Newbie still on the fence for uccnc vs mach3


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Thread: Newbie still on the fence for uccnc vs mach3

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    Default Newbie still on the fence for uccnc vs mach3

    Building my own small cnc (about 650mm X 450mm) and trying to decide between the 2. So far the general consensus is that guys prefer uccnc and think it's easier to use for a beginner. I'm 99% sure I want to go uccnc, but there's one hang up I have. When searching for tutorial videos, they are endless for mach3 and not common at all for uccnc. For example if I want to search for something specific like how to setup dual screw/ dual stepper for X using a slave on uccnc, I can't really find specifics like how to set it up to calibrate squareness with 2 home switches. Much more info available for mach3. Should I be worried about this? Or should I just trust that I can rely on you guys to help me out with uccnc when needed? So far my experience on this forum has been great. Plenty of experienced guys willing to help. I think I would be OK even with the lack of tutorials for uccnc, but I'm still open to suggestions and opinions on one vs the other. If it makes much difference, I'll be running a g540 and most likely a uc100. Possibly skip the uc100 if I go mach3 to keep price down.

    Any advice is appreciated!

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    Default Re: Newbie still on the fence for uccnc vs mach3

    When using the home switches to square the gantry, the squareness is normally dictated by the switch position. To set up the slaved motor in UCCNC, you go to the master axis setup page, and select the slave from a drop down list. That's all there is too it.

    From a usability and setup standpoint, there's very little difference between UCCNC and Mach3. And CNC drive has an active user forum for UCCNC, and excellent support.

    Gerry

    UCCNC 2017 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2017.html[/URL]

    Mach3 2010 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2010.html[/URL]

    JointCAM - CNC Dovetails & Box Joints
    [URL]http://www.g-forcecnc.com/jointcam.html[/URL]

    (Note: The opinions expressed in this post are my own and are not necessarily those of CNCzone and its management)


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    Quote Originally Posted by ger21 View Post
    When using the home switches to square the gantry, the squareness is normally dictated by the switch position. To set up the slaved motor in UCCNC, you go to the master axis setup page, and select the slave from a drop down list. That's all there is too it.

    From a usability and setup standpoint, there's very little difference between UCCNC and Mach3. And CNC drive has an active user forum for UCCNC, and excellent support.
    Sounds good, uccnc it is. Right here is a good example of how quick I can get help. You answered my question inside of an hour, actually only 10 minutes. I'll check out the cnc drive forum as well

    Thanks!

    Edit: since I brought it up, one thing I'd like to confirm. I understand how to slave A axis to X axis, but for the home switches, I assume I go into axis configuration and assign X axis home switch to the proper pin and assign A axis home switch to the proper pin. When I tell the machine to home X, both steppers will drive towards their switch, if one switch triggers first, the other motor will continue moving independently from the other until it hits its switch even though one is slaved to the other?



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    Default Re: Newbie still on the fence for uccnc vs mach3

    Correct. During homing, they move independently towards their own switches.

    Gerry

    UCCNC 2017 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2017.html[/URL]

    Mach3 2010 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2010.html[/URL]

    JointCAM - CNC Dovetails & Box Joints
    [URL]http://www.g-forcecnc.com/jointcam.html[/URL]

    (Note: The opinions expressed in this post are my own and are not necessarily those of CNCzone and its management)


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    Quote Originally Posted by ger21 View Post
    Correct. During homing, they move independently towards their own switches.
    Perfect, makes sense. To take it one step further, when the first stepper arrives and hits the switch, will it immediately back up off the switch while the second motor is still heading towards home? Or will the first stepper hit the switch and hold there while it waits for the second switch to trigger, then both back up off home switches simultaneously? If the first arriving stepper was to immediately back off the switch while the second one was still heading home, I would think it would cause an excessive amount of twist on the gantry for a short moment, maybe even overload the steppers and cause lost steps if the gantry was stiff enough. Or does it work the way I assume and wait for both switches to trigger before simultaneously backing both off?



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    Default Re: Newbie still on the fence for uccnc vs mach3

    I'm not 100% sure, but it's a little more complicated.
    First, there is no additional backing off of the switch during homing.

