Tormach Probe - Pros & Cons ?
I'm now getting into work that requires me to flip the part more than 2 times. One side of the part has to be dead on or the work is trashed. It's taken me almost 5 - 15 mins sometimes to set this up and most of the time it's a little off (0.01" - 0.02"), plus my vision in my left eye isn't so great and puts stress on my right.
At the moment I'm using a little magnifying jeweler eye piece to set the X & Y. So looking over the Tormach site I see the probe and was curious what the users have to say about it.... ?
Next I see they offer a replacement tip and wondering why. If the probe is suppose to stop the machine from moving once touched, how could you break a tip ?
Last, I'm not seeing much info available on it and wanted to know how it works for setting up the X & Y coordinates. Say if I had a 4" x 4" x 1" height block, would I zero out the Z first then let the computer do the rest or am I having to jog it to each corner myself ?
Or do you recommend a different piece of equipment that will help me ?
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Wildhorse Probe hookup to PCNC770
I just received and hooked up the Wildhorse probe to my Tormach PCNC770.
Here are some of the details:
You need to change the connector from the 1/8" stereo mini-plug to a 5-pin DIN plug. Beware that the pin numbering on these DIN plugs is a little odd (sequence is Pin 1,4,2,5,3 - as you look from the rear - one of these pins carries +12v so check twice !). A wiring diagram is in the Tormach manual (figure 8.22).
The wire to the "Tip" of the WH probe goes to Pin 4, and the wire from the "Middle ring" goes to Pin 5. The LED will work correctly when you wire it this way - If you wire it backwards, the probe will still work without the LED.
As has been written before - you need to tell Mach3 to use opposite logic. Without addressing any of the warranty issues, the directions for doing this are described in the Tormach PCNC770 manual (section 9.5.11) and are fairly easy to do.
My impressions: This is a pretty nice probe for the money. The key is alignment which can be tricky but after a little practice is not too bad - I was able to get it to align within .0005 on the indicator.
I plan to mount it in a setscrew R8 collet - so that it will always be inserted the same way and orientation into the spindle (I marked the pulley so it won't go in 180 degrees out). I also need to test "edge finding" accuracy against my conventional Starrett edge finder before trusting it completely...
It definitely looks like it will be fantastic for finding edges and the middle of a hole. I just started playing with "Bed O nails" probing - it may work well for metal objects - but my testing on wood shows that it will "leave a mark" on soft materials.