Hello,
I re ran the program and watched the DRO. I homed the machine. I moved X and Y to the corner of the spoil board and zeroed it. I then moved X to 135 and Y to 162. They seem to work fine. I brought Z to the top of the spoilboard and zeroed it. I then moved it up to +60. I started the program with H8 removed. The dust hood came down and the the spindle lowered into the spoil board to make a mark. It came up slightly and moved to X and Y zero. When the spindle moved it might have been at Z +1. The DRO for Z showed +50.8. I ran the whole program and the DRO came to -.500. If the spindle moved it was only slightly. It should have tried to go through the table. I checked the Machine Cord's and Z was at -423.5975. I don't even have that much travel on the Z axis. The motor home/soft limits for Z are soft max 1.0 (should that be zero?) and soft min is at -285. When to program finished it came back to zero. the DRO read +50.8 but the spindle didn't raise. The Machine Cord's read +372.2975. I opened the cabinet and took a look. The servo drive for Z had an error 20. I retested again and as soon as the spindle bottoms ot on the spoil board the error came back. It must know that the spindle didn't travel properly. I brought out my dial guage to confirm the travel of Z. My dial guage is in thousands of an inch, it doesnt have a huge travel, I couldn't get perfectly straight either. I moved the spindle 10mm and came up with 398 thousand of an inch. Google said the it should be 393.7. I think that is prety close and I moved Z several times up and down and came up with the same results. I still think it is a Mach3 setting that needs to be inputted or I put one in wrong. What do you think? Is there a way I can send you pioctures of the settings if you think that would be helpful. Thanks again!
Cheers
Peter

Hi Peter,

If you attach the <your profile>.xml file (typically Mach3Mill.xml) wich is located in your Mach3 folder I can set my machine to your setup and see if I can find any fault with your Mach3 settings.

You will need to rename the <your profile>.xml file to a unique name in order to attatch it to your posting.

Which Motion Controller are you using & is it connected USB or Ethernet to your PC. ?

Tweakie.

I hope this works. I have had some challenges with edge. I connect with ethernet. I was told to turn off the internet so I have when I am running Mach 3. Please let me know if this works. I won't  get back to you until tomorrow.
Cheers
Peter

Hi Peter,

Just a quick check of your Mach3 settings reveal many errors.
For example you are using Port 1, Pins 2 to 9 for Motor Outputs & they cannot be used for Input Signals. They also cannot be used again for Output Signals.

If you click the Operator tab / Check Config. this will detail some, but not all, of the errors in your Mach3 setup. You may also have errors in your MKX-ET setup which you will need to check.

I think that the best advice that I can give you at this stage is to read through the Mach3 manual which details just how to set-up Mach3 for optimum performance.

https://www.machsupport.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/Mach3Mill_Install_Config.pdf

Tweakie.

Hello,
I was finally able to surface my spoil board! A very long time coming. I have read a bunch of the manual but still have some more to read. If you have time please look at the xml file and see what you think. I still have some fine tuning to do. A few questions with the set up. I watched the Art Soft video on Trouble shooting and was able to get lots of information from it. One of the things that was said was that on the Diagnostics page that there shouldn't be any lights on the Input signal and current state box. Input 2 was on and I turned on active low and it went out. I did the same for Input 3 and it went out. I just rechecked it and it was on and turned off the active low and it went out. Not sure why this is. The digitize light is on but I don't see anywhere in the inputs to change anything. I also had to figure out the motor steps, which I did. I am not sure what to do about the acceleration and velocity. I did read that section but still am a little unsure what to set this at. I watched a few online video's and it seems to be set by sound? What are your thoughts on this? Thanks again for all of your help. I have a few more questions on tool changing and auto zero but I see that there are some video's from Art Soft about this and I will watch those first.
Cheers
Peter
 

Hi Peter,

Great news that you have your machine working 

Looking at your .xml, you still need to correct your Port & Pin allocations which are wrong otherwise Mach3 will get confused and you will have inaccurate results and problems in the future.
The Digitize light is controlled by the Input Signal Probe.
With regard to Motor Tuning, this is basically done by ‘trial and error’; Ideally Acceleration should be set to the highest value that works with 100% reliability even if it means reducing Velocity slightly.

CNC is a long road and I have been on it for more than 20 years now and still learn something new every day. Keep at it my friend.

Tweakie.

Thanks again for your help. In all of the information I have received from Art Soft, the connection to the CNC machine is through printer ports. I am conected through eithernet. Where can I get information on how to properly set this up with Ports and Pins?
Cheers
Peter

Thanks again for your help. In all of the information I have received from Art Soft, the connection to the CNC machine is through printer ports. I am conected through eithernet. Where can I get information on how to properly set this up with Ports and Pins?
Cheers
Peter

Yes indeed, you make a valid point, but we have to remember that the Mach3 manual was originally written when the Parallel Port was the norm.
Mach3 makes all it's trajectory calculations and planning based on the information wich you provide to it - irrespective of it being sent to the Motion Controller by Ethernet, USB or the Parallel Port. You do need to correct your Ports & Pins errors so that Operator / Check Config... gives a clean bill of health.

Hope this helps.

Tweakie.