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  #31  
Old Thu 28 February 2008, 17:17
Greolt
Just call me: Greg
 
Victoria
Australia
J.R. do you already have a Z zero touch plate set up?

If so I can explain how to use a button on the Shuttle Pro to activate it. It is quite simple.

Some others including Gerald want to use an external switch to activate the Z zero routine.

That is a little more complex setup. But not that difficult. Any one who can build a Mechmate will eat it for breakfast.

I am now happy with the macropump/brain combination I have working if anyone is interested in looking at it.

Greg
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  #32  
Old Thu 28 February 2008, 18:11
sailfl
Just call me: Nils #12
 
Winter Park, FL
United States of America
Greg,

I don't have a machine to try it on but I would like to look at the code that you have. Can you post it or send it to me.

Thanks for your efforts.
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  #33  
Old Thu 28 February 2008, 19:04
rkd
Just call me: Ryan
 
BC
Canada
I am interested in looking at it. I dont have an actual machine going right now but I do have a simulator setup on my kitchen table that would work just as well.
I too appreciate your efforts. It's people like you that improve these online communities.

Last edited by rkd; Thu 28 February 2008 at 19:07..
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  #34  
Old Thu 28 February 2008, 19:06
Greolt
Just call me: Greg
 
Victoria
Australia
PM sent
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  #35  
Old Thu 28 February 2008, 19:22
J.R. Hatcher
Just call me: J.R. #4
 
Wilmington, North Carolina
United States of America
Send a message via Skype™ to J.R. Hatcher
Greg I will try to get one setup tomorrow. thanks
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  #36  
Old Thu 28 February 2008, 20:05
Greolt
Just call me: Greg
 
Victoria
Australia
For those who want to look at code it is easiest to just go to this link.

http://www.cnczone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=36099

The rest to make it trigger via Shuttle Pro and external switch is not much more than where you put it and how you enable it.

I know I sound like a broken record but I'll say again, none of this is original or my idea.

Lots of variants of this are used all over. This is just my variant.

Others have given me a lot of help getting some sort of a grip on this. (I'm only a carpenter)

Greg
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  #37  
Old Thu 28 February 2008, 21:10
Greg J
Just call me: Greg #13
 
Hagerman, New Mexico
United States of America
Quote:
Originally Posted by Greolt View Post

Others have given me a lot of help getting some sort of a grip on this. (I'm only a carpenter)

Greg

Greg,

Thanks for your efforts. I'm slow, but will have my machine operational soon and gladly give results.

Carpentry is one of the greatest endeavors known to man. When the weight of the world is heavy, I work with wood.

"Every nail driven should be as another rivet in the machine of the universe"
-Thoureau
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  #38  
Old Sat 01 March 2008, 17:18
Greolt
Just call me: Greg
 
Victoria
Australia
For those who are interested in having an external switch to activate the Auto Tool Zero routine here is some stuff to look at.

I am not a software expert. Neither am I qualified in any way in electronics or electrical control.

This information is shared only for those interested to look at. Do not use anything contained here in a working machine. It has not been tested or verified to any proper standard.

Sorry about that, but the legal fraternity in this country are hell bent on pursuing the model found elsewhere which says "Something happened, who can I blame?"

There are three components in the attached zip folder.

M615.m1s, Macropump.m1s and ZeroSwitch.brn

M615.m1s is the zero script that I and others have been using for a while. It usually needs tweaking for a users personal requirements.

If I was only using it from an on screen button, as many do, it would simply have the code found in this file used as a "Button Script". If you don't know what that means then ask.

Because I want to activate it with either the Shuttle Pro or an external switch I place M615.m1s in the macro folder with the name of the profile I am using. For most users this will be "Mach3mill"

This macro can now be called with a Shuttle Pro button. Look at the Shuttle Pro "Plugin Config" for setting that up. It's easy.

For an external switch to trigger the zero routine, I also place the "Macropump.m1s" in the same macro folder, and the "ZeroSwitch.brn" goes in the brain folder.

