Hello guys, I'm new to Mach3.

I have been trying to play around with the software in offline mode and I have a few issues. The first problem is trying to understand what the heck the display mode is doing. The cross hair seems to disappear and hard to locate at times. When I jog the cross hair, and then click zero for x,y, and z, it seems to snap the cross hair back to the bottom right corner instead of to the jog position I drove to. I tried zeroing with machine coordinates button turned on as well as off with the same result. Here is a screen shot of the display window.

Well I was able to figure it out. I watched the video tutorial and made a few changes. The table outline is a dotted line and not a solid line like in the video. It was not turned on by default. I also reinstalled the software without driver support. Another setting I used was selecting the Sherline half pulse check box. And I used loaded the road runner sample .tap file instead of one of the DXF files which was another mistake I made. Now I am able to see all elements clearly and the offsets work as expected.

I have a new problem: How you you jog the Z axis? The arrow keys only move the X and Y axis.

Well I was able to figure it out. I watched the video tutorial and made a few changes. The table outline is a dotted line and not a solid line like in the video. It was not turned on by default. I also reinstalled the software without driver support. Another setting I used was selecting the Sherline half pulse check box. And I used loaded the road runner sample .tap file instead of one of the DXF files which was another mistake I made. Now I am able to see all elements clearly and the offsets work as expected.

I have a new problem: How you you jog the Z axis? The arrow keys only move the X and Y axis.

Z jogs with PgUp/PgDn

Regards,
Ray L.

Thanks Ray,

I actually figured that one out also right before I went to bed.     I was trying all sorts of keys till the Z moved.

Installing without the driver may cause some features not to work correctly. It's best to do any testing with the driver installed. And as long is there's no machine connected, no need to use Offline either.

Installing without the driver may cause some features not to work correctly. It's best to do any testing with the driver installed. And as long is there's no machine connected, no need to use Offline either.

Oh ok, I will reinstall everything with the driver. The tutorial said to only install the driver if a machine is going to be used which is why I installed without it. I'll give it a go...

I have another question:

Why wont the display mode auto zoom to the work piece and toggle between the work piece and mill table?

Anyone know how to make the display mode auto zoom when clicked?

I can zoom by clicking "TOOL" and then clicking "regen tool path" but it would be nice to only click the display mode button to toggle between the job view and mill table view. The older tutorial video does this but version 29 doesn't seem to.

Hi, Mike

When your in Table Display mode and Regen it zoom's to the soft min/max size set in Homes & Limits, The only way to enlarge from there is to use the mouse center wheel to increase it's size by rolling it forever, Best I know.

Chip

Yes I am able to zoom using the mouse wheel but in the video tutorial, which was using the roadrunner tool path filel, every time the display mode button was pressed it would zoom out to the extents of the mill table, and when clicked again, it would zoom to the extents of the tool path dimensions. Apparently version 29 no longer allows this I assume.