We know you’re anxious to take your CNC machine for a spin, so we’ll get straight to the key configurations. If you haven’t opened Mach3 yet, double-click the Mach3Mill icon on your desktop. You’ll see a screen similar to Figure 18-1 appear. The Reset button will be flashing, and you’ll see a large collection of readouts. There aren’t that many configurations you’ll need to perform, and we’ll walk you through each of them.
Ports and Pins
Click the Config menu in the top-left corner of Mach3 and select Ports and Pins. A window like the one in Figure 18-4 will open, with the Port Setup and Axis Selection tab selected
Figure 18-4. The Port Setup and Axis Selection tab of Mach3
The only setting you really need to be concerned about on this screen is the Port #1 box in the upper-left corner of the window. Look at the value for Port Address. In Figure 18-4, the value is 0x378— it’s a hexadecimal value. You need to make certain that this value matches the port value for your parallel port. To do this, open the Device Manager (in Windows), expand the Ports listing, right-click the LPT port, and select Properties. The port value should also be 0x378. If it isn’t, change the value for Port Address to match your LPT port’s value.
Motor Outputs
Next, click the Motor Outputs tab, as shown in Figure 18-5. Verify that the X Axis, Y Axis, and Z Axis rows
all have a green check mark in the Enabled column.
Figure 18-5. Verify that the three axes are all enabled.
Next, change the values under Step Pin# and Dir Pin# as follows:
For X Axis Step Pin#: 2 Dir Pin#: 3
For Y axis Step Pin#: 4 Dir Pin#: 5
For Z axis Step Pin#: 6 Dir Pin#: 7
These values correspond to the terminal port numbers found on the breakout board. Remember back in Chapter 6 when you wired up all three stepper motor drivers to the breakout board in the “Wiring Motor Drivers to the Breakout Board” section. The two wires on the breakout board’s terminal ports 2 and 3 connected to the stepper motor driver for the x-axis motor. The y-axis stepper motor driver connected to terminal ports #4 and #5, and the z-axis stepper motor driver connected to terminal ports #6 and #7. You use the Motor Outputs tab to specify the port numbers that Mach3 will use to communicate with a specific motor.