Macropump is then enabled on the "General Config" page. Brain is enabled via Operator / Brain Control. A Mach restart is needed for both of these to work.

Then you can open, Operator / Brain Control / View Brain, and see the brain operate.

My external switch is connected to a spare input pin and assigned to "Input#4" in "Ports and Pins". Set to become active when switch is pressed.

The brain contains a switch delay as a safety feature. I have it set so the switch must be pressed for two seconds before it triggers.

For this reason I have removed a delay that was previously coded into the zero routine. Two delays built in was confusing for an operator.

Also the brain locks out if the spindle is running or machine is moving.

The macropump simply sets the M615.m1s going. It has a lock out thingy built in to stop Mach trying to run the script multiple times.

Logic tells me that it should not be needed because of the delay in the brain but real world tests tell me otherwise. It works with it in and does not work when it is left out.

Now you will ask "Why both a brain and a macropump?"... "Either one or the other should do it"

A brain can not trigger a macro, so a brain alone won't do what I need.

Mach does not like delays coded into a macropump because of timing issues. It can be done but is much more complex. (remember I am just a carpenter)

The brain makes the switch delay a no brainer. Pun intended.

Also the other safety lock outs are really easy to do in a brain.


Wow what a long waffle of a post!!!! No one is going to read all that.

Greg

PS: I have had a lot of help to understand all this from Brian and others. Mostly Scott (poppabear). Thanks Scott.
Attached Files
File Type: zip ZeroSwitchInfo.zip (1.1 KB, 289 views)

Last edited by Greolt; Sat 01 March 2008 at 17:48..
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  #39  
Old Sat 01 March 2008, 17:30
sailfl
Just call me: Nils #12
 
Winter Park, FL
United States of America
Greg,

Your ExternalZeroSwitch txt file is empty that you included with the zip. Is that what you wanted?
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  #40  
Old Sat 01 March 2008, 17:49
Greolt
Just call me: Greg
 
Victoria
Australia
Sorry my mistake.

I was going to repeat the long winded spiel but forgot.

I have removed the empty text file and reloaded the zip.

Greg

EDIT: I have reloaded and attached here. The m1s files read better in notepad. I don't know much about ANSI versus Unicode. The VB editor puts out one which notepad does not recognise carriage returns.
Attached Files
File Type: zip ZeroSwitch.zip (1.1 KB, 296 views)

Last edited by Greolt; Sat 01 March 2008 at 18:12..
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  #41  
Old Sat 01 March 2008, 22:18
Gerald D
Just call me: Gerald (retired)
 
Cape Town
South Africa
Did you say you are a carpenter? Darn it, we will never catch up to the Ozzies.

Thanks for all the work!
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  #42  
Old Sun 02 March 2008, 04:34
Gerald D
Just call me: Gerald (retired)
 
Cape Town
South Africa
Greg, if I read you right, the button must be held down for 2 seconds, which seems rather long. . . . .

Would it make sense to hold the button for the entire zeroing operation, with a realease of the button causing a quick retraction? For the times when the bit does not make electrical contact . . .
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  #43  
Old Sun 02 March 2008, 15:08
Greolt
Just call me: Greg
 
Victoria
Australia
Gerald in working conditions two seconds is not long. The main motivation is to prevent accidental activation.

I find the two seconds is good. I'm thinking as I press "I want this to happen" and in that delay time occasionally think "Oops I forgot...." and still have time to release button.

That delay can be changed very easily in the brain.

You could write into the code to check back to see if button is still checked at every step but it would be quite long code.

I have found the routine to be reliable. I do have a large LED on screen and touch the plate to the tool and see it light up by
way of assuring myself that no electrical fault has crept in before running the routine.

The Mechmate has an advantage of allowing the Y carriage to lift a bit in the event of a disaster.

Also, if I follow how your machine's switches are grouped, the estop is right beside the zeroing switch.

The trick with it is to keep the probe distance small. Mine is 20mm. Don't have it set to 200mm

I jog the Z down to approx 5 to 10mm, just enough so I can easily slip the plate under, then run the routine.

