I haven’t gone away. Just had to step away for a couple days and remove all the sharp objects from my shop! First I must say I appreciate your help and patience. I spoke with Gary yesterday and he is helping as well. Long post but maybe it will click.
I now have six cb files made. Two for this part (base and lid), and 4 others for an air filter assembly, top and bottom feature of the AF base and lid. They all look good in CB, nicely generate the expected tool paths in cb, and simulate well in CAMotics. None of them will run on my machine. I’ll try to stick with this part for now and post the others when I get my machine sorted. I think I have different issues with different parts, and think I still have intermittent EMI issues.
On the EMI, sometimes when I jog, if I hold the jog button, my machine will occasionally throw an error about receiving an unexpected command from the controller and pause. But it won’t (always) alarm or hold and I can usually resume by reengaging the jog. My homing wires as supplied with the machine are neither shielded nor twisted pairs and I think the are 5v signal. If I set my lap top computer in my machine space, even with no machine movement, my touch pad becomes unresponsive until I move the computer. I’m going to buy some shielded cable for the homing switches, check the stepper cable shielding, and replace those if necessary. -Just isn’t worth it.
The Homing and soft limits are in G53 "Machine Co-ordinates" There are what they call workspaces, for you the important one's are Machine c-ordinates and part or work piece co-ordinates. The homing switches being where they are is ok, as this would (after an homing operation) move the machine a convenient place so that you can load and unload the stock unencumbered. Where the co-ordinates are\can be set to zero in G53 they don't always have to be zero, and could be the tool changer co-ordinates.
This much I understand and have done. Just to save the read back, homing switches are in left rear corner of table and X+ motion to the right, Y+ away from front of table. I home, issue G10 L20 P0 X0 Y0 Z0. Move to a convenient position near the front of the table, issue G10 L20 P1 X0 Y0 Z0 and then G54 (and also G20 to make sure units are correct). I have also tried G92 X0 Y0 Z0 but no matter what, I’m in negative XY machine space. I understand Y being negative because I moved in the negative direction from machine 0, but I don’t understand why I am in X- space when I zeroed and moved in the positive direction.
If you look at the picture I attached, it looks like the controller thinks I have placed the entire part outside the machine space. Am I interpreting that correctly?
In the CB file, I have not changed the Machine Origin from 0,0
By moving my work origin to the right, I can get closer to the machine space but never in it. This has me perplexed because I have a trail file from the machine manufacturer and it positions exactly where I expect it to and runs fine. I also have another file I created that positions and runs through the first MOP but then fails because of the same error 33. I guess it doesn’t like an arc imbedded in the poly line.
I attached a pdf of the console dialogue including the errors after sending the file. That erro 33 I get on other files.
I had and did re-read the Github link so thank you.
If you are using soft limits then you may have to set these parameters: Set your $130,$131, and $132 max travel settings if you plan on using homing or soft limits. It's recommended to enter something approximately close to actual travel now to avoid problems in the future. Note that $130,$131, and $132 max travel parameters correspond to the 'Machine coordinates' parameters in grblControl.
I believe I have these set properly. I did it in USG set up wizard but I can’t jog beyond the soft limits so I think I’m good there. I think you can see it in the attached a pdf (albiet in mm) with the command and response string. I edited out the pages of jog commands but left the (EMI induced?) error.
It's ok for the homing to be where it is at the back of the machine. This position is not the work piece x0,y0,z0. If ok for you to have your drawing co-ordinates XYZ=0 at the lower left hand corner.
I’m not so hung up on the back left being XYZ=0. I figure the important thing is the direction of travel signage is correct because once G54 or G92 is established, it shouldn’t matter other than soft limits, right?
You then place the work piece in the upper right hand quadrant.
This I don’t understand. Why upper right quadrant?
In the picture I've made a blue rectangle in my start up template. This represents the machine work envelope. This is a visual cue for me to place anything outside this area. else you'll hit the limits
Need to learn to do this. Is this same as bounding box?
If a new user fails take this into account and there’d followed the recommended set up for the machine and drawing procedure may not realise that some tool paths can dip in to negative territory triggering the hard or soft limits. I have my soft limits turned off for the grinder and laser, but if you do want to use then then you have to set them in your controller as above.
This may indeed be the case but until I get my head straight and machine debugged, I’ll leave soft limits on. I think I’d have crashed my machine 20 times by now without them.
I do have some thought's about the cad, If you are happy with the terms and conditions for fusion then it would be the one to learn. If you want a “buy once” parametric modeller then there are a few of those too. If you want a free one then freecad is a good choice, I use the linkstage version not the downloadable current version.
I looked at and like Aliebre for CAD because of features and buy to own, but it has no CAM package. I chose Fusion not only because I have a free copy but also because it had a CAM package with a GRBL post.
Here is a pic of the freecad linkstage screen displaying a model that I 3d printed in various sizes.
I certainly like the example you chose.
Thanks again.
Best,
Kelly
