EMC Sherline MaxNC

[fguden]

Hi everyone,

Fresh out of trade school here. I have a couple questions about EMC.
I'm considering buying a small mill that can interface with EMC and other programs to do 3d surfacing on Jewelry models and rings which will need 4th axis support. Since EMC comes with sherline, I've been trying to find out if EMC works on MaxNC mills also. The only reason why i'm also considering the maxnc is because I need the scanning probe. So here are my questions:

1. Does EMC work on Maxnc?
2. Does EMC take all MCAM gcode?
3. Can EMC do 4th axis?
4. How does sherline compare to Maxnc?

I'd like any and all information relating to these topics, especially if you have info on 3d surfacing of jewelry.

Thanks

[samco]

I have not experience with either mcam or maxnc. I will answer what I do know.

1). maxnc - This guy (one of emc2 developers) has a maxnc. From what I understand the drivers that come with it are not that great - he made his own driver using the L297-298 chips. http://timeguy.com/cradek/cnc

2). Emc2 uses the nist standard gcode. I have had good luck using fanuc options for posts with minimum mods. http://www.isd.cme.nist.gov/personne...RS274NGC_3.pdf They try to stick to it. lots of info here http://wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/emcinfo.pl

3). Emc2 can do 6 axis. You can download the live cd here http://linuxcnc.org/index.php

4). No clue.

[fguden]

Thanks for the info. I'm trying to get a reliable setup with both 4 axis and digitizer. I'm not rich so I have one shot at a good purchase with no extra for custom mods. I tried contacting timeguy through his e-mail a while back, but no reply. Does he have a screen name here?

Thanks

[samco]

He is not on here... but if you get on irc - irc.freenode.net #emc you will probably catch him. He name on there is cradek. He is not on all the time but quite a bit.

You can use the embedded java irc client on the linuxcnc.org site.
http://www.linuxcnc.org/index.php?op...emid=8&lang=en

sam