Long cuts, tool changes, and 4 & 5 axis unit questions

[dylan-hydronalix]

Hello,

I have experienced a couple of issues during long cuts, and am curious to the cause of them and a potential solution.

First off, during long programs, think over 24 hours, I have experienced an issue with tool changes and the auto tool zeroing function. It will get the end of the cycle and ask for a tool change, which when complete will touch and on the z axis probe as it should. However, the controller will act almost as if it forgot to update the z axis height for the new tool and use the previous offset. I have attached a picture of one such occasion, where the bit took a bite of the material because we had switched to a longer bit. It appears that if we run each cycle on their own individual programs, turn the machine completely off and then re-home it in between programs that it will function properly. For obvious reasons, this is not ideal and a potential safety issue. I feel what potentially causes this, is the controller running out of memory, as this appears to only happen when the tool change prompt is allowed to sit for an extended period of time.

In the same vein, if the machine is emergency stopped, and set to continue the program or even if the program is restarted, the machine will act unpredictable. The machine will make random movements in a random direction at a random point. Again, if the machine is completely restarted and homed again, it will function correctly. I feel that this is again a memory or cache issues.

Finally, is there a reason that the fourth and fifth axis units are in inches and not angles? Is it possible to change this?

 

[masso-support]

Thanks for the feedback, we have not seen this issue before and will be interested to look into this.

1. Is there a way to replicate the issue, some steps we can follow to replicate all the issues that you mentioned above so that we can run tests.
   
2. What version of the MASSO software are you running.
   
3. Will you be able to provide the gcode file.
   
4. In your gcode, for example the tool change command, is it format T2 M6 or M6 T2
   
5. The 4th and 5th axis can be used in angular mode also, simply put 360 for "Motor: Distance per revolution" value.
   

 

[dylan-hydronalix]

Hi,

I'm working on getting you the gcode and step-by-step instruction to replicate it.

These instances occurred on 3.28.23a.

Yesterday, we tried to update to 3.29a but afterwards we were unable to change the homing offsets. They were greyed out and unable to be interacted with. The A axis on our machine turned off as well after the update. We tried trying to make the A axis read as the B axis, but were unable to get it to move as either, through jogging on the machine, with the MPG or homing. We ended up having to revert to the previous used version to be able to make use of the machine.

 

[masso-support]

• Thanks and will wait for your instructions.
  
• In v3.29.1a the homing location is disabled and is automatically populated from the axis min and max travel depending on direction invert option in the homing window.