Principle Of Operation; Software Concept; List Commands And Control Commands - Scanlab RTC 4 Installation And Operation Manual

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Principle Of Operation

4.1 Software Concept

Figure 3 shows a simple laser marking sample
The image is made up of straight line segments or
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vectors. The RTC 4 software driver provides a set of
jump commands and mark commands for drawing
such vector images. Each of these commands
describes one vector. The RTC
provides arc commands for producing circular arcs.
Additional software commands are available for
controlling the laser during the marking process.
Mark Mark
Mark
A laser marking sample
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The RTC 4 processes the commands it receives and
precisely transmits the required marking signals to
the scan head using a pre-defined 10 µs time raster
and to the laser. The scan head's galvanometer
scanners accurately position their deflection mirrors
in synchronization with the incoming control signals.
The control signals are transferred to the galva-
nometer scanners digitally in accordance with the
industry standard XY2-100 (or for optical data
transfer in accordance with the XY2-100-O protocol).
Current scan head status information can be queried
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via the RTC 4, also in accordance with the XY2-100
(or XY2-100-O) protocol.
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The RTC 4 provides various analog and digital signal
outputs freely available for tailoring laser control to
customer-specific requirements. The customer
assumes responsibility for use of these signals.
(1) In this manual, laser marking is mentioned only as an example
of the many possible laser materials processing applications.
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RTC 4 PC Interface Board
Rev. 1.3 e
4 Principle Of Operation
(1)
.
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4 software driver
Mark
Mark
Jump
Mark
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List Commands And
Control Commands
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The RTC 4 command set consists of
control commands and list commands.
Control commands are executed immediately.
They are used for controlling execution of lists and for
setting some general parameters. Other control
commands are provided for direct laser and scan
head control.
Before a list command can be sent to the RTC
list must be opened via a control command. List
commands sent to the RTC
executed immediately, but stored in a list buffer. Only
after the list is closed and started, the RTC
the commands from the list buffer and processes
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them in real time. The RTC
buffers. Each list buffer can hold one list ("list 1" or
"list 2") with up to 4000 list commands. If an
application needs only one list, then the RTC
entire memory can be treated like a single list with a
capacity for 8000 commands. In this case, list 1 can
be loaded with up to 8000 commands (but list 2
must not be used). This also makes possible the use
of structured programming.
List commands include jump commands,
mark commands and arc commands, as well as
commands for setting various scanning parameters
such as laser power, jump speed and marking speed.
Some commands exist in two versions: as a list
command and as a control command. Among these
dual-version commands are the I/O commands.
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All RTC 4 commands are described in detail
in chapter 10 "Commands And
An overview is provided in
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4, a
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4 afterwards are not
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4 reads
4 provides two list
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4's
Functions".
chapter 10.1, page 69.
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