Hi,
Here's my setup: Bridgeport Series 1 cnc with Mach3, Geckos, original steppers, 70V supply, XP laptop, smooth stepper.
X and y work perfectly. I can do a job and note that the mechanical counters return to exactly their original numbers after I'm done.
Z, however is goofy. It loses steps during a simple program, but never ever if I just to a jog 0.1" either way. I can do that all day and never lose a step. What is different about Z motion within a program? The simple program is just 4 or 5 linear cuts in a loop that starts off 0.1" above the part, does a .050 cut and then another one. I command it to return to the original position and it's usually off by quite a bit, like .045"
I have tried slowing the feed speed down to a crawl, 2"/min. No improvement. Slowed down and sped up acceleration in Motor Tuning to no avail. Speeds on each axis set to 20 "/min.
How can this be? The pendant jogs are perfect, but a z motion with F2.0 quivers and loses steps. I see the z motor shaft quivering back and forth in program moves but rock solid in pendant jogs.
Flummoxed.
???
cnc1000