John Fuoco made his design for a limit switch shield for the Arduino open and available to the public. I just got mine hooked up and working today, and man oh man… it so nice to finally have hard limit switches and also be able to home the machine, and use work coordinate systems, and use a Z touch plate… all without NOISE screwing me up!
Check out his post with his design: http://www.shapeoko.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=3045&start=11
I just got mine hooked up also. I setup solid state relays to switch the spindle and shop vac on and off from the g code.
i’ve been considering whether I should do the same… but I kind of like being able to manually turn them on and off… i guess i’m worried i’ll want to cut a file that doesn’t have the commands to turn it on so I’ll be first editing files to manually enter commands and stuff. Any advantages to have them controlled by G-code in your experience?
Its only 2 M codes at the beginning and end. I love it, as the garage is pretty hot in Florida i normally go back in the house, so its saves me going back in to keep checking. I still have to order a push button for the Hold also. If you have a video of your Z touch plate working i would love to see that in action. Cheers