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  1. #21
    Registered MrBean's Avatar
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    This one's for the Inner Body, Upper section.
    There are 2 CamBam files for this. The first is the main pocket, which just leaves the 3 alignment studs sticking up.
    The second tidies up the studs and cuts the remainder of the part.
    So we have:

    2 CamBam files
    2 Gcode files
    1 DXF

    Regards Terry.

    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Who want to make a touch probe?-inner_body_upper1-jpg   Who want to make a touch probe?-inner_body_upper2-jpg  
    Attached Files Attached Files


  2. #22
    Registered 10bulls's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by MrBean View Post
    ...2 CamBam files...
    Ah Terry San! I see you are at one with the CamBam! Nice work! :rainfro:

    I had a bit of an 'eppyfanny' whilst painting the ceiling. I wonder if you could somehow angle the pins so the inner point is lower (a bit like a shuttlecock) . That would make the thing try to sit at the lowest point. I think whats happening is because the pins are
    all in the same plane, there's nothing preventing it sliding side to side. I think the 'open circuit syndrome' happens when the pins slide a bit and get stuck to the balls by friction. Shinnier pins would help too. Brass and drill shafts are too rough maybe. Another idea is to have a spring on each pin pushing it down, rather than one big spring.

    Scanning today didn't go too well. I got a couple of open circuits and then my Z axis started missing steps. (I'd been playing with motor tuning, trying to get more speed ). I noticed my 5V pull up on the parallel port pin had fallen off too. Gonna try again tomorrow.





  3. #23
    Registered MrBean's Avatar
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    That "eppyfanny" shuttlecock idea sounds like a good'un. Should be easy enough to machine a new inner body to accomodate that. Although, thinking about it, there might not be enough height inside the main body. Will have to dig out the CAD model a take a look. What kind of angle are you thinking?
    45 Degrees, 20 Degrees?? Any ideas......

    Have you tried a weight near the tip of the probing end? It might help a bit?

    Regards Terry.



  4. #24
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    Quote Originally Posted by 10bulls View Post
    Ah Terry San! I see you are at one with the CamBam! Nice work! :rainfro:

    CamBam is great. I'm using it more and more these days. It takes a bit of getting used to, but I can't really think of how it could be any user friendlier. By it's nature, it's not going to be the easiest thing to use ever. No CAM software is.

    I hope you get back on with some more development soon. I know you're busy with other stuff, but Fingers crossed you'll pull out a bug fix or two, and maybe a couple of plugins.

    Regards Terry.



  5. #25
    Registered 10bulls's Avatar
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    Shallow would be OK. 15-20 degree maybe?

    I didn't use weight. The spring is pretty strong now so don't think it will have much effect.
    I think it is pushing a bit lop-sided though. Thats why i think 3 separate springs would be better.



  6. #26
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    Quote Originally Posted by sdantonio View Post
    Any suggestions on a probe material for use on sensitive objects that you wouldn't want damaged. By this I mean an antique made of soft wood with a varnish finish that you definitely would not want any scratches or other damage to appear on.
    My advice is DON'T DO IT!!!!
    I'd hang on until MrBean invents a frikin laser beam (laser bean?) scanner device
    ...then again



  7. #27
    Gold Member Mr.Chips's Avatar
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    Have a question:

    When using the probe is it necessary to move the probe by hand, or could you define the area and then have it probe the piece on a .X mm grid automatically?

    Thanks



  8. #28
    Member ger21's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mr.Chips View Post
    Have a question:

    When using the probe is it necessary to move the probe by hand, or could you define the area and then have it probe the piece on a .X mm grid automatically?

    Thanks
    Mach3 has a couple options, one of which is a wizard that let's you specify the grid size and spacing.

    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)


  9. #29
    Registered 10bulls's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by ger21 View Post
    Mach3 has a couple options, one of which is a wizard that let's you specify the grid size and spacing.
    That's right. It's pretty basic stuff but it does the job.
    It actually generates a probing program in g-code which does the scanning.
    Biggest problem with it is speed (I think there may also be issues with larger numbers of data points).
    Having to probe down, retract, move along a fraction of a mm then probe down again a few thousand times is slow going. Because the distances are quite small you rarely get out of the 'ramping' area of the motor speed control.
    Because these probes work sideways as well, a more intelligent method would scan down then zig-zag until it hits something.
    A multi-pass thing would be good to. First pass to get rough dimensions then a finer pass to digitize details. This way you can spend more time at faster feed rates.
    I think it would be a nightmare to do something like this in g-code. I'd like to knock up a stand alone program to do this.



  10. #30
    Registered 10bulls's Avatar
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    @*!?!& and $??#!@-ing %*!!?-ards!!!!

    Things were going so well, then open circuits started to happen again .
    I'm sure with a few tweaks they'll go away.

    This is a 0.2mm grid scan of a dog tag. This took ~7 hours to scan.

    I think I'll put probing on hold for a bit until I get more time to play with the mechanics and write some scanning software. (I've got 16 8' x 4' 18mm birch ply sheets coming in the next couple of days so I may be a little preoccupied).

    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Who want to make a touch probe?-guide-dog-scan-png  


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    I like the scanning idea.

    If one could set aside enough memory for a completed scan of an object, taking into consideration the size and final resolution of the image, one might be able to speed up the scan process.

    Think of it like a topographical map. It is scanned at Z height. If any peaks appear at that height, they should activate the probe and those points could be located at the correct X, Y, and Z points in memory.