    When UCCNC is homing, the axis moves until the switch closes, then reverses direction until the switch opens again. The Home position is the point where the switch opens back up.


    I would think it would cause an excessive amount of twist on the gantry for a short moment
    I suspect that when the first side hits the switch, it does back up while the other side is still moving, until the switch opens.
    Note that for this to occur, the axis is already out of square, and this process is actually bringing it into square, not pulling it out of square. So it's actually removing the "twist".

    Gerry

    UCCNC 2017 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2017.html[/URL]

    Mach3 2010 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2010.html[/URL]

    JointCAM - CNC Dovetails & Box Joints
    [URL]http://www.g-forcecnc.com/jointcam.html[/URL]

    (Note: The opinions expressed in this post are my own and are not necessarily those of CNCzone and its management)


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    Quote Originally Posted by ger21 View Post
    I'm not 100% sure, but it's a little more complicated.
    First, there is no additional backing off of the switch during homing.

    When UCCNC is homing, the axis moves until the switch closes, then reverses direction until the switch opens again. The Home position is the point where the switch opens back up.



    I suspect that when the first side hits the switch, it does back up while the other side is still moving, until the switch opens.
    Note that for this to occur, the axis is already out of square, and this process is actually bringing it into square, not pulling it out of square. So it's actually removing the "twist".
    Ok, yes that's a good point point. If one motor is leading, backing off first will at least be twisting it the right direction. Also it sounds like the "backing off" is just a very miniscule distance if all its doing is reopening the switch, or re closing rather. However it actually works, I think I have a good understanding now and whatever it does obviously works properly without twisting things if it's implemented on super heavy duty rigid steel mills. I feel pretty confident about it now

    Thanks again



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    Default Re: Newbie still on the fence for uccnc vs mach3

    There's one user here that found that his gantry is too stiff for the motors to try to square it. So make sure you have the ability to make adjustments if needed.

    Gerry

    UCCNC 2017 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2017.html[/URL]

    Mach3 2010 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2010.html[/URL]

    JointCAM - CNC Dovetails & Box Joints
    [URL]http://www.g-forcecnc.com/jointcam.html[/URL]

    (Note: The opinions expressed in this post are my own and are not necessarily those of CNCzone and its management)


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    Quote Originally Posted by ger21 View Post
    There's one user here that found that his gantry is too stiff for the motors to try to square it. So make sure you have the ability to make adjustments if needed.
    Yes, I should be able to mechanically adjust my gantry to square. My aluminum plate brackets will have holes slightly larger than the bolts so I should be able to snug things up, move it where I want, then torque the bolts down.

    Do most guys use dual home switches for dual stepper axis? Or is it also common to sometimes only have one switch on the master stepper and assign home for both X and A to the same home switch?

    I imagine with super rigid gantries, maybe only one switch is needed? Assuming you get it adjusted perfectly square mechanically. Also I'm assuming with dual stepper axis, losing some steps is a really bad scenario since the motors will then be fighting each other to pull the gantry out of square



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    Default Re: Newbie still on the fence for uccnc vs mach3

    If you only use one switch, then you just don't assign a switch to the A axis at all.

    Some people don't use any home switches. Some use one because they think it's hard to set up two.

    I imagine with super rigid gantries, maybe only one switch is needed?
    If the gantry is square, and so rigid that it can't go out of square, then there's no reason to use two switches.


    Also I'm assuming with dual stepper axis, losing some steps is a really bad scenario since the motors will then be fighting each other to pull the gantry out of square
    A properly setup machine should never lose steps. Any machine that regularly loses steps , isn't a very good, or useful, machine.
    What I'm saying, is this shouldn't be an issue. And with the sized motors you are talking about, they'll stall pretty easily if one were to get out of position.

    Gerry

    UCCNC 2017 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2017.html[/URL]

    Mach3 2010 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2010.html[/URL]

    JointCAM - CNC Dovetails & Box Joints
    [URL]http://www.g-forcecnc.com/jointcam.html[/URL]

    (Note: The opinions expressed in this post are my own and are not necessarily those of CNCzone and its management)


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    Default Re: Newbie still on the fence for uccnc vs mach3

    Makes sense. In my case, I'm pretty sure I would benefit from using the 2 home switches for X since I'm building from 80/20 which will be decently rigid, but nothing compared to a steel machine.

