Messages

41

General Mach Discussion / G41 and G42 Help Request! Example given

« on: January 18, 2009, 08:21:51 AM »

Hi, I'm having trouble with tip radius comp in Mach3Turn and I'd really appreciate some help.

Tool table is set with Tool 1 as a normal DCMT tip cutting to the left with a 0.4mm radius, no offsets and "tip direction" is set to 1.

Working in Diameter mode and using R3.042.020.

My G-Code (pls. excuse my comments):

(MT2 Test Taper)
g21 (metric)
g61 (exact stop)
g18 (xz)
g90 (absolute)
g40 (off radius compensation)
g95 (mm per revolution feed mode)

T0101 M06 (Select Tool 1 data and do a tool change)
M03 S1000 (Start Spindle at 1000rpm)

G0 x0 Z3.0 (move to safe position)
G41 (Left tool tip compensation, rad is from the tool table for tool 1)

g1 x0.0 z0.0 F0.1
g1 x8.0 z0.0
x10.0 z-1.0
x10.0 z-10
x12.53 z-10.0
x14.53 z-11.0
x17.78 z-76.065
x17.78 z-78.72
x19.0 z-79.5
x19.0 z-97.0

G40 (off radius compensation)
M05 (Stop Spindle)
M30 (End and Rewind)

If I remove G41, it shows the profile I want in the path display, but it won't cut the right size as the G1 points are the finished article surface.

If I use G41, then I get the attached:


I've tried changing abs and inc IJ mode with no effect. Did I miss something? Any ideas?

Also, is there information anywhere on "tip direction", I can't find that.

Just got spindle feedback and threading working a treat (mesmerising) but this G41/42 has me stumped.

Final point, why do I get the jagged edges in the tool path display of the work piece? Is there a setting for this?

Thanks very much for your help.

Richard.

42

General Mach Discussion / FeedHold restart?

« on: March 11, 2007, 10:14:57 PM »

Hi, Using Version 2.55 I notice that to restart from feedhold I have to press stop then start. Any one else notice this? Or am I doing something wrong?

This is OK except that the spindle stops and then does not re-start when I press start. So it is a little dangerous? Why can't it be like the older versions where, after feedhold, just pressing start get things going again? This is far more natural I think? Or is there a setting to adjust this I've missed?

Also, it still does not re-start correctly on arcs.  And, if you feed hold twice on an arc, it goes off on a completely different tangent! I think this was being worked on. Can you let us know how it's going?

Apart from this, Mach3 is working just great.

Thanks!

Richard.

43

G-Code, CAD, and CAM discussions / Re: What computer is best for controller and cad/cam software.

« on: January 17, 2007, 01:54:25 AM »

I've been using http://www.progecad.com/ The light version is free, small and very capable. Seems to have most things and, well, it is free! How do they do that?

Also has many save options and you can write very simple scripts, so importing data from Excel (for gears etc) is real easy.

Save as ACAD 2000 ASCII DXF and LCAM imports fine.

(I've no connections...)

Richard.

44

General Mach Discussion / Re: FeedHold restart errors on ARC

« on: December 21, 2006, 11:45:54 PM »

Thanks Brian and Chad (ouch - I'm sticking with plastic!)! I can imagine this is incredibly complex.

By the way, just to make things even more difficult, does the same things on a helix...

(Feedhold aside, MACH3 is just great now. I love it. Very stable now on my PC.)

Good luck!

Richard.

45

General Mach Discussion / Re: FeedHold restart errors on ARC

« on: December 21, 2006, 10:54:11 PM »

PS, version R2.0.029.

46

General Mach Discussion / FeedHold restart errors on ARC

« on: December 21, 2006, 10:51:19 PM »

Art and Brian, thanks for fixing feedhold restart feed rate. That works great.

But, restarting on some ARCs after feedhold, strange things can sometimes happen. Feedhold twice and it goes crazy. Seems to loose its arc definition and starts on a very different path.

Pls see attached Gcode and feedhold anywhere on the outer arcs. It will not continue on the path as per the attached pictures.

Restart on the complex small arcs tooth profile then on my XP machine (driver not loaded), it is fine as attached.

