I have an XJ seies mill, nearly identical to an X2 but with stronger headstock. I am planning a 3 axis conversion but as it only sports a rack and pinion Z axis, its going to require more time than i have to play with. I have a job, drilling a grid of holes into steel plates, so a powered X and Y with me manually dropping the head to drill would be an ideal step. I can convert to ball screw on the Z in my own time then.l

Has anyone experiance of this, is there software to perform this 'half' control. Ideally, goto X20,Y10 wait for me to drill (or possibly wait for me to press oneof the limit switches inputs on the parallel breakout board??) then goto X20 Y30 etc etc

I had such trouble counting 18.66 handwheel spins whis way, 8.33 spins that way. I got lost after 10 or so holes and ended up with a squif grid :(

thanks in advance.

Luke

Hi Luke,

What you are describing should not be a problem you just need to look into what gcode you need to add to tell the programme to pause.

What I would recommend to get you going would be to download SheetCam from here http://www.sheetcam.com/ to generate your gcode, find out what code you need to add for a pause and use the programme feature “add code snippet” to add it where required. The code to pause the programme will depend on what control software you choose to run your machine eg TurboCNC or Mach3.

John

I've used TurboCNC successfully in the past to do exactly what you are describing on an X1. Basically, the gcode would move the table to the correct x y position then put a prompt on screen saying "Drill now" and would wait until the spacebar was pressed to continue to the next hole. I used the manual drill press feature of the X1 to drill the hole then pressed the spacebar to continue to the next hole.

It's been a while since I used TurboCNC but I believe the gcode was

( Move to X Y Position )
G00 X1.25 Y2.00
( Prompt )
M00 ( Drill Now )

( Move to X Y Position )
G00 X2.25 Y2.00
( Prompt )
M00 ( Drill Now )

The G00 will move to the correct XY position and the M00 will put the text of the comment in parenthesis up on the screen and pause the gcode program until the spacebar is pressed.

Both fantastic replies, thank you both.

Now all i have to solve is why i just melted 2 10mm cobalt drill bits after only 5 holes in 1mm stainless steel :(

Luke if you would like any help using Sheetcam or Turbocnc shoot me a PM. I doubt you will need the help however as it is very easy to use software imo but I will be happy to help if you get stuck.

John