Greg
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  #44  
Old Sun 02 March 2008, 19:16
Greg J
Just call me: Greg #13
 
Hagerman, New Mexico
United States of America
Greg,

I've been reading some of your posts on that "other" CNC forum.

For being "just a carpenter", you'd make one hella'va electrical engineer.

Last edited by Greg J; Sun 02 March 2008 at 19:18..
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  #45  
Old Sun 02 March 2008, 20:32
Greolt
Just call me: Greg
 
Victoria
Australia
HA Ha Ha!! Those who really know about this stuff might take issue with you there.

My dad always said "You can know just enough to get yourself into trouble"..... That's me.....
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  #46  
Old Mon 03 March 2008, 07:12
domino11
Just call me: Heath
 
Cornwall, Ontario
Canada
Greg,
But hey I have had a lot of fun too getting into trouble in a lot of different fields!

Heath.
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  #47  
Old Tue 04 March 2008, 17:00
Art
Just call me: Art #2
 
Lancaster,Texas
United States of America
Z high set

I am going to setup Z height calibration in the next few weeks. Plan on doing a detail write up to post. Any sugestions appreciated.
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  #48  
Old Wed 05 March 2008, 22:59
Gerald D
Just call me: Gerald (retired)
 
Cape Town
South Africa
Greg, I realise that the pushbutton that initiates the z-zero sequence must go to a dedicated parallel port pin. But, pins being at a premium, can the z-zero plate itself go onto the same pin as the homing/limit switches? (the NO/NC aspect taken care of with some other logic/relay). In other words, would your sequence/files see the z-zero plate as simply another of the series wired home switches? (I must admit I havn't studied your files yet).
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  #49  
Old Thu 06 March 2008, 02:23
Greolt
Just call me: Greg
 
Victoria
Australia
To be honest I don't know.

Definitely probe could not share a pin with a limit.

Mach ignores limits when doing homing. So homing and limit can share.

But Mach would not ignore limit while probing. I think.

Maybe probe could share with home. Not sure...would have to test that one.

The G31 is hard coded in Mach, all the script does is call it as gcode. (G31Z-20)
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  #50  
Old Thu 06 March 2008, 07:52
revved_up
Just call me: Craig
 
Hartland, MI
United States of America
If you pause the machine using the button on the gantry or any of the remote switches for that matter and change a bit or anything that would require resetting the zero would you have to first press the resume button before pressing the zero button or would the zero button also resume the pause before starting the zero routine?
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  #51  
Old Thu 06 March 2008, 10:49
Gerald D
Just call me: Gerald (retired)
 
Cape Town
South Africa
Greg, you seem to be talking of probe and z-zero device as being very similar. Are you using a modified "probe" function to do the z-zero? If yes, I understand why you want limits to function in addition to "probing". However, I see z-zero as something quite different from probing - I think it is just another "home switch" happily in series with the other home switches.

Snag is, we are running out of inputs on a single parallel port . . .
(Realise we already allocate 2 pins to Pause (Feedhold) and Resume, another pin for the button that starts the z-zero routine, and that leaves only one pin for limits, homes and z-zero together.
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  #52  
Old Thu 06 March 2008, 12:56
Greolt
Just call me: Greg
 
Victoria
Australia
Zero touch plate uses the probe input. So it utilizes a probe move (G31)

So in effect it is a probe. Yes five input limit quickly becomes a problem when wanting external controls.

Revved-up, That is a good point. I need to test routine while in feedhold.

I have no problem on my setup but I don't use an external switch like we are talking about with all it's associated macros etc.

I will test with that in mind.

Greg
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  #53  
Old Mon 10 March 2008, 06:55
Allegheny
Just call me: Brian
 
Massachusetts
United States of America
Hi all,

If this has been posted before, I apologize, but I found this mentioned on a Yahoo group:

http://www.cad2gcode.com/cncprojects/id16.html

I haven't built one yet, but in my travels today, I'll try to round up the parts I don't already have in my junkbox.

