Wasted Movement While Carving

[davemartin88]

I have a lithograph carving that I created the tap file from Photocarve. I'm using a 1/16" ball nose bit on a 6" wide x 4" wide photo, here's the setup & material size options.



When cutting, after each diagonal line is finished carving, the bit lifts up from the material, presumably to the rapid clearance gap, then moves to the opposite end of the line, then moves back to the opposite end and starts cutting the next diagonal line. The bit is cutting the full depth in one pass but the carving is taking a ridiculously long time moving back and forth before beginning each actual cut.

There aren't that many options in Photocarve to change so not sure why this is happening and hasn't happened before when I've cut other lithos.

Using the CNC Shark (inches) post processor. Here's the first few lines of the tap file, don't see anything that looks like recurring commands to cause the added movements but don't really understand Gcode.



Maybe it's from the control program for the Shark when the feed rate is set before each line? I have recently upgraded to the 2.1 version of the Shark Controller. Don't want to start over since I'm an 2 hours in but may try to load the same file in the 2.0 version later and do an air cut to see if it acts the same.

Thanks in advance for any ideas.

[Ms Wolffie]

I believe that you would get a more knowledgeable answer in the Shark forum.
The Shark has its own quirks that not too many members know here.
http://www.cncsharktalk.com/

[davemartin88]

Good idea, will do that, thanks.

[bill565]

Hi Dave,

Long and short is setting it to the bottom of material is the issue. If you change it to the top, the issue goes away.

I reported on the same and have found a couple of other posts reporting the same thing.

See this thread: http://forum.vectric.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=19047

Bill

[davemartin88]

Interesting on the z setting being a potential source of the problem. Will try an air cut after changing the z to see how it changes. thanks.