Part Works gives varied machining results

[ronbarnes]

First off I should say I bought a 4x8 PRS Standard in August and now put in the PartWorks program. I noticed I now have a problem when I start my machining. Constantly I get a box popping up after loading my file part that says Virtual tools is not recognized or failed but then it will continue through machining program. Then today as I was making a entry door I was going to surface it and only remove .006 from entire surface but the machine plunged to approx .250 to .300 depth, I went back and checked toolbit info and pathing but it read .006. ? Hum,
Later I tried the 3-d business sign that comes with PartWorks and the first few paths went smooth then the z and the x/y axis decided to get jittery and yet stayed on the same cut path but the cut quality was bad and seemed to move out of alignment 1/16" and that is alot in 3-d carving ha. Now I need to see how much my gantry (x-car) might be out of square.
It is almost like it gose through code and machining very smooth then goes through a semi violent siezure and then returns to normal. I did notice that when I changed my cut speed from 2.5 to 3.5 then hit resume that the gantry sped up 3 or so inches then slammed to a halt and continued on slow but, faster than before I inserted the new speed setting.

Help ...anyone?

Thanks Ron Barnes

[gpari]

You have a dust collector hooked up? Is it grounded?

[scottj]

Hi Ronald,
You have the early version of the posts which has been updated now. You should nnot get the message about the virtual tool after you download the new post fix from here: http://www.shopbottools.com/files/InstallTutorial.exe
The other issue sounds like the computer is not keeping up even at the low speeds you have set. If you have not already done so you should get an external USB 2.0 hub and run through that. This will improve your communication to the tool.

Scott