Hello everyone, After using Millmage (with CNC Genmitsu 4040 PRO and Windows) for a few weeks, here are some tips/troubleshooting solutions I have found. Please let me know if you have also found any tips and/or if you have encountered the same “problems” as me. Thank you.
- When using multiple bits and a probing macro with a ZProbe probe, I always had tool compensation, even though I did a “Reset TLO” (tool length offset) in the macro. After a long time, I noticed that the G49 (reset TLO) at the end of the probing macro was not taken into account or was deleted by Millmage, which adds the tool length compensation. Therefore, in Millmage, I added a macro that performs a G49 and I run this macro after each probing (Z-probe) and it works.
- It is not possible to “frame” the task if you have several operations and one of the operations is disabled (not in output mode). I click on “framing” and nothing happens (not even a warning message).
- I had a hard time figuring out how to machine with a path that is partially outside the part.
The name of the option (at least in French) in Millmage is confusing. The option is located in ‘Edit’ > ‘Settings’ > ‘Editor Settings (tab)’. You have to disable the “Ignore out-of-bounds shapes if possible” option. In my opinion, this is confusing because I wanted Millmage to ignore the fact that a shape was outside the project, so I enabled this option. However, you actually have to disable it. So there is confusion between “ignore the shape outside” and “ignore the fact that the shape is outside.”
So if you have shapes that are partially outside the project and you still want to machine them, you must disable the “Ignore out-of-bounds shapes if possible” option. - Sometimes it is difficult to position the center of the cutter (bit) perfectly on the origin of the project, especially if the cutter is not conical. Therefore, I position the cutter on the side of my workpiece, inserting a sheet of paper until the sheet is blocked. Then I move the cutter back above the workpiece and offset the spindle by half the diameter of the tool. If the tool is 4 mm in diameter, I offset by 2 mm, but if the tool is 2.5 mm, I cannot offset by 1.25 mm, only by 1.2 or 1.4 (jog step). However, you can offset by exactly 1.25 mm with a GCODE command in the console or, better still, by creating a macro:
G91
G0 x1.25
G90
Admittedly, wanting to machine to 1/100 (mm) is perhaps a little unnecessary as a hobbyist
- When starting the machine, I always perform a homing operation, followed by the command:
G10 L2 P1 X0 Y0 Z0
to ensure that all potential offsets are eliminated. - Please note that there are several places where you can set the units (metric or imperial).
I thought I had found all the locations, but my tools were still in imperial even though I had set everything to metric… until I saw that in the “Move” tab, there is a “Link” option that needs to be activated!