    On the next pass, the Z height is lowered. The probe is looking for contact. Maybe a look Ahead function could also be worked out where the system knows where the previous contact points were, and can bypass those but continue the scan at the next point.

    This would allow the probe to move at some speed at a fixed point in Z axis space until contact is made. If the look ahead function works, the previously scanned areas would be bypassed and only the areas without data would be continiously probed until the scanning was complete.

    Guys, I know this is complex, and I left out a lot of steps, but it might be possible if someone has a few hundred hours to spend on it.

    Jerry



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    Quote Originally Posted by 10bulls View Post
    My advice is DON'T DO IT!!!!
    I'd hang on until MrBean invents a frikin laser beam (laser bean?) scanner device
    ...then again
    All the commercial scanners and computer controlled measuring systems uses tools with ball tips. Shouldn't be a big problem to put a ball bearing ball at the end of the tip.

    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Who want to make a touch probe?-accessory_13-jpg   Who want to make a touch probe?-accessory_14-jpg   Who want to make a touch probe?-accessory_17-jpg  


  13. #33
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    although im sure physical measuring is used for a lot of tasks, it really isnt suitable for use on antiques, as 10bulls mentioned. I have previously used laser scanners to image small statues etc, but these tend to be very expensive.

    As for a 'cheap' diy solution, well if you consider a dlp projector and a decent digicam cheap, you can do pretty well with structured light scanning. Its good to sub-mm accuracy, but not as accurate as a touch probe. http://www.ercim.org/publication/Erc.../rocchini.html



  14. #34
    Registered 10bulls's Avatar
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    Playing around with this has made me want to try a more sensitive probe. I was thinking of using probe tips epoxied to piezzo transducers. A gentle poke should give a good voltage spike to pick up.
    ...or even use a record player stylus!

    I couldn't resist having one last tweak tonight. I manually bent the brass tube pins upwards and put 3 separate springs in. I put a bit of double sided carpet tape over each pin. This holds them down, stops then sliding AND gives something for the spring to stick to so it doesn't sproing out.

    I also put quite long m3 screws that hold the cap down. This allows for a wide range of adjustment. Tight down results in quite a hard poking force but no doubt reliable. A couple of turns loosened I managed to get it to a point where I could reliably trigger it with my finger without drawing blood and it
    didn't seem to stick. Though I don't think I'd trust it to scan any part of my anatomy any time soon.

    I'm going to give it one last go tomorrow for now.

    Last edited by 10bulls; 12-12-2006 at 07:17 PM.


  15. #35
    Registered 10bulls's Avatar
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    Another use for a touch probe.

    Having a stiff probe may not be so bad. If you had a pointy diamond tip on the probe, you could record how far you had to push to trip the probe.
    You could equate this to hardness (maybe).
    At metallurgy work experience we did something similar but measured the width of the diamond imprint with a microscope).

    I've often wondered how well my experiments at tempering metal work. You could use this as some sort of indicator.

    It could also make a pretty effective body piercer in the wrong hands.



  16. #36
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    Quote Originally Posted by daedalus View Post
    although im sure physical measuring is used for a lot of tasks, it really isnt suitable for use on antiques, as 10bulls mentioned. I have previously used laser scanners to image small statues etc, but these tend to be very expensive.

    As for a 'cheap' diy solution, well if you consider a dlp projector and a decent digicam cheap, you can do pretty well with structured light scanning. Its good to sub-mm accuracy, but not as accurate as a touch probe. http://www.ercim.org/publication/Erc.../rocchini.html
    I have been measuring prototypes in clay with mechanical devices. The CE-J machines are of course extremely sensitive, but if you need to leave marks on the measured device, the probe spring is too strong.

    That's at least my opinion.

    Regards,
    Sven



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    Default Cambam

    Hi!

    Can anyone help me I have problem to import DFX.cambam files (probe) from MR Bean. I have Microsoft xp service pack 2, and installed MS Net Framework1.1 and hotfix kb886903 and NET Framework 2.0 with security update. I can install Cambam and get the program to start, looks normal. And after that i downloaded files from MR Bean probcambam and try to opend it but only receive an Error message:There is an error in the MXL-document (14,55).
    and a code is diffrent from file to file. I have tried the other way to install the cambam with no luck. I have two computers and thay behave in the same way, same Error. What do i do wrong please help me i really want to make the probe. And for extra info i cant load any file.

    Thanks Magnus



  18. #38
    Registered 10bulls's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Magnus View Post
    And for extra info i cant load any file.
    Bit of a stab in the dark, but it may be related to regional settings (loading DXF files will also have problems). Can you try changing your decimal character to '.' rather than ',' and see if that helps.



  19. #39
    Registered 10bulls's Avatar
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    Eureka! I think we've cracked it!!!

    The "One Penny" Touch Probe

    This probe took me a few hours to make, using pretty simple stuff and has been continuously scanning for 2 days now (90,000 cycles), without any glitches.

    It's only a wobbly prototype but can resolve down to about 0.01mm.
    Some surface mount bits turned up today so I'm going to build a Mk II version using a milled pcb and some other improvements MrBean and I are contemplating.

    I also happen to have had dumped on me several acrylic sheets some builder was chucking out in some assorted (day glo) colours. I think that'd look pretty cool, especially a 3 LED version :rainfro:

    Oh well,

    enjoy!

    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Who want to make a touch probe?-kiwi-jpg   Who want to make a touch probe?-1p-probe-jpg  


  20. #40
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    Yeh. Forget "Intel inside", this should be badged "Electronics Outside".



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