, 55 and 56. They should all be set the same.

%
O0001;
(uprod to end housing)
(no filler)
g0g90g17g54x-.102y0z0a0
m8p.4
m3p.4
g01x.102f2.5
m5
m9
g0a180x-.102
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1x.102f2.5
m5
m9
g0a218x0y-.025z.02
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1a326f2.5
m5
m9
g0a37x0y-.025z.02
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1a150f2.5
m5
m9

(use filler)
g0g90g17g54x-.102y0z0a0
m1
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1x.102f2.5
m5
m9
m1

g0a37x0y-.025z.02
m1
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1a150f2.5
m5
m9
m1


g0a180x-.102y0z0
m1
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1x.102f2.5
m5
m9
m1

g0a218x0y-.025z.02
m1
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1a326f2.5
m5
m9
m1



g0g90g17g55x-.102y0z0a0
m1
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1x.102f2.5
m5
m9
m1

g0a37x0y-.025z.02
m1
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1a150f2.5
m5
m9
m1


g0a180x-.102y0z0
m1
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1x.102f2.5
m5
m9
m1


g0a218x0y-.025z.02
m1
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1a326f2.5
m5
m9
m1



g0g90g17g56x-.102y0z0a0
m1
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1x.102f2.5
m5
m9
m1

g0a37x0y-.025z.02
m1
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1a150f2.5
m5
m9
m1


g0a180x-.102y0z0
m1
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1x.102f2.5
m5
m9
m1


g0a218x0y-.025z.02
m1
m8p.4
m3p.4
g1a326f2.5
m5
m9
m1


g0g90g54a0x0y0z0
M30
%


14
I'm waiting to hear from Vista. They were initially unable to duplicate the problem.

15
Thanks for responding.

There is no macro. The wire is fed by hand.

Using the keyboard or mouse works fine. No problem.

A typical program segment is:
G0G90G17G54X-.102Y0.Z0.A0.
M01
M8P.4 (argon on)
M3P.4 (laser on)
G1X.102F2.5
M5
M9
M01
(on to the next weld)

16
I've posted this in the CNC Zone forum and got a pretty limited response so I thought I would try this forum.

I have a laser welder that I added a motion system to. Gecko steppers and 540 box, Mach 3 and a lot of machining to get it all together and working. Everything worked fine, but the mouse and keyboard were pretty bad as input devices.

I read some good things about the pendants that Vista CNC sells and ordered their P2S because it has the ability to command "cycle start", "stop", "rewind", etc.

The pendant is pretty nicely made. The housing is plastic but sturdy, the switches work nicely and the MPG works just like the ones on $100K cnc machines.

But I've run into a glitch that REALLY needs to be fixed before I can use it.

I have a program to laser weld a part that requires the use of filler wire. This means that stop points (M1s) are needed in the program to get the wire in place before it starts the feed move.

If I don't use the pendant it feeds as it should through the whole program whether optional stop is on or off.

If I use the pendant while optional stop is on, it works as it should until I use the pendant cycle start to restart the program after an optional stop. That's when the feed moves become rapid moves. Once this happens it stays that way regardless of whether the commands come from the pendant or keyboard. The only way I've found to restore it is to exit the program and re open it.

If I use the pendant with optional stop off, everything is fine. It seems like the combination of optional stop in Mach 3 and cycle starting from the pendant is where the trouble is.

It also does this with M0 stops.

Has anyone else encountered this problem?

I sure hope that someone has an answer!

Mike




17
General Mach Discussion / Re: Setting "steps per" on rotary (A) axis
« on: October 08, 2014, 11:23:48 PM »
Thank you so much! That did it for the most part.

I hadn't set Config, Toolpath, Rotations. So now, when I command a move of 120 degrees it moves 119.970 or so. I think this must be because the proper steps per degree is 88.888888............, which Mach 3 rounds to 88.88889 or such. Am I right? For my application it's not a problem at all, but I'm curious about it.

Thanks again for the response. They should put that in the book.

Mike

18
General Mach Discussion / Setting "steps per" on rotary (A) axis
« on: October 06, 2014, 07:16:27 PM »
Hello, new member here.

I built a motion system (Gecko 540 and Mach 3) for a laser welder and just added a rotary table to it. The rotary moves, but I can't get the "steps per" setting to have an effect on the amount of rotation.

According to my calculations the steps per degree should be 88.8888. If I set it at that and command a 120 degree move, the rotary moves about 260 degrees. If I change the steps to degree to 44, it still moves about 260 degrees. And it's the same whether it is set at 160 or 320.

Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong?

Mike K.

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