Carves start too high

Easel Accessibility
1

Hello All… I have an X-Carve 750 x 750, X-controller, Win-10, Homing Switches, No z-probe (yet). I’ve only had it up and running for a few days. i have tried to make a few simple carves with easel. When I Home the machine its a little off of the little circle deal in the bottom corner of the waste board by a couple mm. Anyway when I hit carve the machine spends a half hour milling air on top of my stock. Don’t get me wrong, it milled the hell out of that air, but I really would like it to skip that part and get straight to milling wood. I am also familiar with fusion 360 so I did a design in that and sent it through via UGCS and had the exact same result…(scratches head). I’ve been trying to figure this out out on my own for the last 4 days straight. I’ve read every post I could find and have tried everything I found with no luck. Any help would be much appreciated.
Thanks,
Mike

3

Are you setting your Z zero position to be on top of the wood? You should set it so that you bit is touching the top of the stock, set Z zero, and then start carving.

1 Like
4

Yup I set the z on top of the wood.

5

Will do on adjusting the switches and Ill look into the Triquetra 3 axis probe.

7

ok how do i do that?

8

How are you setting the bit on top of the wood? Are you manually moving the router in place by turning the ACME rod or are you jogging the machine using Easel and/or UGCS?

So, my setup routine (without using my 3-axis plate) is:

  1. Power on the Xcontroller
  2. Home the machine using UGCS/Easel (the Z will be at the top of the axis from homing)
  3. Using the jog controls, move the X and Y close to the corner of my workpiece (I use large steps to get close to position)
  4. Using the jog controls, move the Z down close to the board, leaving some space between board and bit to allow for X and Y movement.
  5. Using small increment values for jogging, jog the X and Y on to the corner of the board
  6. Using small increment values for jogging, jog the Z axis down until the bit touches the tip of the board
  7. Set home/work position in Easel or set X/Y/Z zero in UGCS.
  8. Jog the Z axis up enough to attach the dust boot
  9. Hit Carve in Easel or send the Gcode file in UGCS

I might have missed something but that is the type of detail we’d need to be able to help you figure out what’s going wrong.

9

Ok gotcha…

  1. Power on the Xcontroller Check
  2. Home the machine using UGCS/Easel (the Z will be at the top of the axis from homing) Check
  3. Using the jog controls, move the X and Y close to the corner of my workpiece (I use large steps to get close to position) Check
    4.Using the jog controls, move the Z down close to the board, leaving some space between board and bit to allow for X and Y movement.Check
    5.Using small increment values for jogging, jog the X and Y on to the corner of the board Check
  4. Using small increment values for jogging, jog the Z axis down until the bit touches the tip of the board Check
  5. Set home/work position in Easel or set X/Y/Z zero in UGCS Check, Did it in Both
  6. In Easel it raises up before you can carve, and in UGCS it raises up off of Z and stays up.
  7. Hit Carve in Easel or send the Gcode file in UGCS Check…Then Beat Head against wall in frustration!!! lol…
10

Settings within Easel for Z-axis rod (Lead screw)? Within machine setup did you select the correct one Acme or 8mm?

11

Post the first 20 lines of your G-code file here.

12

Yes Acme.

13

Here you go,
G90G94
G17
G20

(TOOL/MILL,0.125,0,0.5,0)
(STOCK/BLOCK,8,8,0.75,0, 0, 0)
M9
T1M6
S20000M3
G54
M9
G0X3.9732Y4.7043
Z0.95
Z0.8294
G1Z0.7225F20
X3.9727Y4.7039Z0.7186
X3.9713Y4.7028Z0.7152
X3.9695Y4.7007Z0.7124
X3.968Y4.6976Z0.7106
X3.9674Y4.6938Z0.71

14

Here is what it looks like in UGCS

Screenshot.jpg1907×1068 184 KB

16

Im using the f360-easel. Ive tried generic grbl also. Is there something else I should use? Are we on to something???

17

Yeah, you have problems here.

Suggest you remove the T1M6 when using grbl.

This says that you are going to raise Z about 2.5 inches and then start carving. That what you see?

18

Yup thats whats happening.

19

removed it…same result

20

I’m not familiar wit GCode…yet… but do lines 12 and 13 look like the culprit?
G90G94
G17
G20

(TOOL/MILL,0.125,0,0.5,0)
(STOCK/BLOCK,8,8,0.75,0, 0, 0)
M9
S20000M3
G54
M9
G0X4.0268Y4.6832
Z0.95
Z0.8294
G1Z0.7225F20
X4.0273Y4.6836Z0.7186
X4.0287Y4.6847Z0.7152
X4.0305Y4.6868Z0.7124
X4.032Y4.69Z0.7106
X4.0326Y4.6938Z0.71
Y4.6984F35
X4.0312Y4.707
X4.0272Y4.7148
X4.0211Y4.721
X4.0133Y4.725
X4.0046Y4.7263
X3.9954
X3.9867Y4.725
X3.9789Y4.721
X3.9728Y4.7148
X3.9688Y4.707

21

That was just a side issue.

Your CAM program, is where the problem is. It is generating G-code that causes the problem you are having. I’m not familiar with the software you are using, but that’s where your problem is.

Maybe someone else here can help with that.

22

Ohhh Im using Fusion 360

23

What thickness workpiece?

It might be that your coordinate origin for your CAM setup is different than your work origin. Fusion let’s you select the corner for the origin. If you have the origin at the bottom, it’s assuming you zero off the waste board and not the workpiece.

You can also have Fusion remove the M6 line by telling it the bit is a manual change.