SheetCam communicating with Mach3 issues

[msimpson99]

I have sheetcam and mach3 running on a new build. Sheetcam can communicate just fine with mach3. It reports the actual position of the CNC in the remote dro's but the cursor is not correct. After a lot of testing it looks like sheetcam thinks the number coming from mach3 are mm not inch. both software packages are setup in inches.

It seems that it is only the remote cursor that seems to be in error. Has any one else using inches experienced this?

[davek0974]

Hmm, sheet cam does not communicate with anything as far as i know, I use it all the time and all it does is generate G-Code files.

Got any screen-shots of what goes on?

[acourtjester]

As stated above you have the communication backwards. SheetCam creates the G-code for mach to run.
Now in Mach3 you can click on the configure drop down menu and the first thing is "select native units" click on that and a box comes up Click OK and a new box comes up with MM's and inch pick your box for the way you want to operate your table then do the motor tuning using measured distance to get the correct values in the "steps per" for you table.

[msimpson99]

Sorry but sheetcam goes much deeper than that. Not only will it give Mach3 a tap on the shoulder and tell it to load the latest processed file, it will give commands directly to Mach3 and thus your plasma or router. In addition a white cursor shows the current position of your machine on your Sheetcam drawing.

There are many packages that will communicate directly with Mach3. I know cause I have used many of them with my CNC routers. I even wrote one.

There are two ways to start this communications.
1. Click the M button next to the calculator. This will bring up a dialog. I think its called the remote dialog.
2. Under plugins select the "Enable Mach3" menu item.

You will need Mach3 to be up and running and communicating your your plasma/router.

Here is a screen shot of Sheetcam communicating with my little micro mill.

It all works perfect. The only thing that seems to be broke is the white cursor in SheetCam thinks the numbers are in metric so it does not display the correct position. It would be nice to follow in SheetCam the location of the cut. Mach3 shows this as well so its not that big a deal.

You have a lot of control over your machine directly from Sheetcam. You can even send it gcode commands. Note that SheetCam also has a Moveto command in the operations menu. This tells Mach3 to move the machine to a given position.

[davek0974]

Ah, then you are way more advanced than myself, I prefer to keep a distance between the two, my sheet cam is on my laptop indoors and the Mach setups are in the workshop, i run nothing but Mach on my control boxes, no network or wifi either.

Interesting though

[msimpson99]

I had them separate for a while but, wanted to do some real time stuff. It is very possible to write some scripts to do simple cut jobs without having to generate a cad file.

My machine is very unorthodox. Its very small. It only has a cutting area of 19" x 12". I will be building a larger machine at a later date, I'm just experimenting with as much as I can before I embark on the larger build. The machine is a converted KRMx02 CNC router 19x14 build size.

[WyoGreen]

That's pretty interesting, I knew you could send a job straight to Mach3 from Sheetcam using the M button, but I didn't know it was a 2 way communication. I'll have to check it out. I'm not sure how useful it would be for me, as like the others, I only run one thing on my cutting computer, and that's Mach3. I've been told too many things running at the same time can mess up your timing signals between Mach3 and your controller.

Steve

[tnbndr]

That's odd, my SheetCAM doesn't even have the "M" button next to the calculator, or anywhere for that matter.

[davek0974]

That's odd, my SheetCAM doesn't even have the "M" button next to the calculator, or anywhere for that matter.

Same here?

[acourtjester]

are you using SheetCam development 6.1.28?

sheetcama.jpg (28.62 KiB) Viewed 2685 times

sheetcama.jpg (28.62 KiB) Viewed 2685 times

[davek0974]

SheetCam TNG here

[WyoGreen]

It's been a long time, but I seem to remember that the Mach3 button is a plugin option? Take a look under Options/Plugin options

Steve

[tnbndr]

WyoGreen is correct and since I don't have Mach 3 loaded on my office computer SheetCam did not find it or load the plugin.

See pic.

[msimpson99]

I have contacted the folks at SheetCam and they have recreated the problem and will look into it.

[msimpson99]

That said, here is a screen shot of my setup for controlling my KRMx02 plasma conversion.

I keep mach 3 on the left monitor, sheetcam and Corel Draw on the right monitor. Works very well. Now to be honest this is the setup in the shop. I only use the CAD in the shop for simple things and testing. I have a much larger computer in the lab where I do serious CAD.

[SeanP]

Can sheetcam communicate over the network with mach 3 plugin?