So what am I doing wrong here. While testing drilling some 1/8" 6.35 holes 1.5" inches deep, with a 1/8" bit, it would drill to about 2" inches deep. So I tried a few different things, one of which was switching to mm. The only thing that seemed to have any effect was setting the In/Outside Overcut % lower. So at 95% it looked to drill about 95% of the 1.5" inches. But then I added a second hole and that went straight back to the 2"+ inches. I didn't use any of the other settings etc.. Just what you see in the parameters below. And by my reading, it is suppose to drill to the dept of material thickness at the bit diameter. I saw nothing about "In/Outside Overcut %" having any effect on the Plunge Tool... Any help is greatly appreciated...
Hi I am a little confused, your settings show 1/4" material but you mention trying to drill 1.5" deep. Which one is it? Maybe you can attach your actual files? but firstly, have you read the help? SketchUcam Toolbar Plunge holes can be complicated things so there are a some options to be aware of. Which hole drilling option have you selected, normal or 'quick peck'. It is possible that your Z is losing steps on the way down and using a different option may highlight that. what happens if you turn multipass off? (just run in air rather than trying to drill material like this) secondly, are there any warnings in the Gcode? the common ones look like Code: (PLUNGE Warning: limiting Z to min_z -100.0mm) Z-100.000 F1000 (Warning move Z=-110.0mm LT min of -100.0mm) X18.500 F2000 and that means that your setting for Z_MIN and Z_MAX is less than your material thickness. Read the help about that here SketchUcam - Thing to do After Instal (how this might cause 2" holes in 1.5" material I don't know, but we need to examine the Gcode for warnings Plunge holes default to 'material thickness at overcut% deep'. You can change the percentage for each hole by typing into the edit box at bottom right of the Sketchup screen. Don't forget to press enter after typing the depth. If you need a lot of partial depth holes you can either a - do a separate drawing with just the holes and set the material thickness for that section, then join the Gcode files later. b - create a grid of holes at the % depth you want, then move them to where you need them. Keen to see your files so I can figure this out...
Sorry, that was a quick recreated screenshot on my shop PC. Which brings up one interesting point. Which is that the whole UI isn't visible on the shop monitor there. I only mention this because after playing with on my main PC (in my nice air conditioned office), I noted the "OK", etc. buttons on the bottom there. I haven't been back to the shop to try it out, but all the sims seem to show things working as they should now. I'm thinking that in the heat of my shop, I was changing, or rather, not changing things. And a bit of heat frustration to boot... And yes, thankfully I was only poking air. ;p But that last run poked down past the 2 by 4 I had sitting next to the bit, and on past the 3/4" piece of MDF it was sitting on, and into the bed just as I hit the kill switch... lol And to be honest, I overwrote the files so many times, I'm not certain this file is unchanged from that run. In fact I'm fairly certain it has been changed, because having only now actually took the time to look at it, it looks fine to me. But if you would ignore my stupidity, and give it a quick once over, I'd be grateful.... Thanks..
if your screen is too 'vertically challenged' to see the whole parameters dialog you can do one or more of: adjust the windows screen scaling (something like 'make font smaller' buried in the control panel) until it does fit. learn how to move a window around without a mouse. press ALT-Spacebar, then M. this should put it into move mode , now you can move it around with the arrow keys. press Enter to end the move. so you used the 2x4 to set Z zero at the top of the 2" portion, right? this particular file cuts to ~36mm deep, 95% of 2", no problems at all.
Yea, for some reason, I didn't think anything else was down there. Been a while since I've needed the CNC... Yes, a 2x4 on top of a scrap piece of 3/4" MDF. So around 2.25" inches total to bed. I'm certain I must have altered the plunge setting between the holes by fiddling with the shift key or the parameter settings. I should know by now when it's time to take a break.. Thanks for giving it a once over...
Yep, I'm just gonna chalk it up to heat flustration on my part. Just ran it through a whole 105 (19.05 deep) hole run (poking air), and it ran perfect. Ran in 17:03 with a 200mm straight plunge rate... Thanks for all your help and tolerance...
