AR8 Elite and RhinoCAM?

[srdavids]

Hi all,

My university's shop has 3 CNCs, one of them is the AR8 Elite. The other two use RhinoCAM to postprocess, but the Axiom, as of now, still uses VCarve Pro. We would ideally like to get all of them on the same workflow, but I've been having trouble getting the gcode posted correctly.

My apologies if this is has been covered somewhere, but I've been searching the forums and, while I found some mentions of RhinoCAM, I haven't seen anyone with the same problems.

As of now, when I select the file on the controller and "Run from SD", I get the typical DNC_EXE message when starting a file, but then nothing happens from there.

These are the first few lines of the Gcode I currently get from RhinoCAM using the Axiom Precision CNC file supplied by Mechsoft here:

(Filename: 3_Profiling.cnc)

(2 1/2 Axis Profiling)

N10 M3S20000

N20 G00 X14.708 Y-69.103 Z6.350

N30 G01 Z-6.350 F745.1

N40 G01 X13.889 Y-75.399 F372.5

Any help or nudge in the right direction would be much appreciated, thanks

[Axiom Tool Group]

When you select the file to run from the SD memory, the machine would be expected to go to the front left corner....then lower to the safe height and wait there.

You should then see a flashing red light on the controller and when you press the left arrow key the job should begin.

[srdavids]

Sorry if my original post was unclear. I have run this many times posting from Vcarve, so I understand what is supposed to happen. The problem is that it does nothing when I attempt to run the RhinoCAM generated gcode.

[gerry]

Look at the gcode headers of a Vcarve and Rhino file......

[srdavids]

Yes, theyre different. Have you had luck getting it to work? If so, what do I need to change? I'm only familiar enough to with Gcode to know what I'm looking at, but I haven't done post processor editing outside of some really basic changes.

[trung999]

srdavids, I think you need a RhinoCAM post processor written for Axiom. If you don't use Vectric (I don't) getting a good pp can be a challenge. You might want to reach out to one of our members, germanguitars, who uses RhinoCAM. If you get a good pp you might want to post here for future RhinoCAM users.

[srdavids]

Thanks Trung, I'll try messaging him. RhinoCAM does have a postprocessor titled Axiom Precision CNC, which I link to above. That's why I'm a bit stumped on why I'm having issues.

I'm awaiting verification on MecSoft's forums, but they dont seem to be as active as these, and I was hoping someone here had success with this workflow

[Axiom Tool Group]

The MecSoft post processor may have been made for the RichAuto controller used on all Axiom machines other than the Elite models.

Since the Elites use a HUST controller, the post processor requirements are different. Unfortunately, this controller is virtually unheard of...so those posts are seldom found.


However, as part of an update....we recently returned from a trip to Taiwan where we met with HUST. We have discussed creating a small piece of translation software, where you would simply save the tool-paths using a very widely known and recognized gcode format like Seimens or Fanuc....and then that gcode could be ran through this translation software to convert it to the proper HUST language.

Its an extra step, but something that is often done with larger industrial machines. Which is where the idea was born from....our large SCM machine uses something very similar to compile the proper gcode for the control.

Hopefully this will alleviate the need for so many different posts for these controllers. Unfortunately since HUST is developing that piece of software, we will largely have little idea of when it will become finally available.