Brian
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  #54  
Old Mon 19 January 2009, 02:03
kaartman
Just call me: Koning #20
 
Abu Dhabi
United Arab Emirates
z zero wire diagram
This is how I understand it, to use a push button to activate the Z Zero process i need a N/O push button switch, input from PMDX 122 enter at one side of the switch and GND connected to the other end of the switch, now where does the wire come from that is connected to the touchplate.
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  #55  
Old Mon 19 January 2009, 03:52
sailfl
Just call me: Nils #12
 
Winter Park, FL
United States of America
I had an extra hot wire in the push button box on the Y Car that I used to connect to Pin 11 on the PMDX and to the touch plate. I actually bought a inexpensive sprial wire that goes from my connection in the box. The other end currently has a alligator clip (which I will get rid of later) which I connect to my touch plate.
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  #56  
Old Wed 21 January 2009, 07:52
kaartman
Just call me: Koning #20
 
Abu Dhabi
United Arab Emirates
Thank you Nils, I have done that
Regards
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  #57  
Old Wed 21 January 2009, 14:13
Art
Just call me: Art #2
 
Lancaster,Texas
United States of America
KISS (keep It Simple Stupid)

t http://www.turningaround.org/HTMLPag...zero_addon.htm is my implementation of the MachBlue screen set. It contains the link to CNC Zone where the software and all details. Been using it for the las 6 months and love it.
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  #58  
Old Thu 22 January 2009, 04:20
javeria
Just call me: Irfan #33
 
Bangalore
India
Art - agreed that your setup is good - but for large machine like Mechmate - a laser crosshair - and a simple plate like Z - zero would be better -

bending over to hold the heavy steel block will be a problem for many unless you have employed some one to do it.

Now that I have seen what you have done - will have it done for my smaller machine and have a regular Z zero plate on the Mechmate.

Need to certainly try the Blue screen. Also some time back somebody was designing a Fanuc type screen which looked very interesting - have to look at it.

RGDS
Irfan
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  #59  
Old Sun 25 January 2009, 23:20
kaartman
Just call me: Koning #20
 
Abu Dhabi
United Arab Emirates
Z Motor don’t stop
The z Motor turn when I activate the Z Zero at the gantry push button but it does not stop when the touch plate connects with direct ground wire, spindle ground or the ground on the PMDX 122, the LED at Pin 15 does light up when the touch plate touches gnd on pmdx
The wire from the pushbutton originates at pin 13 on the PMDX to N/O switch to ground on PMDX, the wire for the touch plate is from pin 15 on PMDX
M615.m1s and macropump.ms1s extracted and copied to Macro folder in mach3mill, and Zeroswitch.brn copied to Brain folder, Mach 3….. config > port/pin> input signal> INPUT #4 –enable- port 1- Pin# 13 and active low (tick), Config> General Logic> enable Macro Pump, Brain is enable in Operator/ Brain , vital restart done,
What did I do wrong, please help
Regards
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  #60  
Old Mon 26 January 2009, 02:19
sailfl
Just call me: Nils #12
 
Winter Park, FL
United States of America
Koning,

I had the same problem and drove the router into the plate lots of times. I even pushed the router out of it's bracket. It wasn't until I reconfigured Ports and Pins did it start working and it works every time. In Ports and Pins, you have to use the Probe. Once you have done that, it should work. You can test it by holding the plate in the air or by touching the plate to the router once you have the macro activated.

I have a 3 inch down distance and I have the feed rate set at 10 but I would try 5 feed rate first. I always check the circuit before I run the macro.

I would also not use the macropump when you are trying to get it to run. Just use the macro so you know you don't have a programming problem on top of configuring the zero touch plate. You can always add the macropump back in. That way if you have a code error you can more easily find it and you can be sure that your hardware is working correctly.

I had problems getting the macropump working and it was a simple coding error but it was easier to find since I knew my zero touch plate worked.

Let me know if you need any other help.
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