[Fortdick]

I have my machine up and running an been sending chips all over my shop. I now need to clean up, but where is the fun in that?

I am changing around some of the hardware and plates, just generally fiddling with my set up. Per Hoss' suggestion, I am rebuilding my Z axis to eliminate a unsightly wobble in the pulley as a result of an off center flange the ball nut mounts to. I am just going to bore out a 13/16 hole thru the pulley and thread the top half in at 15/16 and then just mount the ball nut that way.

My question is if I can use a G73 cycle with a bimetal hole saw to bore out the center hole on the pulley. I did the first one by hand and what a pain that was. If I can't use a canned cycle, how would an experienced machinist go about boring a 13/16 hole in a steel pulley?

My second question is if anyone knows how to eliminate the binding problem on the Y axis of these little X2 machines? If I want to take the table apart for cleaning, or some modification, I have to factor in at least two hours of drinking around with the Y lead screw, hand winding it back and forth while I adjust everything so that it won't bind in the extreme + or - range. There has to be an easy way to support the back end of the screw so that it doesn't sag and bind when the table is fully forward, or twist and bind when it is fully back. I don't even want to go into the time wasted with the brass screw nut or the gibs!

My last question, for now, is if anyone has any idea why Mach3 arbitrarily decides to fault in the middle of a batch of code? I had checked all the diagnostics and it just tells me an estop was tripped. I push reset and start cycle and it will run fine. It is really a pain when you are doing a simple MDI run however and have to go back to zero and start over again.

Any advice is appreciated. Thanks for taking the time to look and please be patient, we were all noobs once.

Dan

[Fastest1]

I would do the pulley on a lathe. Or possibly on the mill but a boring bar and or boring head would be best.

Regarding Mach faulting. This is most likely a noise issue. It can be caused by many factors.
Do you run limit or home switches?
Are the wires adjacent to any stepper or spindle wiring?
Do you have a good wiring strategy that ties all of the grounds together creating a Star point?
Do you have any debounce applied in Mach on the general config page?
Does the machine fault on the same line or random places? You can always raise the Z and cut air to verify when it occurs.
This should be a good start.

[Fortdick]

Thanks Fastest. I will check with some air cuts and take a look at the debounce. I may have to get some distance between my drivers and my power supply. It might be when the PS fan kicks on.

[Fastest1]

Almost all machines will require some debounce. If it was on 0 try 500. It is still a very short period of time 500 x 40us. It means the signal will have to be constant for that period before Mach will see it. If left at 0, any stray signal will throw a false trigger

[Fortdick]

Almost all machines will require some debounce. If it was on 0 try 500. It is still a very short period of time 500 x 40us. It means the signal will have to be constant for that period before Mach will see it. If left at 0, any stray signal will throw a false trigger

These are the kind of things you don't learn on YouTube!

Thanks Fastest

[Fastest1]

There is a lot to learn. Between here, the electronics section and the Mach forum, I pick up a tid bit occasionally ;-) Btw this is referred to as noise. It caused me many problems in the beginning. Mostly due to improper grounding techniques.