I also have Gview = Tplane on my right mouse button so I can make double dog sure I'm in the right Tplane.

Under Settings -> Configuration -> CAD Settings

Make sure "Update Cplane and Tplane when changing Gview" is unchecked.

Just curious if a tool breaks, the machine changes tools, hauls a$$ into the next cut. How long before the behind the door checker recognizes there is a problem?

We run Cooljet chillers in a cell with three machines. They work well controlling growth of tombstones since HP coolant heats the coolant up to around 99 deg. without chillers.

They also help a great deal reducing the makeup coolant we have to add. Our shop is "climate controlled" although the AC gets stretched pretty thin with the outside temp is around 100. We aim to keep the coolant at ambient temp., usually around 72ish

I think I've seen two orders over 25 pcs in the last month or so for our horizontals.

LOL

You could run seperate programs for each op. Call each program as a sub from a main program (M98/M198 PXXXX).

Or buy a cell

And remember it is case sensitive at the machine

I was too slow Joe.....

http://www.cncci.com/resources/tips/how%20g28%20works.htm

Basically it is go home via a point. It requires that "via" point. If you put in G90 G28 Z-.5, the machine will move to z-.5 realtive to you current work offset z then return home. So G91 G28 Z0 returns to zero via an incremental move of 0.

In a Fanuc control G53 is the machine coordinate system. G28 is first zero return. If you command G28 Z0., it's going home. You just might not like how it gets there if you leave out the G91 Z0.

In Excel use

=IF(ISBLANK(B3)=FALSE,IF(B3/64<L$9,B3/64,L$9),"")

The difference being ISBLANK(B3)=False

My Open Office autocorrected False to 0. I guess that doesn't work in Excel.

Learn something everyday

Good luck

BTW for some reason I was thinking the Excel function is ISEmpty.... That is incorrect. There is no such thing. They both use ISBlank. I was posting at home without access to Excel.

Sorry bout that.

Oh sorry. ISBLANK returns true if the cell is empty, false if it is not empty

True = 1

False = 0

The easiest thing for you might be to use a formula (using your chipload column formula as an example) like:

=IF(ISBLANK(B3)=0;(IF(B3/64<$L$9;B3/64;$L$9));"blank")

Replace "blank" in the above formula with "" so it gives you a blank cell. I just put that there for illustration.

Note there is a difference between a cell where you don't see anything and a truly blank cell. If you get 0.000 as a result, its because you have a space or other character in the B column. Highlight the cells and press Delete -> Delete All

This example is just nesting another IF statement with what you have. It tests to see if B3 is blank. If it is not blank, it uses your formula, if it is blank it gives "". Since the cell reference is not absolute, as you copy it should populate with a cell address from the proper row.

You could just copy that formula down the column for a few hundred cells or however many then lock them. To do that without dragging the little crosshair, you can select the cells you want using Shift+PgDn then Edit -> Fill -> Down

There are other ways to do this also. This is one might not be the most elegant, but it's pretty simple.

For Excel you could use the ISEmpty function

[ 03-19-2008, 01:17 AM: Message edited by: Jerosu ]

Also, a shortcut to get the absolute reference is to press F4 in Excel, or Shift+F4 in Open Office after you either type in a cell value, or click on a cell to input that value in a formula.

Example for Open Office:

in a cell enter "=B2" then press Shift+F4.

It will change to $B$2, as you press Shift+F4 additional times it will toggle through $B2, B$2, $B$2. What that is doing is giving you an abolute reference to the column, the row, or the column and row.

The example above didn't work because the $ needs to proceed the column or row, so F$2$ is invalid (should be $F$2). F$2 is absolute reference to only row 2 although it works for your application apparently.

http://www.balax.com/catalog.pdf

Great reference material- pg.67 has recommended starting speeds.

In my experience, parallel will only get as close to the wall as your max step over allows. In other words, all of the stepovers are the same, it stops short of the wall to avoid violating it.

I think it's more like a car without brakes. You can go like heck....then what?

Good thing Mastercam and Fanuc thought of all the hacks when they were coding their products.

Why? Because Mcam chokes on it ?

I agree it's not the most elegant or straight forward way of doing things, but it does come in handy once in a while. It is also a perfectly valid way of turning cutter comp on and off (at least in a Fanuc control).

I've had that happen too. It wants to send the tool to Z10. which is not what the clearance or retract is set to. In fact here's some code for a retract for a part I am working on now. Clearance and retract are both set to Z1.

No really........ they are

G01 X.9067

G00 Z1.

G01 G40 Y.7539

G00 X.9167 Z10. <-----------?????

G01 G41 D288 Y.7559

G00 Z.321

G01 Z.252 F10.

X.199 F15.

I've seen this a few times but can't repeatedly reproduce it.

Search McMaster Carr for Ultrasonic Cleaning Solutions. They have brief descriptions of what each one is for (metal, etc.)

If it were me, I'd call the manufacturer of the unit and tell them what you are cleaning and what you want out of the process. I'm sure they will be more than happy to help you.

What he said ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Unless you mix up your chains (centers and points) then it will let you enter a diameter and just ignore it on center of circles. Makes for some interesting results if you're not careful with your autocursor and chaining.

If you do that and look in the chain manager all you see is point1 point2 point3 with no distinction between a point and a center of a circle. That is not desired functionality if you ask me.

IMHO of course.

Have you tried water?

Instead of having subprograms that machine stick letters, make the sub programs using TT fonts. I just toolpath them in Mcam then strip the header and prep stuff (spindle, coolant, etc).

Create -> Create letters ---> select TTF box at the top of the dialog