Getting Started with UCCNC Software

I'm a long time Mach 3 user but I've finally gotten completely fed up with their very poor CV trajectory planner so I've purchased a UC 100 as well as the control software. I've started working on it today and have a few issues I'm dealing with and wondering if anyone else has found any solutions to this:

1) Reverse Axis - out of my X,Y and Z axes, only the X is moving in the proper direction. I've been looking for a reverse axis checkbox like in Mach 3 but I can't seem to find one anywhere. Does such a thing exist or do I have to re-wire my motors? (would be very annoying if I have to re-wire)

2) Limit switches - since I'm just getting started, I'm hitting the limit switches quite often and there doesn't seem to be a way to move the machine away from the limit switches. Am I missing something?

I'm sure I'll have more question as time goes on but this is something I need to get going as quickly as possible.

As soon as possible, I have to write an M6 macro to handle the tool change. I'm currently using Ger G's screen set for Mach 3 which using a mobile plate and fixed plate to handle tool changes. I saw some stuff in the other thread that looks like it shouldn't be too big a deal to take care of this.

Thanks!

Just a quick update - the "active low" button on the axis tabs reverses the directions (got this info from Balazs from UCCNC).

Just ran a few test parts and this software blows Mach 3 out of the water as far as machine control goes. Parts cycled about twice as fast as Mach3 and look much better as well. Much better adherence to the intended trajectory. Even when I had linear and corner tolerance set to .0001" it was still sat least 50% faster than Mach 3.

This is good stuff!

Hi Andy,

I'm using uccnc too, but it seems 100% slower than Mach3. I didn't change the default parameters, so maybe it is obvious... Could you share the parameters you set for constant velocity mode? thanks so much.

Enzo

Hi Enzo,

You've probably got something setup incorrectly or, perhaps your Mach 3 settings are set up for speed rather than accuracy. Being a 'Merkin (i.e. I'm in the U.S.) I use inches so my unit size is 1" or 25.4mm My settings are:

(I forget what they're called but they're in this order):
Lookahead = 200 or 300 (can't remember)
0.001"
1"
1"
0.001" (Max corner error)

I just did some air cuts of an acoustic guitar neck program I have and with Mach3 it took 1:04 to complete while with UCCNC it took only 47min. There are two really big differences - in Mach 3, I had to drop my lookahead down all the way to 10 to eliminate edge rounding on 3D parts and even at 10 I still have an unacceptable finish. I also had to drop my acceleration down to 23 from 40 because some 3D moves were causing stalling in Mach 3. I know for a fact this was due to a Mach 3 bug because the stalls would always happen at the same line of code. With UCCNC, I have my acceleration at 60(!!!!!) with no problems. I actually had it up at 80 but I moved it back to 60 to be safe.

Hi Andy,

thank you so much!

So converting your values in mm (just to help some metric guys):

Stop at angle degree > 89 (default value)
Linear error max = 0,0254 mm
Linear addition length max = 25,4 mm
Linear unify length max = 25,4 mm
Corner Error Max = 0,0254 mm

As soon as possible I'll try these values and I'll let you know.

P.S. I use Rhino3d and RhinoCam for the paths calculation.

Thanks again,
Enzo

Does the UCR200 work with UCCNC?