try to communicate this way instead of YouTube

[bluestang123]

@swolebro So I have tried to write this like 7 times in YouTube which for some reason will not post this.. Crazy how terrible YouTube is when it comes to comments. I tried to Fork the github and make comments as I went. I was hoping you could see all that... https://github.com/bluestang123/swolebro-youtube https://github.com/bluestang123/swolebro-youtube/pulls I did request a pull request from you but I really have no idea what I am doing as I am learning GITHUB as well for the first time. I do plan on posting all my code, ini, hal, 3d prints etc. on GITHUB so that everyone can use what they need. I want to give back as much as I can to the community that made it possible for me to make a machine in my garage. I will change the code beginning notes in the code right now. Thanks again for all your work!!! I haven't tested this on a live plasma yet of course and I still need to make an enclosure for the parts I put together hardware wise.. But honestly that is a much easier task then starring at a bunch of code you have no idea what it does lol... I can model in cad way better then I can code today anyways. Great videos though!! Really helped me work through what all I did wrong and how I eventually got to the right stuff displayed!! I am not sure if this is the best place to communicate with you but I hope this at least get's to you.

[swolebro]

Aha, now I'm seeing your fork of my project. When you posted your videos earlier, I was looking at your copy of the file in your bluestang123/plasmacnc project, which you had in some of your video descriptions. That one appeared to be printing the wrong variables to the LCD, hence why you saw the constant "14" being displayed.

Your current file in your fork looks good though, and seems to work by what I saw in this video of yours. Is there anything else you need help with?

And yes, GitHub is much better than YouTube when it comes to tracking comments, even if some of the git stuff is difficult to learn. Once it starts to click, you see why programmers like it so much.

With your fork, since you've got your work in a separate branch, you can overwrite the thc.ino file that I wrote with your own. There's no reason to have your own copy named Arduino INI file. Edit the file in place, then use git checkout master and git checkout bluestang123-patch-1 to swap back and forth between the two versions, and git diff master bluestang123-patch-one thc.ino to quickly show you all the changes in that one file between the two branches.

Doing a git checkout master; git merge bluestang123-patch-1 would then take all the changes you did in your working branch and put them into your default master branch. If you wanted me to accept those changes in the default of this repo, then that is when you would use the pull request here on GitHub, which basically gives us a place to discuss changes and gives me an easy button to merge from your project into mine.

This website really has the best guide to working with git, btw. If you can read and understand chapter 2 in that guide, then you are at least as well off as 90% of software engineers.

My apologies for the slow response here. I did see this message earlier, but I was moving this week, so I was too busy to sit down and type anything... I vaguely remember you mentioning you were in FL in one of your videos. Whereabouts? I am now officially a Florida Man as well, and it's already 1000x better than where I left.

[bluestang123]

Sorry life in general gets in the way of steady work in the garage. I meant to get back to you sooner. So I will speal a little hear and hopefully you find it interesting verses a bother. I am still struggling to get my machine to move the distance I tell it too. So when I do get to work on the machine, most of the time it is that problem i am trying to figure out. I did finish my 3d printed box to hold the Torch Height control. I ended up running 24 volts from my sensor power supply to the box and then using a buck converter to get down to 7 volts input to the VIN and also power a 5 volt step down board for the reference voltage. I could not get away from the jumping voltage no matter how big of capacitor I used. So I ended up changing the floats to INT's and we will see how that goes. I found out too this weekend my second Parallel port board had the wrong cable input so I had to order a female to male instead of my male to male (sadly there are no electronics Brick and Mordor's anymore that would sell these cables. So I am just able to make it move and see my limit and 4 home switches and I have my E-stop wired to pin 15. I have my second board controlling my up and down signals as well as ark ok input that technically is not wired up yet (still working on how to show that signal without frying the bob board input). I will read up on the get hub docs and try to get the fork correct too; sorry its not as fast as I probably should be doing that. But hopefully if the INT's work I will also update that code one last time and include the wiring diagram and my buck converter and my voltage drop board for other folks to have as options. But it is crazy how sensitive that analog input is. Hopefully my harbor freight plasma won't interfere anymore either when I actually fire it up. But that is part of the fun. Currently I am using a Chinese uno too. So I live in central Florida off the I-4 corridor between Orlando and Tampa. That's probably the most I want to say on the public forum. If your close by we can figure out how to do a private message with one of these social media outlets as I would love to have ya check out my projects or vise a versa. So right now I have the cable in the mail and I am trying to work out how to get the most speed out of my machine at the same time trying to get it to go the right distance i command it too. I also just found out last night my isolator board will not work with my limit switches so I ordered a 4 pack of relays with iso's on them. Hopefully that will work fine with my PNP's. The goofy board works when only one of the 4 sensors is tripped and as soon as a second one trips the board stops sending through any signals, like it is shorting to ground or something internally. Frustrating but I am almost finished with the electronics and then when finished with the speed and acceleration issues I will be able to upload Plasma C and really start experimenting with cutting some metal. But I have to get that right first. Right now I am reading a ton of forums on what others did to calibrate. I again appreciate all your help and the videos you made; definitely makes this a very doable project for sure for me as i am not a software guy, but I am learning little by little.

now lets see if these pics upload

[bluestang123]

[swolebro]

Huh, nothing is jumping out at me with the StepConf wizard screenshot. When you do, eg. G1 X10, how far does it end up moving instead? Only think I can think of offhand is that you might not be setting RS274NGC_STARTUP_CODE in your INI file. There should be a G20 somewhere in there, to set everything in freedom units. Otherwise, you might only be moving 1/2.54th of the distance.

For the analog input being spazzy, are you talking about for the potentiometer when adjusting the setpoint on boot? Yeah, those cheap little ones can be finicky. Honestly, where I did take a small rolling sample of those values, the comparison I did here was probably too strict:

https://github.com/swolebro/swolebro-youtube/blob/master/arduino/thc/thc.ino#L146

If there's more than 0.1V worth of variance in the setpoint value (expressed as a float), then your arduino will get stuck in an infinite loop on boot. Probably could have added some leeway in there.

It looks like GitHub has gotten rid of its messaging feature. Same as YouTube. In either case, you're not too too far, so it'd be cool to see another build. I do have a Gmail for "swolebroshopworks" (you know, just that@there.com), so if you send me your phone we can coordinate further. Just mention it here when you email there, since that inbox otherwise goes 100% unchecked.