Re: Linux vs. DOS

> The one thing I am disappointed in the home function is that the position

of

> the switch seems to always correspond to 0.00 for the axis. In looking real
> quickly I didn't see a way to indicate home as being a different position.
> From my limited home shop type experience this is a MAJOR pain for setting
> up a switch for the Y axis (X in lathe terms) of a lathe. With a mill all
> movements are relative and if you move your home point .100 other than
> having to move your tooling you will still get parts that are the correct
> dimension. On a lathe the 0.00 point on the Y (X) axis has to be dead on to
> the centerline of rotation or you get off size parts. In DeskNC I was able
> to tell the program what coordinate I wanted home to be. This way I didn't
> have to try and adjust the position of the switch to get it so it clicked

at

> exactly 0.00. All I had to do was home up one and then take a cut on a
> piece, measure it and enter 1/2 of the amount I was off as the coordinate
> for the home switch.
>
> Matt, any chance you can ask Fred if we can get the ability to set the
> coordinate we want to be home in the ini file?

Gee, I've never ran a cnc lathe before. I would think that you would set the
switches up to home wherever it's convenient and then use G92Xnn.nnnn, or
manually right click on the X axis display (or press ALT-X for the X axis)
and enter the value you need to shift the zero point to where you want. How
are you doing this now in the mill? Like when you use an edge finder to find
the corner of your workpiece. I'm guessing that you could line up your tool
tip to the center of rotation by chucking up an edge finder and feeding the
tool into it. When it goes off center, you are half the edge finder diameter
away. Zero the axis, remove the edge finder, jog in that amount (.1" if you
use a .2" edge finder) and zero again. Then face off the stock (or use a gage
block to establish a precise distance) and zero the other axis. The problem
comes in with tool offsets in a multi-tool job. The tool table in the EMC is
linked to the Z axis for length (H) and X/Y for the radius (D) and this will
need changing to really get lathes going good. We need to be able to freely
associate [AXIS_n] with the desired axis letter (or make a quick change
wiring setup for you as the changing axis letter assignment problem is
specific to the 3-in-1's unusual geometry), and take into account that
there's no Y to worry about with respect to tool radius compensation. Until
then I guess you write single tool programs substituting the X mill axis for
what should be Z on a lathe, and Y on the mill for the lathes' X.

Matt

P.S. Soon I'll bet you'll want a spindle encoder for threading! Isn't there
an LED thing or something on a Shoptask that takes the place of the threading
dial?