Just made my first test cuts

[timberfab]

Well, I had to tell someone and most of the "normal" people in my life give me the blank stare and knowing nod when the CNC talk starts.

But here goes,

I built a used and abused Torchmate with a TD Cutmaster 82 plasma about 4 or 5 years ago. Beat it up, fixed it up, and made some great stuff with it. Sold it over the winter and spent the money on parts for a new machine.

6 x 12 water table (not filled yet haha)
CandCNC Dragoncut with DTHC II Blah blah blah
Hypertherm 1650 with a Duramax torch upgrade

After poking away at it for a few months and learning the basics of Sheetcam this morning, I made my first cuts this afternoon! Very happy with the results. and only have 2 problems

- Calibrated the z axis, but when I run a program the torch touches off, fires, begins the motion, then hits the material, before raising up to a decent cut height. How do I get the torch not to hit the material before raising to cut height?

- When I load G-code into Mach3 the toolpath display shows nothing. It remains an empty gray box. How do I get it to display the Toolpath?

Thanks for understanding my excitement at seeing this beast move and cut!

[beefy]

Hi Timberfab,

Is your THC Delay set long enough, so that when the piercing is happening and the voltage is going sky high, all of that just gets ignored until the THC Delay period is over. Seems like the controller is trying to correct the high voltage and diving down in an attempt to reduce it.

Don't have any idea about the toolpath not showing, sorry.

Keith.

[timberfab]

Thanks for the point in the right direction. Haven't messed with the THC too much. I'll take a look at it.

[grindergary]

Just out of curiosity, have you tried to regen the toolpath? Sometimes when I load a g code, the toolpath does not show, hit regen and it shows up then.

Gary

[timberfab]

well i boot up the old compy and opened Mach3 loaded g-code and the toolpath display was fine.

As far as THC sensing delay goes, what is normal delay. Does this delay begin when the torch begins it's descent to the metal? Or after the OK to Move signal is given (after the arc starts and the torch moves)?

I didn't make another test cut just checked the THC sensing delay, it is set at 1.00 seconds.