New milling motor Proxxon FBS 240/E upgrade to Kress 1050 FME-1

[Davek0974]

Great so I can pretty much ignore the tool offsets in Mach as it's all done in cam - program roughing cut on tool 1, program tool change, program finish cut on tool 2. Mach3 runs the roughing cut, stops and requests a tool change, I change tool and re-zero Z, press go and drink coffee ?

Now it makes sense, gets confusing when you have tool charts etc in Mach, I presume they are meant for g-code where the tool offset is not pre-programmed in cam?

Yes i meant spiral cut not ramp.

Thanks BTW

[JAZZCNC]

I presume they are meant for g-code where the tool offset is not pre-programmed in cam?

No tool offsets are for machines that have spindles with tool holders that can be changed. In this case you measure the tool length offset which is the distance from the tool tip to the surface on the holder that contacts the spindle nose. You also have the option to enter diameter for when doing tool compensation. Say for wear or under size tools.

On manual tool change spindle without repeatable holders, like ER collet system on most routers then it's not used and just leave empty. It's actually important that you don't have any values in these because if the Cam calls for G43H which is tool length compensation and theres value in that tools offset it will be applied to the tool length and change the Z height.

To see this happen do a test. Set tool #1 in tool offsets to height of 10mm and save. Then zero out the Z for tool #0 which will be the default tool when first starting mach and all offsets are referenced from.

Now using MDI type g43 H1 T1 (space between them) and you'll see the Z dro change to -10. G43 applied the tool length offset and now mach thinks the tool is at different height.! . . . Very dangerous when not being used correctly.

Don't forget to go back and set tool #1 to zero.!!

[Davek0974]

Great, thanks for that, its all starting to make sense now, surprising differences between plasma cutting and milling.

Dave