Question Cutting Depth and Offsets

First day on the CNC was a success!

Some questions:

Question #1
I have the cut depth set in VCarve to go to 8mm, but when actually measured, it goes into the spoil board much deeper than anticipated and a total depth of 12.5mm



Any Ideas?

Question #2
When setting up the job in UCCNC there is some kind of offset that makes it hard to work with small materials.
I set my Zero points for X and Y and the job is offset into the material considerably farther than designed in VCarve. It is as if there is some kind of minimum distance from the work the offsets must be...

Hi,

I may be stating the obvious, but you did remember to zero the Z axis with the tool just touching the workpiece didn't you!!

Under the "Offsets" tab check that the tool offset and G92 offsets are at zero as well.

Peter

Yes, I Zero'd the Z axis after the bit change.

I was poking around in the settings and noticed there is no tool offset. Is this something I need to set? Seems like it would change constantly depending on how deep the bit goes into the collar.

Like you I have been setting the Z axis to zero when the tool just touches the workpiece - my tool offset is zero and the z axis behaves correctly when drilling or milling with pcb-gcode generated Gcode file. So I would suspect something is not set correctly in Vcarve raher than UCCNC.

I have Cut2D, but believe that the setup philosophy is the same as in VCarve. Have you reviewed this page in the manual? It might hold the answer to your problem.

Ok, I have been doing some reading about the number of Steps per Unit. Mine is set at 200, but I'm reading on the board elsewhere that they are using 133.33 for the larger Stepcraft 840.

Would you mind sharing what your UCCNC is set to?

I think Stepcraft 1 models and 210 has 200 steps per unit. As described here

Hi,

It would appear that your machine profile is that for the original Stepcraft, not the series 2. No wonder you are struggling!!!

I think all the original machines had 200 steps per unit (mm), whilst all the series 2 machines 133.33 steps per unit (3mm leadscrew).

My machine is an SC420/2 and the screen shots below show the axis configuration for that machine. Of course the backlash settings are unique to my machine - yours will be somewhat different. I have also attached a copy of my profile file for your information - remember that your macro file will need to be named to match the profile name.









Hope these are of some use to you - if your machine is a 420/2 you could use the profile direct, otherwise edit a COPY of your original.

Peter

Seems the profile file got lost somehow - I'll try again in this post


LATER EDIT:-

Failed again - can someone educate me, everything seemed to be ok.

Thanks for the help Peter! I will give these a shot hopefully this weekend!

Hi,

I have found out how to send you the 420/2 profile file that eluded me before. Apparently the forum rejects certain file extensions - but doesn't tell which anywhere in the English forum - clever eh!!

I have renamed my profile file as a .txt file and it gets sent ok apparently. Just rename it as a .pro file and it may give you some additional help.

Peter.

STEPCRAFT 2 steps per unit 133.33

STEPCRAFT 1 Steps per unit 200

so thats why your seeing scaling issue.

The new parameters are working great. Thanks again.