Messages

21

General Mach Discussion / Re: Open vectors

« on: January 12, 2020, 01:41:50 AM »

Hi Tweakie

I shall do that.

Cheers

Peter

22

General Mach Discussion / Re: Open vectors

« on: January 11, 2020, 05:04:04 PM »

Hi

Thanks for the reply. I was using the Engraving tool path, or at least trying to. You mention the quick engraving tool path, I don't see this in the version I have: VCarve Desktop V10.

Best

Peter

23

General Mach Discussion / Open vectors

« on: January 11, 2020, 03:43:45 PM »

Hi

I appreciate that the may not be the right forum, but here goes.

I'm using VCarve and I have created a stylised line drawing of a dog and I want to engrave this onto a bit of MDF with a 60 degree V bit. I have selected the image and set the tool, but when I hit 'Calculate' to get the tool path I get a message saying:

"Ignoring Unsuitable Open Vectors. 19 open vectors in the selection are being ignored. There are 0 remaining vectors."

No tool paths are created.

What am I doing wrong?

24

General Mach Discussion / Re: Code snippets

« on: January 07, 2020, 02:29:35 AM »

Hi Peter,

I think the best and easiest way is to use a CAD/CAM software to draw your part (or import the .dxf / drawing file) then it can create the Gcode for you automatically applying the tool radius and offsets, etc. Actually writing the Gcode by hand seems a bit outdated nowadays.

One of the most popular range of CAD/CAM programs is made by Vectric; https://www.vectric.com/ (for what it does it is worth every penny).
There are also many FREE softwares, one I use a lot is F-Engrave; https://www.scorchworks.com/Fengrave/fengrave.html

Perhaps Google free CAD/CAM software.

Tweakie.

Hi Tweakie

I took your advice and purchased Vcarve, it's very good isn't it. You are quite right about manual coding being a bit too old school; my first project was cutting foam to hold a Shure IEM beltpack - I work in live music and AV production. The code for what is essentially a 70 x 88 mm hole with a few other cutouts was over 1000 lines of Gcode!

Cheers

Peter

25

General Mach Discussion / Re: Code snippets

« on: January 01, 2020, 04:09:11 AM »

Hi Guntruck 1776

Thanks for the reply, this was the code supplied to me by BR549:

G0 X0 Y0 Z0 (Centerpoint of hole)
( first pass of depth)
G1 Z-1 F10 (lower Z in center of hole)
G1 X2 F10 (move to Radius of hole)
G2 X2 Y0 I-2 J0 F10 ( Cut circle at 5mm { 3mm tool and 2 mm offset =5mm radius} radius from centerpoint)
G0 X0Y0 (return to centerpoint)

(2nd pass of depth)

G1 Z-2 F10
G1 X2 F10
G2 X2 Y0 I-2 J0 F10
G0 X0Y0

M30

This was working fine with me changing various values to see what happened - I was trying to cut a 10mm hole with a 6MM cutter - with no success (I am new to this)

I changed the feed rate on this line to F20:
G2 X2 Y0 I-2 J0 F10 ( Cut circle at 5mm { 3mm tool and 2 mm offset =5mm radius} radius from centerpoint)

It was after I changed it back to F10 that the issue occurred even though the G1 X2 F10 line hadn't been changed in any way.

I went back to the original file and the same problem occurred, yet other files with similar Z & X movements are working OK

Like I said, I am new to this, so forgive any glaring ignorance on my part.

Cheers and happy new year

Peter

26

General Mach Discussion / Re: Code snippets

« on: December 30, 2019, 01:37:11 PM »

A weird thing happened today. I used the code and experimented with it by changing some parameters and it was working well, but suddenly it didn't work. I had run the code 20 or so times, then when it got to the line G1 Z-1 F10 (move to radius of hole) it stopped and would not go to the next line, even though I had not changed anything on that line, and it had been working fine.

I checked some other files with similar Z and X movements and they all worked.

Any ideas as to why this happened?

Best regards

Peter

27

General Mach Discussion / Re: Non repeatable movement

« on: December 29, 2019, 12:23:54 PM »

Hi everyone

I have solved the issue: I had the step pulse far too short (I used the default of 3) and the number of steps per inch way too high, this must have resulted in lost pulses. Changing these settings, along with changing the feed rate and acceleration has resulted in repeatable results and a much smoother operation.

Thanks for your suggestions, no doubt I'll be asking more questions in the future.

Cheers and a happy new year to you all

Peter

28

General Mach Discussion / Re: new to this game

« on: December 27, 2019, 04:15:03 AM »

HI Cad Cam Man

Thanks for your kind offer and  I have no doubt that I will be contacting you

Cheers

Peter

29

General Mach Discussion / Re: Non repeatable movement

« on: December 26, 2019, 10:16:44 AM »

Thanks, I'll give it a try and let you know.

Love your profile pic.

30

General Mach Discussion / Non repeatable movement

« on: December 26, 2019, 07:17:22 AM »

Hi, I'm having some issues with non repeatability. I shall explain:

X0 (Ref 0 in the software)
X15 (In inches)
X0

Cutter head moves 15" to the right, stops and returns to zero, but it doesn't. It says 0 in the software but the cutter head stops short by about 0.25". Similar situation with the Y and Z axis.

Hema 23 motors, standard driver boards, Mach 3 software (obviously), timing belt for X/Y axis, lead screw for Z axis.

So what am I doing wrong?