Tool Numbering

[Joe621]

Greetings

First a little about us we are an in-house sign shop for a Theme park in Florida and until we purchased our Shopbot we would either send the job out to a local vendor our we would band saw and route our dimensional signs.

We installed our 96 x 60 prs alpha back in June or so and after a couple of tweaks and learning curve issues we have been using the bot for several different projects. Last week I had a very simple job of cutting some shapes job looked good in the vcarve preview took it to the cnc and the spindle would not turn on, strange so I tried a different job no problem that job cut fine so I thought it might be a vcarve issue so I reworked the job and again nothing. After racking my brain (what little I have left) I call support and discovered the issue was a new bit that I had added to the tool database in Vcarve Pro and gave it the number of 20 and on the shopbot tool #20 is for a second spindle so the second spindle that I don’t have was turning on. OK I guess that ones on me I have not read all of the programming documentation where they talk about numbering of tools but I assumed that if there were 50 tools available in the Vcarve database I could use all 50 on my shopbot.

So my question is what do you do? I have about 25 bits that I have already used so I can double up and have 2 different bits that have the same geometry but are for different materials but I also have the issue that I will not be the only person designing and running the machine. So what kind of system have any of you come up with to keep it at least a little organized. I don’t want to have several tool databases for Vcarve .

Oh you want may want to know we use everything in our shop. Foamed PVC is the most used but we do use some composite and solid pvc, wood and even aluminum and of course sign foam from 1” to 3 “.
Any help or ideas would be appreciated.

Joe

[GeneMpls]

Hi Joe- I have struggled with that as well. The system I developed is imperfect (http://www.talkshopbot.com/forum/showthread.php?20480-Keeping-track-of-bits-in-Tool-database) but is
the best I have come up with. SB3 still calls out the main number and then I put the number of my tool in the toolpath name ( ie '[t4.6' to designate tool #4.6). It 'kinda' works. Gene

[davidp]

Hi Joe,

I am assuming the tool number to which you refer is the number you assign in the tool toolpath, the Tool number at the bottom of the Edit Tool window. It is for an Automatic tool changer. It is the location of the tool on the tool rack. It is not used as a tool identification other than its position in the rack. By having the tool numbered as 20 you could be confusing the bot. If you do not have an atc you can number every tool as 1 it will make no difference to the ID of the tool. The tool ID is contained in the tool name.

It can get very confusing especially if as we do you have several hundred different tools. You just have to be diligent find a system that works for you and fill in all of the details on the tool data base.

Good luck

David

[Brady Watson]

The tool number is important if you are using the TC_inch or TC_mm posts, or if you have an ATC.


You can find some more info on tool numbering convention in the header of the MTC file...

A) Tools for head one (Z axis) can be numbered from 1 to 19. (ONLY)

B) Tools for head 2 (A Axis) can be numbered from 21 to 29 (ONLY). Using tool number 15 should result in code sent to the Z.

C) 30's, 40's, 50's and 60's are dedicated to drills.



The tool number can be any number in the range for the head(s) in question. Not every tool is going to get its own unique number. You are going to have many tool #1s etc. It takes a little bit of discipline and thoughtfulness when creating toolpaths so that you input valid tool numbers for each head. VCP/Aspire will tell you if you have two tools the same number but different geometry (EG - ball vs v-bit) when you attempt to save them out.

It is easiest to just enter in numbers in the appropriate range dynamically (each toolpath/project) than to have a huge tool database and have to sift through it to find the right number tool...Just pick a system that works for you with the least amount of confusion & stick to it.

-B