Joystick Control

[Sanghera]

Hi all,
I was looking around in the garage and I found and old joystick. And then I thought, is it possible to control a CNC machine with one of these? I think I have seen it before. Does anybody know if you can use a joystick to controll the motors. It may not be so usefull for a Router, but if you had a robotic arm or something it would be so cool.
Thanks.

[broncosis]

I have some old code for controlling a printer port
via joy stick some where but I didn't write
it was a joint thing we used for out printer port interface
back in highschool

hmm I think I just found my break out board
I may have a use for this thing after all

if you want the code just shoot a pm and I'll send it to you
pretty easy stuff we did it in grade 10 like 8 years ago

[ynneb]

If you use Mach2 it will enable you to use a joystick, or a gamepad, or other controllers.
It will enable you to set the buttons to do many different things.

[Sanghera]

The Mach2 Breakout board or the software?
Thanks.

[ger21]

The software supports all that stuff, but you'll have to wire it all up yourself.

[Sanghera]

You mean I can use the same port for my joystick, in the computor, and the software will take the signals from the joystick, and send them to the driver? Without any additional boards?
Thanks.

[ynneb]

You mean I can use the same port for my joystick, in the computor, and the software will take the signals from the joystick, and send them to the driver? Without any additional boards?

Yes.


You can download Mach2 from here http://www.artofcnc.ca/
This will give you a trial version that will alow you to use 100 lines of gcode. If you wish to purchase Mach2 it will cost you 150 bucks.
Dont feel you will only be purchasing a joystick controller. Mach 2 is a complete program for interpreting Gcode and then sending signals to your driver cards. You need a program like this anyway, to make your whole CNC thing work.

[Sanghera]

Would you be able to cut a circle with a joystick, or is it strictly up down, side to side and back and forth?
Thanks.

[ynneb]

Would you be able to cut a circle with a joystick, or is it strictly up down, side to side and back and forth?
Thanks.

No. Not unless you are the world champion at playing playstation games. (Lots of hand to eye coordination) The joystick is mainly used for jogging the machine into position. I guess you could do some scribble cuts if that was what you needed.

[Sanghera]

Oh, so you could just jog the machine to what you want as your home (start) position, if that is correct?
So, the joystick does have the capability to run the multiple motors at once and not one at a time eh?
Thanks.

[strat]

i just picked up on the prg . works great i have an old suncom joystick i use on it its an F15-Talon has 3 axis 2 which are programable to keystroke so full control from the stick the one thing i wanna do is get one of the buttons programmed for the spindle on /off

[Hobbiest]

Check out what Dave has to say about it at www.buildyouridea.com