Any chance of being able to use IF, THEN, GOTO, DOWHILE etc etc?
Does anyone else have any uses for these or is it just me??

That is a major job and will not happen... There is VB and I can help you with that

Hi Brian,
Thanks for the reply, I'm really keen to be able to use parametric programming. Where should I start to be able to use it?
The main one I would use is as follows.

#100=4 (No. of Repetitions)
N10
 IF[#100 EQ 0] GOTO10
PROGRAM
#100=[#100-1]
GOTO10
N20

And also DOWHILE as per below.

#100=4 (NO OF REPEPTITIONS)
WHILE [#100 GT 0] DO1
G01 X100. F1000
#100=[#100-1]
END1

Thanks.
Darc

You can do that this way :-

O1000
(MAIN PROGRAM)
G00 X0 Y0 Z0
M98 P1001 L4 (JUMP TO SUB PROG 4 TIMES)
M30

O1001
(SUB PROGRAM)
G01 X100. F1000.
.... Etc
M99

Graham.

I was hoping to use the IF or the DOWHILE function, so I can have calculations inside the program, so it's smart enough to work out various things and jump backwards and forwards when neccesary with the GOTO command.

Use the Force! (VB)

It is not as bad as you think... For example

Code"X" & Xpos & " Y" & Ypos

This will output a line of Gcode with whatever you have Xpos and Ypos set to

Sorry for the slow response, I've been away on holidays.
BTW, it would be used for a cut off machine.

I was thinking of having a program much like below, is it possible to have it attached to a button?
e.g when I push the button with 20mm on it, it will run the below program?
e.g when I push the button with 16mm on it, it will run the below program but with 16.0 in the variable #1?

;Y0.0 is always the centerline of the bar of steel
#1=20.0   ;Variable Bar Ø
#2=[#1/2]
G90 G55 G21
G00 Y[#2+1.0] ;Rapid into 1.0 away from job
G01 Y[#2-[#2*2]-1.0] F300 ;Cuts in to -11.0 (½Ø + 1.0 further)
G00 Y300.0 ;Pulls away from the job
M30

If the answer is no, please feel free to explain how I would go about using VB scripts instead.
Thanks.
Darc

Darc,
You can do this, its simple.
I can think of two ways.

1. If you are always using the same diameters (for example 10 different diameters), do a screen (or wizard) with 10 buttons, each with the VB code for each diameter, so you will have a button for 20mm, a button for 16mm, and so on and so forth. You will have to use the sintax required to run a gcode in VB.

2. If you have a large number of diameters and it is prohibitive to have a button for each, make a screen (or wizard) , with a DRO in which you can input the diameter of the bar you want to cut. then Just have a button that reads that DRO and inserts it in the #1 variable you proposed.

Hope that gets you started.
Regards
Fernando

Thanks fer mayrl, I just made up a quick screen, I placed multiple buttons on it, with different sizes on each of them.
Could you please give me an example of the syntax I would need to run an G code program from VB?
Thanks

From the top of my head I beleive its like the following:
for a 20mm bar following the program you posted

CODE "G90 G55 G21"
CODE "G00 Y11" ;Rapid into 1.0 away from job
CODE "G01 Y-11 F300" ;Cuts in to -11.0 (½Ø + 1.0 further)
CODE "G00 Y300.0" ;Pulls away from the job
CODE "M30"

basically the syntax is the following:

CODE "whatever Gcode you want"

You can add variables to this syntax like this

#1=GetOEMDRO( DRO number) ;whatever DRO you put in the screen, lets say you put a 10 in that DRO
FEED=GetOEMDRO( DRO number); whatever DRO you pout on screen for inputing the feed rate, let say you put a 300 in that DRO
CODE "G01 y" & #1 "F" & FEED

this woudl simulate the following line
G01 y10 F300

Hope that gets you started
Fernando