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I have a gantry type router (custom made) and I want to set up th Z axis.
I think it has lost the correct Z position as Z zero is about 80mm away from the Z up limit switch.
Whats the correct proceedure to set the Z zero? I assume it should be set to be the max Z height and not the lowest Z position?
A could just manually position the Z axis while it's off but I am sure there's a way to set it within the Mach3 software?
Any help appreciated!
Cheers.
Set it to zero just off the switch while your in machine coordinates. Thats what I do anyway. There is also nothing wrong with moving the axis manually while off power and starting up with it where it makes sense to you.
The normal thing to do is to set your home switch at the top of the Z axis stroke (with a few mm to spare as a safety margin). This will set 'machine zero" there as a reference point. But for doing an actual job, you'd set a different "floating zero", usually at the top of your workpiece, or at bed level, by touching off the tool there. If you record that position before zeroing out the axis, you can return to it if it's lost.
Thanks guys.
I have it sussed now. The M6 tool change macro was confusing things. I didn't write it (it's a previously owned machine and laptop) and I don't really know what it's doing, so once I took that out of the program and just set the tool height manually, with zero Z at the bed, everything went to plan. I just need to make sure the Z soft limits are set right as there is no Z lower limit switch of course!
Also slighly confusing that when doing drilling ops, CamBam says Depth when it means Abs Z position of the bottom of the hole! Two very different things!
There is certainly a bit of a steep learning curve, but today I got 500 holes drilled and all in the right places!