By way of explanation for what I use the axis disable for :-

I have had occasion to make wooden signs that are longer than my work table and so they have to be routed in stages. When the progress of the work reaches near to the end of the table, I pause Mach, disable the Y Axis, reposition the work and table manually (with the cutter in exactly the same position on the work), re-enable the Y Axis then restart Mach for the next phase. As Mach knows nothing about this repositioning (DROs remain the same), the work progresses as normal. For this to be successful the routing on each part of the job must be complete prior to the move and this sometimes means some GCode editing prior to starting the job. It is perhaps a bit long winded and does require positioning jigs but this method does enable work that is longer than the cutting area to be undertaken.

Tweakie.

It's completely unnecessary to move the table manually - Move the part to its new position, jog the table to where it needs to be, and re-set the DRO.  This is the more conventional way of handling your problem.

Regards,
Ray L.

And can all be done during either an M6 or M1 without rewinding the program.

Bill C.

Quote from: Tweakie.CNC on February 22, 2009, 02:32:46 AM

By way of explanation for what I use the axis disable for :-

I have had occasion to make wooden signs that are longer than my work table and so they have to be routed in stages. When the progress of the work reaches near to the end of the table, I pause Mach, disable the Y Axis, reposition the work and table manually (with the cutter in exactly the same position on the work), re-enable the Y Axis then restart Mach for the next phase. As Mach knows nothing about this repositioning (DROs remain the same), the work progresses as normal. For this to be successful the routing on each part of the job must be complete prior to the move and this sometimes means some GCode editing prior to starting the job. It is perhaps a bit long winded and does require positioning jigs but this method does enable work that is longer than the cutting area to be undertaken.

Tweakie.

It's completely unnecessary to move the table manually - Move the part to its new position, jog the table to where it needs to be, and re-set the DRO.  This is the more conventional way of handling your problem.

Regards,
Ray L.

the  reason I said to move it manually is because say you are doing 3 fixture offsets and you had to indicate each one. I would think it would be alot more easier moving the hand wheels off the mill than moving the hand wheel on the keyboard.
also I forgot to mention if I would like to move in increments of say .005 or .001 where do I have to change that  in mach.
thhanks for the replies.

Tab-jog mode-increment-.001, then mouse click the appropriate arrow. Or MDI-M90 or 91-(X or Y) - increment or absolute position.

thanks

It's completely unnecessary to move the table manually - Move the part to its new position, jog the table to where it needs to be, and re-set the DRO.  This is the more conventional way of handling your problem.

Regards,
Ray L.

Brilliant solution here by Ray. Coincidentally that is the way I used to do it before I fitted the disable switches. It is only when you come to actually making stuff that is longer than the table size that you discover the most convenient way of doing it.

Luckily, in this world, there is always more than one way of doing everything.

Tweakie.