GearHeads Forum

Richard:

Its a good point. All my work has been on imageing and cutting, so I hvent had to get power at a location without motion.
I will add a way to do that, perhaps with a Gcode that fires a set power for a set time..

Art

Richard:

I see what I think would work best. We need to add a Gcode for what your trying to do with drilling.
A simple one like G101P50D1000  which would shoot the laser at 50% power for 1000ms..

It shouldnt be too bad to do that. If the laser spindle library is active, we have a call named

SpindleControl.TestFireRealTimePWM( lTime, lPower);

which will fire the laser at any power for any time.. so to add a Gcode like described above would be
written as a library function as below:

//fire laser as a drill with no motion required// G100 Ppower Dtimeinms
global GCode101 = function()
{
  power = ParmsPRI[0]; //get the P word
  time = ParmsJKD[2];  //get D word..best not to use T, tool number would change.
  SpindleControl.TestFireRealTimePWM( time, power); 
  print("Firing laser at " + power + "% for " + time + " Milliseconds");
};

  So.. just adding the above function to your GCode library should add the Gcode call G100P50D100 run a laser fire.. ( Its pretty easy to add your own Gcode calls, so long as they arent recognise calls, the library call will be made. Your generally safe over 100.. Id add a dwell as well after the G101 ( or add one to the function..), but thats basically how you add a GCode in Auggie. Carefull though, theres no safety there,
if you request a long fire it will happen, though I think its limited to 1 minute..

Note:

Just tried the above, works here..but there is an example function G101, so delete that if you stick with G101 as your call.

Art

Thanks art
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;the method works but the holes are too small for me to use as intended [can hardly see them even with my glasses on &nbsp;< .25mm dia], I will need to explore the circular boring a bit more I need bigger marks than that.
had to dwell before and after drilling to get the timing correct

ps
I used G4 Pxx &nbsp; &nbsp;for the dwell &nbsp; I thought &nbsp;the p term was &nbsp;millis &nbsp;seems auggie says seconds
&nbsp;

problem solved. coppercam can bore without creating arcs ,just need to turn off circular interpolation.
can now make etch drill point marks any size I need at any speed I desire

Richard:

Excellent. I should have though of the spot being too small really. But what the heck, its a good call to have
in the toolbox..

Art

I have to say the pcb making has turned out much better than I could have hoped for. The distance correction button was the key to success,
seems a 3w laser&nbsp; simply can't over cook paint on a copper substrate ,as long as your moving just blast away.
Art&nbsp; ,&nbsp; many thanks for you efforts and assistance

Richard:

All good to know. Those diode lasers are getting popular it seems,
so at least we know Auggie can drive one so long as you have a cnc57
to hook it to.

Art

AUGGIE WOES

I'm hoping to replace the chinese motion controller on my mill with the pokeys57cnc . the aim to get probing functional
and make life simpler.
the problem , when the mill is used with mach3/pokeys dll_plugin it does something to the pokeys57 .whatever it is auggie disagrees
with it , i then have to use the pokeys pgm to reset the pokeys57 to factory. then start auggie twice over to enable the laser pwm
and power relay to regain functionality. if i'm lucky .

you might ask why use mach3 , well my prefered cad/cam package produces code (arcs) that auggie balks at [sample attached]
and not only that having both icons on the screen means i hit the wrong one occasionally gah!

is it possible to make auggie more assertive/thorough in setting pokeys57cnc attributes and or can auggie learn some alternative ways to
handle arcs ?

ps got a 15w diode laser [chinese watts , realistically 6w] , love it . can cut 4.5mm perspex providing its not clear or white.
red / black best&nbsp; 8-9 passes @250mm/min for 4.5mm , 4-5 passes for 3mm
pcb mask etching now @ 500mm/min is 3x faster than with 3w laser
pps
the paint masking trick is brilliant for chemical etching unflat metal surfaces

Hi Richard:

Yeah, switching between m3 and Auggie is rough.. Auggie relies on the pokeys to remember its
settings..it saved me form redundant configuration masks. Did you try the profile saver in Auggie,
you can save the pokeys states, and it will refresh them. It isnt perfect can can get you most of the
way there..on mine I need only reset the softlimits when I use it..

&nbsp; On next Auggie update Ill look at your arcs and at the profile problem to see if I can make the
profile saver more perfect on the pokeys side.&nbsp; In theory it should be able to save a Mach3 state and a Pokeys
state depending on when you use its save function.&nbsp; It can then be used to reset back to M3 or Auggie state
before you use it.

Art