I am new to CNC, program computers for a living, and do woodworking in my spare time. One of the first projects I’d like to do with the X-Carve is to trace an existing piece of carved wood moulding using a touch probe and replicate it.
I’ve seen a few touch probes on the market that claim compatibility with Mach3 and LinuxCNC (I would probably use one or the other with the X-Carve). Is it possible to wire a touch probe to your controller? Will you offer a touch probe as an accessory?
Thanks …
Welcome @GeorgeWesolowski we are glad to have you here.
We do have a touch off probe in the works. On this thread @BartDring talks about it and shows a picture in the sneak preview
Homing cf. Tool Length Setting
Another way to do it would be to take a picture and trace it in a program like Inkscape or Adobe Illustrator.
Zach, thanks for the reply and the welcome. It’s great to get a reply directly from the CEO!
As someone who will use the machine primarily for woodworking, I would use a touch probe for 3D tracing of small carvings. The one’s I’ve seen have the electrical contact(s) within the probe itself so it can be used to “touch off” on a non-metallic surface. You then run a tracing routine which visits every x,y point in the piece and uses the probe to get (and record) the depth at each point.
I’ve never even considered a software solution to tracing but that definitely seems viable as well.
I am going to play around with both methods when I get my machine (order placed).
There’s lots of good information on this site and I am looking forward to getting going with the X-carve, and participating in the forum. Thanks again …
This is a set up from Brian Oltrogge that he made up for his CNC machine. He posted the free plans on cnczone.
Here is a link to the forum post:
http://www.cnczone.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-146212.html
And here is a post to his design plans for the probe he created.
http://www.grunblau.com/brian/downloads/cncdigitizingprobe.pdf
It would be big for this machine but basically just scale down the design.
Hey zach, any update on the touch probe?
No, not a Z touch plate. A 3D Touch probe, like the original guy was asking about. To trace/scan in items to your CAD software. Similar to the he one Shark makes.
No, a 3D Touch probe/scanner.
What Zach was referring to in his post is a touch off probe (what most call a Z probe).
What you’re looking for, from a GRBL perspective, is possible but would need a separate piece of software to work. You’re essentially trying to create a model from a carving.
In my opinion, you’d be better off using a laser measuring device to analyze the surface. I feel like you could snap some digitizing probes if feed rates aren’t controlled properly or with certain geometries.
