Back to my original question. Did anyone setup the X-Carve Arduino and what values did you use for Steps, Distance, Feedrate…etc?
I think if we had a simple way to “Flash X-Carve Arduino” with the X-Carve default values, then you would see more people using Estlcam. I personally want a non-cloud based application and Estlcam looks very promising at the moment.
My mount for the dewalt won’t be here until next week, if no one has done this by next week I will do it next week once I have my machine up and running.
Yes - the Arduino more or less just buffers relatively simple motion instructions and makes sure they are executed with µs accuracy.
The computer on the other side is responsible for almost all calculations and makes sure the Arduinos buffer is well fed.
500kbaud are a bit overkill (up to 8000 G01 instructions per second). The reason for choosing this speed is primarily the perfect baud rate divisor @16MHz with 0% error. The divisor for 115200 baud is off by 3.5% which is well outside Atmels 2% recommendation and can cause unreliable connections. I just didn’t anticipate the trouble with some clones and will implement a fallback to 250kbaud and 76.8kbaud soon.
Its an internal development.
I someone provides me with well working settings I’ll add a preset with one of the next releases.
Christian
If i set up my arduino with estlcam can i switch back by following the machine setup in easel?
Or does it take more to go back to the old situation?
I’m pretty sure you’d need to re-flash GRBL.
Yes, you must re-flash the X-Carve version of grbl to go back to using Easel.
So here’s my question to Inventables, can’t you guys just make a machine controller that will jog the machine plus send code to the machine if you didn’t want to use easel. I find easel very nice software but would like quicker access to the machine like in UGS. Just a thought. I think that would bridge the gap from vetric to x-carve very well.
They are working on this with Easel… you will be able to put your g-code from a Vectric app into Easel and it will act as the sender.
I just hope you won’t have to log on then go through the same steps just to get to machine control. This is a huge gap that could be filled by easel but it needs to be much faster. Thanks for the update hope they finish it soon sooooo many of these free programs that have sooooo many bugs.
Hi,
You need to re-flash the Arduino with GRBL.
- Should I try to add a “backup” function with one of the next Estlcam
releases to save and restore the Arduino? - I’m also currently programming a few new features for Estlcams
controller - so if you have some suggestions and wishes for the next release please let me know…
Christian
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Haven’t tried the software yet but the ability to change feed rate after the job was started would be incredible. Backing up the arduino also would be fantastic. Software looks great will be trying it soon. Keep up the good work, I’ve tried a few so far and yours looks the best. The fact that your asking for input is great. Thanks for the code.
That back up feature would be a great tool for people like me (with limited software skills)
in the wiki part of the forum you can find all the standard grbl settings etc. for making a preset.
is there an option for a z axis touchplate?
Yes, backup to be nice and simple for the masses!
Also, on the CAM side, please add the ability to combine multiple options on profiles: tabs, lead-in/start point, and overcuts.
Not sure how hard it would be, but being able to run SVG files that use primitives like rectangles would be nice. I’ve found that they need to be converted to paths for them to come in correctly.
That’s called UGS or chilipeppr.
Well for some reason neither work well. UGS has wasted more bits than easel and chilipeppr can’t complete a circle correctly. Plus UGS won’t stop the spindle after job conpletion. It’s very buggy easel works great all the time when you create your product in it but takes way to much time to get to machine controls for jogging and attempting tool changes.
Hi,
I’ve implemented feedrate override more or less sucessfully but I’m not sure whether it will ever find its way into an official release:
- It can only slow the machine down (and again up to 100%) because it
voids the motion planners precalculations in a time critical situation.
Slowing down is no problem as it just increases the safety margin but
speeding up causes step losses. - At the moment it behaves non-linear and affects higher feedrates more
than lower ones. I may be able to solve this but I’m not sure… - (The 8bit AVR just forces you to use all sorts of tricks and
simplifications - doing 32 bit floating point math several thousand times
per second is just not possible.)
Not yet - but this will be possible in a few weeks.
Tabs and lead-in / start points can’t be combined. Why would you want to do so?
- Lead-in is used if you don’t want to plunge into the material along the
toolpath - but exactly this must happen if you combine it with tabs
unless you want to specify a lead-in and lead-out for every single
segment between the tabs. - Start point and tabs also make limited sense - if you have tabs you
souldn’t need to have to worry about where the cut starts because the
part is held by the tabs.
Overcut on the other hand can be combined with everything else.
Primitives like rectangles are supported but SVG is quite complex and Estlcams input filter unfortunately still not compatible with every file. If you like please send me some sample files to christian@estlcam.com and I’ll try to solve the problem.
Christian
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A couple of thoughts. On the comment about ChiliPeppr not being able to complete a circle correctly, it’s not actually ChiliPeppr that is completing the circle. It’s Grbl that is. so the circle would run the same in any sender like UGS or CP or Easel.
On the feed rate override, there is a really nice feed rate override in the TinyG workspace now in ChiliPeppr. You could possibly go mimic those changes for the Grbl workspace. You’d have to make mods inside the Javascript and in the Serial Port JSON Server.
You can go up and down by any multiplier you want as long as the multiplier generates a valid number your CNC controller can digest. The changes are only made to the lines that are heading into the planner buffer, so a bit different than the comments above where I’m guessing you changed the actual firmware on Grbl.
It would be good to make the fields for the position of the axis to be editable. I’m trying to calibrate the x-carve. I want to set it to a point, tell it to move exactly an amount in one direction, and measure the actual distance travelled. Then I can tweak the settings to make the two match. This is to allow for belt stretch etc. It is possible to do it via using the arrows, but it would be good to be able to type in an exact position.
What I’m trying to do is equivalent to this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vSxFutlfngk
Hi,
you can use the command line to move the machine exact distances:
If you e.g. enter “X10” the machine will travel 10mm (or inch depending length unit setting) to the right.
All available commands are explained if you hover the mouse over the command line.
The X / Y / Z fields are also editable if you like to set a specific value (without actually moving the machine)
Christian
That is partly true, but you’d be surprised how much the 8-bit AVR can do with efficient algorithms. I have to admit that I even had my doubts, but it turned out the math isn’t as intensive as you may think. Most of the floating point calculations can be done a priori (beforehand). Only a few have to be done in real-time.
FWIW, Grbl v1.0 will have full feed and rapids overrides in it’s release. Again, with efficient and smart algorithms, you can do this in a robust manner that even an 8-bit AVR can do.
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