In another post I saw people talking about commands M10 and M11. For example: M10P1.
I seem to understand it has something to do with turning on something and moving without a delay.
Would anybody be so kind to explain what those commands are and how are they supposed to be used?
I'm using mach3 to control a laser cutting machine. Right now i use M3 to turn on the laser and M5 to turn off. I also use the PWM output to control the power of the laser. It works OK. except, there is a little delay from the laser turn on to when it starts moving and also a delay from when it stops movint to when the laser goes off. For instance:

S50
M3
G01 X5 Y0 F40
M05
M30

I would really appreciate any help.

Regards

Hey Arturo,

That delay you are describing is called "Dwell" and it is adjusted in CONFIG--->PORTS AND PINS--->SPINDLE SETUP---> GENERAL PARAMETERS---> SPIN UP.    You can change the amount of delay to '0' to eliminate the delay.

HTH.

Regards,
Sid

Thank you. But that is not it. I already have all dwells set to zero.

Arturo

I`m also keen to find a solution to this problem.
I have tried using M8/M9 to control my water spray solenoid valve,
also tried M3/M5 with PWM and got slightly better results playing with the spindle
pulley speeds and PWMBase Freq. I can still visually see the overshoot of flow after
turning the solenoid off.
Realistically there is obviously a certain amount of water exiting the valve
at the Off command until the solenoid is physically closed.
The Valve driver info states there is approximately 0.3 ms response time of the valve,
so I`m not sure if it`s just an accumulation of time from the
Off command - thru Mach3 - thru the port - thru the breakout - thru the driver - to the solenoid.
And yeah, bear in mind my table speeds are around 12-15 Meters/min (around 500 IPM)
(not asking a lot, expecting it to stop flowing over a distance the size of a pin prick

What I`d like to do is be able to verify the signal times running in unison with
my axis stepper motors.
Is it possible to get some software to measure the wave forms without an Oscilloscope ?
So far all my searching suggests you need to output the signals thru the parallel port
before you can read them back into the pc.
I am a bit loathe to cough up for an oscilloscope. Any suggestions would be much appreciated.


arturoc - just as a matter of interest, what sort of diameter is your laser beam and how high
is it set off the work plane ? Would it be possible to have a mirror mechanism to deflect the beam
and prohibit the cutting action at the execution of an M5.
Perhaps this would be faster than turning the laser off.  Please ignor my ignorance of laser machines.

you can read some of my machine exploits here
http://www.machsupport.com/forum/index.php/topic,4926.msg34384.html#msg34384

Do a search for M10P and you should find some info. You may have to private message a member to ask for info as in the thread he didnt detail it.
Hood

wil,

The laser beam is about .008"at about .050" from the work area.
I think the M10 & M11 commands should work. The laser is RF driven, so I expect it to turn off almost immediately (microseconds) after the signal goes off. I'm going to try the M10 commands. I'm also going to scope the signals to see how everything really works.

Hood,
What makes you think I didn't do a search before posting my question? Of course I did! But in the 2 posts I found I couldn't find an answer.
I f you don't want to help please don't bother answering with silly answers.
Anyway between me and othe member of the forum we are figuting out how these misterious M10 and M11 work.

Regards

Wil,
I scoped the signals. With the regular M3 and dwell set to zero, the spindle output turns on 0.5 seconds before the first motor pulse.
With M11 the spindle output turns on about 1.5 msec before the first motor pulse. This is with a 25000 Hz kernel speed.
the P1 after the M11 or M10 refers to the output it controls. i.e. P1 controls output1, P3 output3, etc.
Thanks to iggy for all your info.

Hood,
What makes you think I didn't do a search before posting my question? Of course I did! But in the 2 posts I found I couldn't find an answer.
I f you don't want to help please don't bother answering with silly answers.
Anyway between me and othe member of the forum we are figuting out how these misterious M10 and M11 work.

Regards

arturoc
 Your reply hardly deserves and answer but as I am such a nice guy I will. The reason I didnt tell you how it works is simple, I dont know how it works. In fact I never even knew M10 or M11 existed until I saw your mention of it. I did a quick search and came up with a thread where it was mentioned, in this thread one guy talks about it and then when asked how it works he replied to PM him for info.
 Now as I dont give a toss how it works I dont see why I should be the one to PM the guy, maybe you feel it is your divine right for everyone to jump through hoops for you while you sit on your fat arse and expect to be spoon fed, but believe me it is not. I help out on this forum for free like the rest of the Mods and Admin so dont think you are owed anything by us. Do a little leg work yourself and then be so kind as to post your findings here so that you can help others. That is what forums are all about, posting info to help others. And in doing so you might stop the next ignorant bast%^$£ that comes along needing such info, from accusing someone of

answering with silly answers.

Hood

Hood,
What makes you think I didn't do a search before posting my question? Of course I did! But in the 2 posts I found I couldn't find an answer.
I f you don't want to help please don't bother answering with silly answers.
Anyway between me and othe member of the forum we are figuting out how these misterious M10 and M11 work.

Regards

Hood's answer was hardly silly were as yours was rude!

Hood, like many on this forum, tries to help in any way he can. Despite not knowing anything personally about your problem he did a search and found some threads with some relevance and posted them up for you, as simple reply saying you had already tried them but thanks for the effort would have been enough.

I for one will think twice about answering any of your quires in the future in case I get a similar rude responce.

Steve