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IndustryArena Forum > MetalWorking > MetalWork Discussion > Crazy Y Axis drift when upgrading to Mach3
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  1. #1

    Crazy Y Axis drift when upgrading to Mach3

    Hi, About 6 months ago i bought a 3040 from our chinese friends and upgraded it to a 2.2KW spindle. I have had relative sucess cutting aluminium on a laptop and parallel port to USB program USBCNC. It was cutting very accurately and with little issues apart from it would very intermittantly stop, Crash and reset its zero and scrap the part.

    After 10 or so parts scrapped over the months i decided to do away and get a proper dedicated XP desktop computer. I watched many youtube videos and set up mach3, taking care to correctly calibrate the steps per MM and set up soft limits. (Please note i didnt touch the actual CNC during the upgrade)

    I thought i had it sorted but there is a problem milling at multiple depths , and it appears the Y axis moves slightly negative each time it moves down a layer creating a step effect instead of a perfectly straight vertical cut, this even applys on old Gcode that came out perfect previously. All other axis work perfectly. Ive also tried .

    Ive thoroughly checked everything on the hardware side and nothing seems loose and the spindle is straight. Redone the step calibration for the Y axis multple times and it always is spot on with accuracy.

    Someone pointed out it may be a driver error, but surely that would cause the accuracy to be off when calibrating? Also im guessing (possibly wrongly) that this isnt a cnc problem, more of a computer problem as thats the only thing thats changed?

    Any help with this would be greatly appreciated as this really has me stumped.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    May 2003
    Posts
    323

    Re: Crazy Y Axis drift when upgrading to Mach3

    Check for short on y axis wires I had mine crash and stop randomly . fixed it and no more issues.

    Sent from my MHA-L29 using Tapatalk

  3. #3
    Quote Originally Posted by ChrisW View Post
    Check for short on y axis wires I had mine crash and stop randomly . fixed it and no more issues.

    Sent from my MHA-L29 using Tapatalk
    That would perhaps explain the issue on my old set up but surely a short would cause the step unit calibration to be off?

  4. #4
    Join Date
    May 2003
    Posts
    323

    Re: Crazy Y Axis drift when upgrading to Mach3

    It could lose steps whenever there's short and still keep going.

    Sent from my MHA-L29 using Tapatalk

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Aug 2009
    Posts
    1567

    Re: Crazy Y Axis drift when upgrading to Mach3

    try a new Endmill cutter

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