Well, this sounds dumb. but my journeyman pro is up, wall mounted, and ready to go. Im looking at the xyz probe and Im thinking…how do I set this on my piece to home the device?
I could use double sided tape. but honestly Im completely dumbfounded on how to properly probe for zero on a vertically mounted CNC.
keep in mind the “home” for the CNC is the bottom right if I look at it head on. so the probe can’t “sit” on the material.
any suggestions?
Can you clamp it in place?
I can, just making sure the clamp won’t affect the probing function. if it doesn’t then yea I could clamp it just making sure I don’t interrupt the probing activity.
If the clamp or clamps are reasonably low profile, and you keep them away from the corner of the probe that has the small engraved probe-target circle, they shouldn’t interfere with probing.
But keep in mind that the Buildbotics controller, for some reason unknown to me, moves the bit at rapid speed to the origin corner of the spoilboard as soon as the XYZ probe is completed. I find that behavior both unnecessary and dangerous, and it has caught me off guard many times. In any case, if you place a clamp at that corner of the probe block, it must be low profile.
good idea. I have an idea no what to do. appreciate the feedback
just an update. I actually just held the probe in place with my hand. I was afraid I would short the signal but it worked fine. kinda of a pain to hold it but all good now. did my first test cut with the test file and it worked perfect.
Hey Patrick,
if one has a pneumatic clamping system, I had the idea that one could make the XYZ probe a probe that adheres to the surface of the workpiece by suction
man now you got me looking at pneumatic clamps!
for the initial probe and my start on the cmc journey Im going to just hold in place for now.
Im wondering if I could just save the XYZ probe settings to always start in the same location for every cut, only having to probe for Z for different thickness materials.
Hey Patrick,
there was an article about pneumatic clamps on CNC machines in German Make Magazine the other day (sorry, paywall and in German, but very interesting!)
German Make Magazine 02/2022
I was looking at some pneumatic clamps from Rockler as well. louder of course because they use a regular air compressor. but much less expensive.
https://www.rockler.com/rockler-pneumatic-clamping-system
I think this could work as a long term solution to create very consistent outputs.