But on my Win2k PC, connected to machine, it goes around in small circles after feedhold on the tooth profile (sorry, no picture).

CV or exact stop makes no difference nor does feedrate.

Hope this helps?

Richard.

47

General Mach Discussion / Re: Interesting problems.

« on: December 17, 2006, 09:36:26 PM »

Hello Dfurlano,

Looks like it was worth it - nice.

I used to have (maybe) similar problems. My advice is to bite the bullet and upgrade to Vn2.0.25 or 26. It really is very good and extremely stable. (Back up your mill.xml first and you may find your x and y motor settings need to be reversed for some reason.)

Your file loaded fine into this version on my PC with "inc" arc settings.

Good luck.

48

General Mach Discussion / Re: Feedrate Overide Ver 2.25 3 Issues maybe??

« on: December 11, 2006, 08:09:58 PM »

Thanks Brian

1) OK, I will try that - I wondered what that did!

2) I tried Monday's download (25) and still had that problem (version 20 also messed up arcs during feedhold - not checked that on 25).

3) Ah, I thought it might be something like that. But 25 does it in CV and exact stop which surprised me. Anyway, not a big problem.

I would be really grateful if 2) could be fixed, otherwise we can't safely use feedhold.

Now Mach is 100% stable on my PC, with my home made machine (made mostly of wood!) I am making things I never thought possible like name stamps and a little plastic rotary Wankle demonstration engine - very complex profiles and even internal gears, all cut with Mach3 and very small cutters. I'm learning a lot, thank you all.

Richard.

49

General Mach Discussion / Feedrate Overide Ver 2.25 3 Issues maybe??

« on: December 11, 2006, 07:56:44 AM »

Art, Version 2.0.025 is great in all respects. I love it all.

Well, except three little things. (Unless they are features, I don't know?)

1) Feed Rate Override will allow anything other than G0 go faster than the max motor speed in Motor Tuning, and so loose steps.

Give this a go, setting FRO to 100%:

G17 G21 G40 G54 G90
N10 G0 X0Y0Z10 F111
N20 G1 X10Y10  F60
N30 G1 X30Y30  F600
N40 G1 X50Y50  F1000
N50 G1 X0Y0    F300
N60 G0 X50Y50  F222
N70 G0 X0Y0    F333
N80 G1 X50Y50  F100
N90 G0 X0Y0    F1234
N100 G0 Z0 F0

Works fine. All G0 are at the max speed (F settings ignored) (400 mm/min on my machine) and any G1 F settings over 400 limit to 400.

Run it again at FRO = 120% (not an unusual setting) and all hell breaks loose. G0 are OK but with G1, any setting over 400 is limited to 400 but then the FRO is applied so I get 480mm/min. At 200% I get 800mm/min and mostly missed steps, ouch.

>>Can the total feed limit, after FRO, please be limited to max motor tuning speed in all cases?? (Or is there a setting I have missed?)

2) Look at line N80. (With FRO back at 100%.) F is F100 which is fine but "feed hold" during this path then "Start" again and the feedrate is now max speed (400) and I have a broken tool. Am I doing something wrong? Can it continue at the same feedrate as it was doing please?

3) The feedrate in the "Feedrate" box is not the feedrate of the line the machine is performing. Sometimes it is the next line, sometime a line much later in the file. Is this correct? Can it display the actual line the machine is working on as the FRO displayed is then also not correct for that line?? (Tested with G0 feedrates removed!)

Thanks for your consideration. (I've almost spoilt a few pieces with these points.)

Richard.

50

Polls / Re: Does your computer remain slow when Mach has closed down?

« on: December 07, 2006, 10:16:12 PM »

I have AMD 3200 Athalon with XP and also Intel P3 1Ghz win2k and not had any issues with Mach 3 shut down - all versions. I have laptop Intel Centrino and didn't install the drivers so not sure about that.

Had lots of hang-ups before I found the Mach3 inputs config had a random reference to Port 2 that was not enabled - kept crashing when the mouse was moved! Took months to find!

When your computer is slow, use Ctl Alt Del, select task manager and processes and see if Mach3 is still running - and CPU usage? Might help see what is going on.

By the way, did you optimise running processes? XP, I did not, Win 2k I did - helped a lot with performance but take care...