    I know this is getting off topic and not in the right section, but since it's related to what we're talking about, I'll just ask here. When I power my machine off, close uccnc, then reopen it and power the machine on, what are my stepper motors going to do? Will they just pull to the nearest micro step? And from there I will home everything? I'm assuming when first powering on, uccnc has no idea of the actual position of all the axis until you home to give it a reference, and from there its just counting steps to know the location of every thing. Am I missing anything there? What I don't understand us how a machine could even work without using home switches to get that initial reference. Would you just jog over to about where home is and zero it there? Otherwise how would uccnc know where it's programmed limits are in the first place when powering the machine on?



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    Default Re: Newbie still on the fence for uccnc vs mach3

    I believe that most drives will move the motor to the nearest full or half step maybe?

    With CNC, there are two sets of coordinates. Machine coordinates, and work coordinates. Most people will zero their X and Y axis relative to their part before running their code. This is setting a Work Offset, and is using work coordinates.
    When you home your machine, you are setting the machine coordinates. If you don't use softlimits, or any feature that requires repeatable machine coordinates, then you don't need to home the machine. Many people don't. They just zero their axis where their parts are, and run them.

    UCCNC will remember it's previous location when you start it, but the actual position can move, either by the small amount the steppers will move when powered up, or if the machine is physically moved.

    Gerry

    UCCNC 2017 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2017.html[/URL]

    Mach3 2010 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2010.html[/URL]

    JointCAM - CNC Dovetails & Box Joints
    [URL]http://www.g-forcecnc.com/jointcam.html[/URL]

    (Note: The opinions expressed in this post are my own and are not necessarily those of CNCzone and its management)


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    Quote Originally Posted by ger21 View Post
    I believe that most drives will move the motor to the nearest full or half step maybe?

    With CNC, there are two sets of coordinates. Machine coordinates, and work coordinates. Most people will zero their X and Y axis relative to their part before running their code. This is setting a Work Offset, and is using work coordinates.
    When you home your machine, you are setting the machine coordinates. If you don't use softlimits, or any feature that requires repeatable machine coordinates, then you don't need to home the machine. Many people don't. They just zero their axis where their parts are, and run them.

    UCCNC will remember it's previous location when you start it, but the actual position can move, either by the small amount the steppers will move when powered up, or if the machine is physically moved.
    Ok, so in the case of skipping the homing and zeroing on your part where you set the pick up in cam, you just have to make sure your program doesn't leave the mechancal travel of your machine? In that case I'm assuming you have no protection and making a mistake can lead to running the machine into its limit. I guess it's probably hard to do if you're paying attention, enter the size of your actual stock in cam, so as long as you pick up on the correct corner, you'll obviously know the program doesn't leave the machine if the stock fits. While I'm learning I'll probably always start by homing and setting limits just to be safe. But that does help me to understand how a machine can work without switches or even homing.



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    Default Re: Newbie still on the fence for uccnc vs mach3

    Ok, so in the case of skipping the homing and zeroing on your part where you set the pick up in cam, you just have to make sure your program doesn't leave the mechancal travel of your machine?
    Yes, or install limit switches to prevent a crash.

    I guess it's probably hard to do if you're paying attention,
    Probably not as hard as you think, but it gets easier with experience. But as long as your parts are smaller than your machine bed, it's not that hard.


    One bit if advise. I'd consider spending an extra $30 or so and get a UC400ETH, rather than a UC100. It gives you another port of I/O, for future expandability, and more I/O if you need it.

    Gerry

    UCCNC 2017 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2017.html[/URL]

    Mach3 2010 Screenset
    [URL]http://www.thecncwoodworker.com/2010.html[/URL]

    JointCAM - CNC Dovetails & Box Joints
    [URL]http://www.g-forcecnc.com/jointcam.html[/URL]

    (Note: The opinions expressed in this post are my own and are not necessarily those of CNCzone and its management)


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Newbie still on the fence for uccnc vs mach3

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