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Messages - Sam

751
Show"N"Tell ( What you have made with your CNC machine.) / Re: Lithopane
« on: November 08, 2008, 09:12:58 PM »
When you said it was a time honored family tradition, you weren't kidding, were you! It goes waaaaaay back!

752
I had the exact same problem with the runaway axis. I did fix it, but it has escaped memory as to what the fix was. Try reading the post by Chaotic and downloading his keygrabber profiles. I don't think that the axis will have the problem, and you can do a bit of sleuth work to find out why. http://www.machsupport.com/forum/index.php/topic,1391.0.html

753
General Mach Discussion / Re: Z AXIS KNEE
« on: November 08, 2008, 10:15:33 AM »
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Looking at the wear on some older machines that never had a power knee
seems to indicate that this is indeed the case.
Most likely because of the manual labor that is involved in cranking those tables, they only get used when absolutely necessary. That's how it is in my case anyhow, but I'm a bit on the lazy side. ;D

754
Tangent Corner / Re: What the.........?
« on: November 05, 2008, 04:21:57 PM »
Hehehe...don't even get me started Tweak. It goes waaay beyond string theory, and sub-micronified cohesion nortronics to the 3rd power, and I'm afraid there's just no way to sum it up on the forums.

755
General Mach Discussion / Re: Peck Drilling
« on: November 03, 2008, 09:44:40 PM »
It sounds like your using the same machine as the one I use. A simple peck drilling cycle is just as you stated. Plunge, chip break, plunge, chip break, etc. However, if your hole is deep enough to cause a problem of evacuation of chips, a retract would be advisable. Plunge, chip break, plunge, chip break, plunge, retract.... or some form thereof. Yeah, 5IPM is kinda (allot) slow.
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If the strings are to long, turn the feedrate up, or turn the spindle speed down.
OR lower the peck.

756
General Mach Discussion / Re: Peck Drilling
« on: November 03, 2008, 08:44:51 PM »
Depends on the rigidity of your machine, quality of your drill, (I would use non-coated bits on alu. regardless of the bit quality) coolant used, among other things. If It were me, I would start about 1200-1800 rpm, 15-20 IPM, and use an oil based coolant. Usually when I start with something, I make changes during or after the first hole. If your hole is deep, it would be a good idea to set a retract depth. Say every half inch or so. The oil based coolant is of great importance to avoid the aluminum from sticking to the bit. Once it sticks, it's done for---end of story. WD40 works, but not really optimal. If you DO happen to have aluminum brazed into the bit, drilling some steel with a good coolant flow will usually clean it off pretty well. The chip break doesn't really matter all that much, as long as its breaking the chip, so .03-.05 should be fine. With aluminum, I would rather have a bit longer strings than very short ones that would cause the soft chips to seize up in the bit. Not long enough to accumulate around the bit, ending up like a ball of yarn, though. If the strings are to long, turn the feedrate up, or turn the spindle speed down. These figures would be a "in the ballpark" starting point for the machine I use.

757
*****VIDEOS***** / Re: SAVING a video
« on: November 02, 2008, 06:22:06 PM »
I feel your pain, RC. My only options are dial-up, or ISDN for more cost than a broadband connection. I have the ISDN.
There is a firefox extension that works VERY well. And its not just for youtube. It will download basically anything with media that you choose for it to download, and its conveniently located on your menu bar. http://www.downloadhelper.net/ The format converter part of it requires a bit more knowledge of formats and additional software, but if you do desire conversion of your videos, it is capable. For simplicity, just click "install the extension".
You will also need a .FLV player for youtube videos, if you don't convert them to another format. http://www.martijndevisser.com/blog/flv-player/ It's small in size (5MB), and its free. It does have a bug or two, like window resizing issues, but its FREE!

758
General Mach Discussion / Re: general newbie questions
« on: October 31, 2008, 11:40:51 PM »
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I don't think this will be very easy to do, the way you want to do it
Hehe.... I don't think it will be easy ANY way you do it  ;D
However you decide to do it, be prepared for a very steep learning curve.
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travels across all of the doors
Ahhh... A mural, or landscape. Now you have to share pictures of your projects!  :) We would love to see some!

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the door sizes are all different, and larger than what you can run through a scanner
The size of the final product is usually of no concern with respect to the size of the drawn pattern. You can scale the drawing to any desirable size. You could draw an eagle the size of a quarter dollar, and cut it on the machine as big as the machine capacity. If you feel that you make your designs best at full size so you can have a real life visual reference, well then I totally understand that. You could draw the whole cabinet system in 3D, but I understand that a computer model is not the same as a physical model. It is a barrier that we all have to overcome in some form or fashion to really tap into the designs in our head.
Out of curiosity, did you build the machine for the intent on inlay work, or was your primary concern with making repeatable parts in quantity, such as frames, dovetails, etc...?
A website that might be of interest to you is ecabinets. http://www.ecabinetsystems.com/ if you've not already found it.

759
General Mach Discussion / Re: general newbie questions
« on: October 31, 2008, 06:16:42 PM »
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raster to vector software "sucks" and i don't care who makes it and how much you spend
I agree with Rich.

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I will make the inlays myself on a bandsaw
Why are you choosing to do this by hand? If your reasoning is "because the veneer is thin"....Thin parts can be cut by sandwiching between two pieces of thicker material. "spoil boards" or "sacrificial boards" are a common reference for them.

If it were me, I would choose to do it in this manner.

Draw the pattern in cad (or cam), OR....
Freehand the pattern, scan your pattern to the computer using a scanner, then trace over the scanned image in cad.
Import the cad drawing into your cam program.

Basically what you are doing is making an outline to use as a tool path for the veneer AND the pocket in the door. Using the same outline for both parts ensures a much better fit.
I would stay away from taking a picture of the part or drawing, and then manipulating the picture to create a tool path. A camera will NOT take a truly flat 2D picture, and therefore can cause all sorts of grief for you. Especially since your needing a reasonably tight fitment.
If your putting this pattern on more than one door, you could also consider stacking the veneers together between the spoil boards and cutting several at the same time.

If all your doing is making simple pockets and outlines, there should be no reason to sell a kidney and buy Mastercam or some other expensive software. Some cam programs will allow you some cad ability, therefore eliminating the need for the cad software, and importing/exporting files between the two.

Good luck with your endeavor.





760
G-Code, CAD, and CAM discussions / Re: New G-Code Summary display format
« on: October 27, 2008, 07:17:25 PM »
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the Times New Roman font used in the summary is distracting. Would you match fonts used in the screens please?

Change the font to whatever pleases you here.....
You will have to restart Mach for changes to take effect.