Hi everyone.
I made a mistake today at work today and if anyone can help it would be greatly appreciated. The machine tool is a Chevalier VMC 2040 with a Heidenhain TNC 410 controller. The machine has a Renishaw touch probe with a connecting cable that you put in and out as required.
I was setting a job using the touch probe. I did a silly mistake and pressed the cycle start button (without realising
) while holding z minus as I approached the workpiece. When I let go of z minus at an appropriate time, the touch probe kept going down, thumbed into the workpiece broke the stylus and jolted the machine to a halt. The error message came up on screen and the machine needed rebooting.
I turned the machine off and then back on again. I never turn the mill off with the touch probe in but I had no choice. When I got to the screen where the machine wants to do it's datum (travel to the limit switches) and pressed cycle start, it carried on feeding down in the z axis instead of lifting up!
I ended up having to turn the machine off and wind the ballscrew manually to lift the z axis to a safe distance. My problem is that I need to do the datum to be able to use the machine! The touch probe being there confuses the controller or something. I have taken out the touch probe but the controller still has the flashing "probe" word on the screen with station 25 active.
Do I disable the touch probe from the parameters? Is there another way?
Thanks for any help.