Cycle Steel on Fuji XP141

When we first got our XP1’s the cycle steal was on a schedule. We would have boards running good and then start placing off in the middle of a run. We finally noticed that the cycle steal had run just prior to the parts being misplaced. We have turned it off on our machines.

We are now discussing the possibility of turning it back on. The biggest issue is making sure you have the correct Fuji chips in the holder for the cycle steal. We were using any resistor for our cycle steal chips. That was what caused the placement to be off.

The biggest worry of turning on the cycle steal, after years of having it turned off, is the possibility of having to correct all of our placements on each machine. If you are having portability problems moving programs from machine to machine, you may want to turn it back on.

BR Bill

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> Does anyone have info on the "Cycle Steel" > function on the Fuji XP141 machines. I am new to > the industry and have not had any luck finding > information on it. I talked to Fuji and they > just tell me to leave it on, it will help with > placement. We have quite a few of these machines > and have it turned off because we didn't have the > chips to run it. Now I would like to know if it > is worth our time to turn it back on. Has anyone > had experience good or bad using it? Would you > recommend using it? Do you use it on auto, or on > a set schedule? Does it help the machine keep a > zero reference point? Does it reduce the > frequency of the machines needing > calibrations? Your help is greatly appreciated.

My recommendation is buy the parts and run cycle steel. The parts are relatively cheap and headaches more expensive. You don't want to have to consider if this is (or not) your placement problem. Start by removing all problems you have control of, then deal the ones you don't.

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