Re: Automatic tool changing ?

[Jon Elson <jmelson-at-artsci.wustl.edu>]

Jon Elson wrote:

> Max Heise wrote:
>
> > Hi Jon,
> >
> > > Well, I don't think this is completely implemented.  but, there are c++ routines
> > > in there now for xxToolChange.cc and such, that add some new states and
> > > variables to EMC.
> > Where do I have to look for xxToolChange.cc ? Using a combination of find piped
> > to grep I haven't even found the word "toolchange" at all. And I was searching
> > case insensitive.
>
> OK, I may be imagining it, I confess I didn't look it up.  But, I'd swear there
> was a beginning stub of code to take tool change requests.  I will have the
> EMC machine up this weekend, and will poke around and see if it shows up.
> There are a whole bunch of stubs that have been added over time, for
> machine control functions.  There is stuff for automated lubing, and pallet
> changing, and stuff that is going to be very machine dependent.  There are
> for the most part just stubs or templates to be properly filled in for specific
> machines.

No, I DIDN'T imagine it.  At least in the 20-Dec-1999 release of EMC, in
the subdirectory src/emcio there is a file bridgeporttool.cc, which has a
general interface to a tool changer.  I don't know how fully implemented
this code is, I didn't study it extensively, but there is something like 10 pages
of code there.  There is a lot of stuff having to do with spindle motor control
and lube systems, I don't know if that is just interlocking these functions
or these functions need to be merged together because they all control
digital I/O bits on the same interface.  But, there definitely is some substantial
chunk of code having to do with automatic tool changers.

Jon