[jimmyo]

I've got to program some jobs with a helical/spiral groove around a bar, (i.e. on the drawing looks like a figure of 8 on its side).

The last time the job was done (on different dia bar and shorter spiral) several of us had a go at programming it and we all got the same result, effectively, two lines, (i.e. C0 Z-50.; C180. Z-100.; C0. Z-50; , its metric, 50mm pitch helical/spiral groove). it was eventually programmed long hand, (all 360 degrees of movement with z move for each degree).

There must be an easier way!

Can anyone help, please!

Cheers Jim

[fizzissist]

You've got 4 quadrants of radii, 2 on each end of the "8", a pair of straight lines connecting them if you want a more elongated "8".

Don't think you're going to be able to use straight G-code to do this.... you've got to integrate some trig functions into the commands,
and that means macros. Then the big question is: Did you pay to enable the macro option?

What about your CAM software, using a "wrap" function?

(I am, as I write this, looking at the tube I milled in the Mazak with live tooling that has a spiral in the side. Modified the sample in the Mazak manual and
used it for an open house demo. .... too bad I couldn't extract the G-code that Mazatrol generated to do it...)

[jimmyo]

i'll take a picture of one of the old ones

[jimmyo]

Attachment 210802

Hopefully these photos show the problem

[andre_77]

Manufacturer my cad cam program says that the lathe HAAS equipment with C-axis can not be programmed to process the radius of the cylinder using g2 g3. His program does this by dividing the radius of a plurality of straight sections.

Why silent HAAS? Maybe something has changed? Because of the receipt of this information was six years ago.

[Markgyver]

If it were the rotary axis on a mill, you could use a G107 to wrap the figure 8 around the rotary part.

For this kind of milling on a live-tooling Haas lathe, the code will need to be programmed long-hand by a CAM system (lots of synchronized CZ G01 moves)