This looks to be a great new wizard.  And good job Rich with the PDF.

I use a spindle mounted camera for setups etc a lot on a mill.  Very accurate and a great aide.

Very often I use it together with the "Circle Centre" wizard by German Bravo to map out the holes on an existing

bracket or job so as to reproduce it.  Holes that are typically too large to "guess" the centre of.

Wouldn't it be great if CopyCat could incorporate a centre finding feature or be able to switch between the two wizards.

Silly idea?  Is it possible?  What do you think?

Greg

Vince,
Did you try using the full circle?
RICH

What's the full circle?  I was using it to locate the outline of a part and the screw holes.  I did not have to make any circles.

Vince

I am working on adding a probe function into CopyCat. It will let you find the center of a hole, and the edge of a part. I should have something ready in a few days.

Ron

Thanks for the response.

I presume a probe function would not allow for the centre finding of a hole using a camera like the Bravo wizard does.

Greg

Hi Ron
Here are some comments / suggestions and others please chime in.

1.SCREEN - would be nice if some of the buttons were moved around
                   such that the video screen had its owne place when opened.
                 - maybe increase the other window sizes
                 - a real rough screen showing this is in the attached file

2.Is it possible to have a "delete" last move button. Once you start an
  arc you need to complete it. ( you can edit the code but i am lazy )

3.Full Circle - darned if I could get it to work " per the help info". Still wondering if it's even needed.
                    read other comments below. The light never comes on , but,...you will see that you
                    clicked the full circle if you look closely at the box.

4.Bug? - If you do  a linear / rapid move and then an arc then forever you can only do arcs and line.
             If you do a linear / rapid and a full circle then forever you can only do circles and no arcs.
             Seems like a broken switch in the code.

5.Probing - YES a nice feature worth doing. If you look at the "videos" there is one showing an automatic
                 centering routine which is realy slick. Don't know what Ron has in mind. Depends on how
                 you do it.

6.THE BIGGY - The first questions is........What do want copycat to do or go as a program?
                 It would be slick if you could go to another  wizard  and pluck their generated code at any time.
                 Thus if you move to a point and if you want to do a circle, drill routine, etc just click a button
                 and you could get that code and paste it to the the teach file and continue on.
       
                 Sounds easy, but.........

                 Currently if you want to do the above :
                  While in copycat, edit file, then open another file generated by a different wizard, copy / paste into
                  the copycat / teach file, save............BUT......need to edit the pasted in file some.
                  May be better to just add a comment at a point.

 So if you had the above, CopyCat now becomes an even more very powerfull tool appealng to users who may
brush off using it.

RICH

GREG,
Right on! CopyCat could become the wizard tie-in along with is current good feature.
RICH

Thanks for the notes.

I have never played with a video cam. I think I have one around here, Ill dig it out and try a few things.

Screen design is tough- there is already to much stuff on this screen, and the organization is not the best. I really need to learn to use a draw program so I can generate better buttons, and Id like to make 2-state LEDS to make some displays easier.

Delete last move might be hard, but I can simply add a cancel button for arc or circle so you can get out of it.

I remember having trouble getting the full circle/arc stuff to work right. I though I had it, but its been a year since I did all this. I will do some testing and see if I can fix it.

I was thinking about a second screen to put the probing stuff. Maybe that would also be the place to do the video window. You could click to the second screen, do your jogging or probing until you had the machine wherever you wanted it, then return to the main screen to select the object button.

I have also consideerd putting all the setup stuff, like feeds, spindle control, etc on another screen. It would be kind of a startup screen, but you could go back to it if needed. It would give me more room on the main screen to make it neater.

I will do some experiments, maybe post some test version here.

I do not think your 'biggie' is possible. The way the VB subsystem works in Mach each time it is invoked its a fresh start, and its not possible to use functions form other wizards. I think you can do what you want with a simple comment- use CopyCat to collect the base points, then where you want to later insert a block of code just place a comment- (add bolt circle here). Then when you have built your base program go to an editor and drop in the other code. Not as neat as being able to jump in and out of other wizards, but it can work.

Ron,
I can draw anything you want in CAD. I just never fooled with the screen designer ( i will / want to, but just have to manny irons in the fire ).

A cancel button would be fine to cancel an Arc move.

You can get a full circle ( very close circle ) out of the arc: ie
G1 X0 Y0 feed move
start arc 
G1 X1 Y1 is 2nd point
now for the last move use X=1.0001 and Y=1.0001 (or -.0001 from the start / .9999 )
end arc
Just a work around.

Radio Shack sells a USB video camera for $19 ("GIGAWARE" and it works if you don't have one). I have 
some high resolution ones but they will not work. Was trying out the XBOX control last night. 

Hmm....wide screeen TV monitor, game control, comfortable chair.....using CC can turn out to be very
relaxing!   

I would prefer to have the video screen as i have shown it. Just my reasoning, but, it keeps what you need to
do what CC was originaly meant to do all on one screen. The feeds want to be kept on the main screen along
with the DRO's.  Besides just picking points, you may want to actaully be doing a complete code file.
Going to another screen breaks your thought pattern / may be a distraction. These are only suggestions
for kicking around. Everybody works differently, I just like Chocolate better than Vanilla.
BTW the tab brings up a blank partial screen.

I figured the biggie wouldn't work but at least we know. That said, then CopyCat stays as first intended.

RICH

1.SCREEN - would be nice if some of the buttons were moved around
                   such that the video screen had its owne place when opened.
                 - maybe increase the other window sizes
                 - a real rough screen showing this is in the attached file

This is my second page to accommodate the video window.

I do not have a probe but use the spindle mounted camera a lot. 

So hence I can do away with the probe section.  That leaves me a bit of room.

This most certainly won't suit everybody but is the ducks nuts for me. 

Greg

Nice Geg,
Are you going to post the screen file?
RICH