How do I do a manual tool change?

You might find this interesting...
softsolder.com/2010/04/14/emc2-ugliest-t...-probe-station-ever/

Rick G

Thanks, Rick.

I have now implemented a minor variant of this. I'm using two "switches." the coarse switch has a long travel after closure but is only accurate to about .05". It is is a simple bent piece of scrap aluminum sheet ( cut from a Coke can) connected in parallel to the "fine" switch, which is merely a flat piece of clad PCB. the coarse switch gets touched .25" above the level of the fine switch. I set G30 above the coarse switch. The subroutine probes at a modest speed for the coarse switch. when is finds it it moves up .25", over to the fine switch, and down .4", all at modest speed, which puts the tool at .1+-.05 from the fine switch. It then probes down for the switch very slowly. This is a two-line change to each of the subroutines. The original design moves too slowly for comfort but too fast to stop before bottoming out: this design fixes that. All else is as documented in the "ugliest" design, but I feel that using a bent piece of Coke can means that I can now claim the title of "ugliest." My variant yields reproducible results, which makes me think that in the earlier design, each probe was actually displacing the switch downward by a tiny amount.

To the real machinists who counselled against this: This is a learning excersize, and I will probably end up not using it in real life.

To the real machinists who counselled against this: This is a learning excersize, and I will probably end up not using it in real life.

It does not matter, it is the learning process that matters.

I could not be happy until I had managed to get my lathe ATC working completely automatically as was intended.
I learnt a huge amount in getting to that state.

It matters not that I now seldom use it for other than tool choice before starting a program run.
I still have the knowledge I acquired along the way.

regards

Glad you got it sorted out and are having fun.

Rick G

ArcEye wrote:

Hi

"You may also want to look here...
wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?ManualToolChangeMacro"
As per a recent discussion on the users list, this script is now out of date and will not work 'as is' due to changes with the NML file requirement.

Attached is a modified version I made which does work with v2.4 and higher, albeit it is still a little quirky and you need to play with it to get used to it.
(just remove the .txt extension )

regards

Hello,

I've been unable to get this to work on 2.5.3

It hangs while starting LinuxCNC.

The error log shows:
"Waiting for component 'hal_manualtoolchange' to become ready...................................."
"LS.hal:90 hal_manualtoolchange exited without becoming ready"

Any help would be appreciated.

Luke

Hi

It is quite simple, this thread is 1 1/2 years old and emc has been rebranded to linuxcnc since then.

If you ran linuxcnc from a terminal, the errors would immediately show that it could not find the python library emc, because it is now called linuxcnc

This version runs under the master so should work with 2.5.X as well

regards

ArcEye wrote:

Hi
It is quite simple, this thread is 1 1/2 years old and emc has been rebranded to linuxcnc since then.

If you ran linuxcnc from a terminal, the errors would immediately show that it could not find the python library emc, because it is now called linuxcnc

This version runs under the master so should work with 2.5.X as well

regards

Hi ArcEye,

Yes I was already using the file that supposedly had been updated for 2.5

I tried your file, and have the same result. "Waiting for component 'hal_manualtoolchange' to become ready"

Cheers,
Luke

You will have to attach your config, zip the whole folder so it can be run.

The component I attached worked fine when I tested it.

Also start linuxcnc from a terminal and post the output, the error you cite is generic, hopefully the other output will give the full story

regards

Hi ArcEye,

Please see the attached zip. I also started LinuxCNC from the terminal for you to see the error.
I had to press CTRL-C (^C), otherwise it will wait continously. I have tried waiting, but it never gets past waiting for the script to start.

Cheers,
Luke