What does Park do?

CNC Machines Shapeoko 5 Pro
1

I have a S5P and I am using the latest version of CM.
At the end of the day, I send the spindle to the back right corner so that I do not have to wait for the machine to travel to the same corner the next day.
In CM there is a Red STOP button in the lower left of the screen. Clicking on it brings up a popup asking if I want to park the machine.
Most of the time nothing happens when clicking it.
Sometimes the spindle will bump hard against the X and Y stops.
If the machine is near the front and I click stop and say Yes to parking it just sits there and does not go to the back right.

So my question is, what is Park supposed to do?

2

Park moves the machine to the back right corner so it’s quicker to initialize next time you start up.

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To add further clarification, in the current version of CM the machine needs to be idle and you need to be at the “home” screen to trigger the park action. If you hit STOP in the middle of a cut, the machine can’t be 100% sure you didn’t lose steps and so it will not move again unless you re-initialize it.

And I know exactly what you’re talking about with regards to the park action doing nothing, if you hit STOP from say, the Jog screen (even if the machine is not movinig), it drops you to the Home screen with the machine un-initialized. From that state, if you hit Stop again it offers you the option to park, but it actually won’t. I’ll work with Rob on clarifying that language or see if we can improve that behavior.

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4

Rob,

Yes, I can intuit that is what it is supposed to do. However, the behavior does not match the obvious intention.

5

Winston,

As CM is aware if the machine is initialized should not the stop button be stippled out when the machine is not initialized? Offering to Park the machine when it knows it can not seems irrational.

6

The stop button should not offer the suggestion to park if the machine is not initialized. That’s an oversight and the popup ought to be fixed. It’s in the queue and should hopefully be remedied in the next few releases.

7

So I pressed stop today in the carbide motion software (pauze, stop - then red stip that asks if you want to park and turn machine off). CNC parked smoothly, no problems. However, when I turned the machine switch to “off”, my spindle dropped down to the bed… first time this happened. Do I just start it up again as normal?

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8

Yes, the low friction of the HDZ ball-screw will sometimes allow the Z-axis to drop thus.

If this is a problem we have a gas-strut to address this:

I usually put a block of foam under my HDZ.

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9

I have the 80mm. Should be already in there then?!

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Check in with support — depending on when you placed your order the 80mm VFD may not have included the Gas Strut — not sure how that is handled.

11

Thanks will do this via email

12

Just bought the 65mm spindle. I think it would be good for Carbide to suggest this strut. I didn’t even know it existed until I ran across this thread.

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13

the strut only comes into play usually (if you got a craazzzyyy perfect ballscrew and ballnut by chance you will experience it more often maybe) right after re-lubing the machine. The only time I usually go through it unless i bump the machine and i have a bunch of extra stuff on the Z axis, (chip shroud, sweepy, air blast, vacuum hose bracket in 3/4 ply, vac hose)

Long story short a strut is however much $$ but a small block of foam under the park position is like a dollar. The only real exception to this is if you experience frequent power outages or use cutters that cost more than the strut.

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