The Matrix control on my Mazak Vertical has a component called an "Intelligent
Safety Shield" that does what you were describing. However, "does" is a bit
misleading, as you have to load a model file that describes the machine, the
table and the "out-of-bounds" areas. And a lot of parameter changing. Depending
on the tool, you may have model files for each one. I had our install tech demo
me a "prebuilt" version and it was quite painful to watch him try and implement
it - not something that could be changed easily. Thus it wouldn't be practical
for collision avoidance with a vise, or to be honest any type of workholding. I
don't know if it's as difficult on the lathe setup (same control), but if you
do both chuck and collet work, changing over from a jaw to collet nose would
require a lot of effort.
I can certainly agree with the request though - the Tsugami lathe I'm almost
done rebuilding to EMC (honestly, though, does it ever get "done"?)....showed
evidence of boring bars or drills slamming into the firewall when someone
didn't pay attention to their extension in regards to another tool (like a
cutoff) on the turret! Those impact marks only showed up AFTER I finished the
nice white paint job, too!
That fact, however is an indication of how difficult implementing this would
be; my turret has 12 stations; there would have to be a collision zone for the
firewall, the chuck/nose, the cabinet sheetmetal, probably 12 axial and 12
radial zones (depending on tool selected) for positive and negative motion, and
a tail or median workholding (steady, etc) if used. That's a lot of continuous
3d to analyze in realtime - that may require more than an old pentium to keep
up with....
The point is you really couldn't (shouldn't) just implement a "little bit" of
safety. If you implement a shield just to avoid the current tool with the
chuck, it doesn't do you any good when a bar in another location slams into the
firewall. It becomes a human problem, not an automation one, as the
operator/programmer will begin to "assume" that since there is a shield, it
will prevent programming or operational errors.
On my Tsugami, I have two sets of ini files, one for my 3jaw chuck, one for my
5c collet nose. The only differences are in their soft limits. So far, that has
seemed to work for me. I've been doing a lot of chuck work, with varying jaw
heights, so I do have the occasional need to change those. I would love to have
a drop-down or manual edit to change the limit variables, though - or quick
profiles instead of exiting Axis, editing, and restarting. To date however, it
hasn't been enough of a bother to worry about. My project of the moment is
graphical tool representation in a panel..... :-)
If I could expand the tool list, I'd love to be able to add at the
per-tool-level, either a "tool profile code" that references another file, or a
set of +/- xyzabc limits (in machine space) that when this tool is selected
become the internal (more restrictive) soft limits. There may be other ways to
accomplish this already, however.
Ted.
Message: 7
Date: Mon, 30 Aug 2010 21:36:57 -0500
From: Daniel Goller<mor...@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Emc-users] Emc2 "Safe Zone" ?
To: "Enhanced Machine Controller (EMC)"
<emc-users@lists.sourceforge.net>
Message-ID:
<aanlktimfjkgsgrr3meqonncvub8gadxfqbhmeb0sq...@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
What additional info would be required to know what I was asking about.
Or is it more "Oh no dude, we know what you wanted, it's just so not
possible, we just don't want to touch this one" :>
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