Hello all,

The reason for being done with Mach s has to do with reliability (and safety) related to running complex Macros. I have had several really nasty crashes/run aways and am just fed up with the deep dark bugs. I have not heard much of anything good about MACH4, in fact, mostly bad stuff about it so that isn't much of an option. I have been working with, selling, supporting, operating industrial CNC machines since the 70s. Up until now I was willing to tolerate the "quirks" of hobby CNC controls but it is time to move on.

My machine(s) are for the most part basic 3 axis routers and a 2 axis lathe. My mill is my tinker toy and I do a lot of modifications, experiments, etc and right now I am (was) working a tool change system for it. This tool changers requires extensive macro programming to do things the way I want it to. Within the tool change mechanism is an "intelligent" stepper drive to control a motor. I communicate with the drive using MACH 3's macro language's serial output command.

Is there a way with Acorn to output serial data?

Thanks in advance for any and all help!

Chris D