Optiv 443 Dual Z

[UKCHAMP]

I have a program that uses the camera for most of the measurements. Last week it ran fine, from beginning to end without any problems.
Today it times out on most of the camera measurements. I have to hit the "continue" button to move it along. Any idea what is causing this?

[mckenzie]

are you focusing on each measurement or once at the beginning and letting it run?

[UKCHAMP]

The base alignment is done tactilely, and none of the subsequent camera measurements use focus. Hexagon wrote this program, like I said, it ran through fine last week.

[mckenzie]

its been a while since ive worked with an optive but when ive seen this issue before it was caused by a slight variation in z of the part surface causing the focus to be off just enough to cause problems. you might try focusing on the first feature and seeing if there is a difference in the focal z value compared to the z from the touch probe alignment.

for my part we were measuring a ton of holes in a flat surface. we did an initial alignment with the touch probe and then use the camera to measure the holes. the touch alignment was to the surface of the part but the camera ended up focusing just below the surface because of a slight radius at the top of the hole. the difference was just enough to cause the program to time out.

this might have nothing to do with the issue youre having but its one thing to eliminate

[UKCHAMP]

I'll give that a try, thanks!

[Ego Murphy]

For vision machines it's imperative that the ambient lighting conditions stay exactly the same. I've seen 40+ hours of gage R&R study get thrown out (causing bazillion-dollar delays...) because someone kept turning the room lights off when they left the room during the long programs.


Also as mckenzie pointed out, tiny part variations are actually big variations to the camera. You have to write programs to careful pre-alignments and multiple rough alignments to make absolutely sure the camera focuses exactly where it can see the features.