General

In general, a user of OreTek never need worry about manufacturing parts other than orthotics, so if your eyes start to glaze over, you're on the wrong page. The generic operator of OreTek need only press F5 to load a job, and the delete to delete it when complete.

Finding edges

First and foremost, if you've run the program for the first time, disable the spindles during edge finding. If you've made a mistake, this way you wont have to replace the wires for the edge finder. Almost as important, check your edge finder to make sure it hasn't somehow bent, or like the #307-3436 part, is not actually true. This test is done by manually moving the router head to an indicator, and then rotating the shaft. If this test isn't done, any error can double as the edge detector is used on the part.

The edge finder is a retrofitted edge finder #893-1978 from Enco capable of finding edges along all 3 axis and is inexpensive, but it's easier to replace the edgefinder itself than to rerun wires. One minor issue is that sometimes the battery spring internally somehow misses the battery. It's a simple matter to tell if it works, simply by touching the collet wrench to it and to the body of the micromill. If it lights up, it works. Be sure to refer to the offset chart to improve the accuracy of cutting depth. Typically, I start any command 0.1" above the part, and add the offset to make it simple in terms of defining my depth of cut.

Plan your cuts

When milling using standard endmills, it's generally a much better idea to change depths off of the part, where possible. When boring an outside radius', if practical, plan a larger radius such that the cutter doesn't plunge into the part. Although the Micromill software can detect obvious errors such as invalid numbers, it presently does not have the ability to anticipate movements that would collide with the part in an unexpected way. For this reason, and when moving into areas deeper than the surrounding area, plan vertical travels to clear other areas of a part to me manufactured. For this reason, the Bore, Drill, Face, and Facep1p2 commands always return to their initial altitude. While the home could home all axis concurrently, the spindles are done seperate in order to clear any part in progress without moving X and Y.

Material and tool specific configuration options

For different types of materials, there is a limit of how much a tool can cut. There are 2 variables that work to adjust for material. Dinc controls the depth increment, or how deep to cut in a pass. Additionally, Xystep controls the stepover per pass, for the bore and face runs. While dinc has a large effect on chipload, xystep does as well. For simplicity, and when performing repeated tasks, such as boring and facing, it's not necessary to write a complicated set of codes to do so. Simply define your stepover (xystep), depth increment (dinc) and go.