Messages

41

General Mach Discussion / More inputs or can I configure Mach3 to use one MPG for X, Y and Z axis?

« on: September 20, 2017, 10:43:37 AM »

Newbie here with a couple of questions......

I'm adding CNC capability to an old Long Chang mill, so far I have added 1200 oz-in steppers on the X and Y axis , and I'm driving these with 2060AC micro stepper drivers via Mach3. I also added magnetic scales for DRO capability. Everything seems peachy-keen so far, other than some motor resonance at medium speeds. I will Add Z axis capability next.

I'm using a dedicated mini-ATX PC board that has two parallel ports.

I also want to hookup a rotary pot (MPG) to make jogging easier. At first glance it looks like Mach3 is designed to work with separate MPG encoders for each axis, I would prefer to have one rotary encoder and a rotary switch to assign the encoder to the desired axis. Is there a way to get Mach3 to change the axis a single MPG will be used for?, ie. a command would be ideal.  If not I will need 2 inputs for each MPG! I'm quickly running out of inputs:
  1 for E-Stop
  2 for X axis DRO
  2 for Y axis DRO
  2 for Z axis DRO

So if I can mutiplex 3 MPG's to just 2 inputs (I'm okay for now), if not I will need at least 3 more inputs.
  2 for X axis DRO
  2 for X axis DRO
  2 for X axis DRO

How does one get more usable inputs?

42

Mach4 General Discussion / Re: New people welcome !! Come in here and introduce your self!

« on: June 27, 2017, 08:50:20 AM »

Hi!
Newbie here from Toronto, Canada. I recently picked up an old LC-30 mill and plan to add steppers to get CNC control.

As a starting point I decided I would try to get a DRO working using Ditron magnetic scales and using Mach3 (demo mode) to display the coordinates.  I installed the X scale yesterday and connected it to the parallel port and played with the Counts/Unit setting in the Encoder tab of ports and pins and it's now working (sort of). If I move the table say 1" the DRO reading on the settings tab will usually be within 0.001", however if I spin the hand wheel as fast as I can for a few inches, it seems like I miss the odd pulse here and there (assumption at this point) and the error can be say 10-50 mils.

Perhaps I need to tweak either the velocity setting (presently default value of 100) or increase the Kernel speed (presently 25000Hz)

I'm finding the mach3 manual somewhat lacking in detail, I'm wondering if the copies I'm using are not the full blown manual? (Mach3Mill_1.84.pdf (5705KB) and Mach3Mill_Install_config.pdf (4213KB)