To the best of my knowledge in Vcarve you have to enter the flat tip in the engraving bits section in the tool data base.
A quick question @RickJohnson : The design image and photo of the cut use two different fonts, is that deliberate or a quirk of moving text between VCarve and Easel?
@AdamKemeny: Iāve noticed no problems or differences due to my using Easel to send Vcarve grbl files to the X-carve. And to the best of my recollection the font in the design image is the font used in the carve. That said, I have tried a few different fonts to see if I could minimize detail tear-out and improve the quality of the carve. So itās possible the cut photo IS a different font than the one in the design image. But that would be my error and not Easelās.
I should note that, so far, I see the same sort of problems no matter what font I use. And the single line fonts also take many hours longer to carve this text than the truetype fonts(9-10 hours vs. 4-5 hours). (Which I find surprising and it makes me wonder if I could speed up the carve by converting the text to curves in Vcarve.)
@RobertCanning: What you suggest has occurred to me and Iāve considered that the waste board is not perfectly perpendicular to the Z axis (because the board was sufficiently flat). But how to precisely verify and correct a misalignment that would seem to be on the order of 1mm over 100mm eludes me for the moment. My X-carve bench and the wasteboard are level. And measuring the vertical distance between the wasteboard and the Y-rails at various points along their length shows no variation that is measurable with the measuring devices at my disposal (a tape measure and a metal ruler). Maybe I need a micrometer?
Ok. Next day, new carve attempt. Photo below.
Made adjustments as recommended and got a much cleaner, but still unuseable cut. The border fail is, once again, my own fault. I think I set the depth of cut too deep (1/8" with a 90 degree V bit). Although why the border is more messed up on the bottom than on the top of the cut I donāt understand.
But the quality of the text cut is still the main problem.
While the text is overall improved, it seems that the bottom curve on just about any letter - but mostly on āeā and āaā and āsā - is bad. And even though the depth of cut and depth per pass are both set at 0.04", it seems that the machine is still making two passes; which I think is part of why those letters get messed up.
But the fact is that I have run out of clues and ideas as to what the heck is going wrong. And Iām begining to think that there is just something fundamentally messed up with the X-carve.
Any and all advice is appreciated.
For no good reason other than to make myself feel better about my X-carve, I thought I share a recent successful carve. This one, however, didnāt have small text like the one Iām trying to carve. This was cut on a 16" x 20" piece of birch plywood.
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Rick, I too have lots of issues with small letter carving and have yet to find a solution. I keep playing the Vectric training videos hoping to find something that will help. The Vcarve tool path preview always looks good until you get to the wood and start cutting.
Thanks Phil, I should have elaborated, I also am getting the small letter e and a tearing out while other letters are carving fine. Itās a software adjustment Iām sure but getting a good cut and documenting the parameters is my goal at this point.
@PhilJohnson: The oak and birch Iām using has already been planed. So youāre saying the wasteboard that came with my X-carve from Inventables is not suitably flat?
Even if that were true, I donāt think that explains my problem carving the curves on small letters.
My waste-board needed to be milled as many other folks on the board have also done. You have to measure various locations on the board to be sure of the levelness.
@RobertCanning: Any chance you could share one of those 1/8" lettering projects with the details and settings of the carve?
You know, Iāve come to the conclusion that my problem with carving small lettering must be due to the material. Iāve successfully carved text in linoleoum blocks that is much smaller than the text Iāve been trying to carve in wood. So the hardness or quality of the material, and/or the machineās ability (or lack thereof) to carve the material accurately, must be at the root of this problem.
Iāve also been wondering how the heck anyone can carve detailed PC boards if the machine canāt do any better than what Iām seeing?
I have to add that Iām getting pretty frustrated and annoyed with the X-carve after spending many, many days trying to solve this problem. I bought the X-carve so that I could carve wooden molds and stamps with fine detail. And with the results Iām seeing from the machine so far, I donāt think that seems likely to work out.
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@RickJohnson the font in the VCarve Pro design image is a Serif font whereas the one youāve carved using Easel is a sans serif. They are definitely different fonts so Iām assuming that Easel doesnāt have access to the font that youāve used with VCarve Pro. Iām only highlighting this because it appears that font substitution can occur between the two apps that will produce a different carve to the original design when using text.
V-Carve creates the g-codeā¦easel is only sending the code to the machine. If the picture is a different font, it must be a different iteration of his design.
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I tried 70 ipm previously (as per Phil Johnsonās recommendation) and the results were quite a bit worse than the 35ipm that I used in my latest carve. Depth I now have set to 0.04 and that seems to be close to correct. The burning on the border was my fault because I had the depth set to 1/8" for a single pass and that was just too deep for my X-carve to handle in a single pass. And my bits were brand new when I started this project.
As to my belts and v-wheels I have done my best to tune them in just right and I examine them before each carve to make sure they are correct. As recommended elsewhere in the forums I bought a fishing gauge so that I could use it to precisely set the tension on the belts.
What else I might do escapes me.
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Just for the hell of it, today I set up Easel with a similar font (Baskerville) to the one Iāve been using in VCarve and tried to cut the text using Easel. The D.O.C and all the other parameters were the same as Iāve been using. The quality from that effort was much, much worse than any other cut Iāve done so far.
Also, the āsimulationā in Easel said the text cut would take 3 minutes. I aborted the carve 11 hours later when it said it was only at 56% complete.
Next cut Iām going to try is going to have the feed rate set at 10ipm and I may try and convert the text to curves in VCarve before I start the cut. Iām also going to check the voltage on the pots for the stepper motors before I start my next attempt.
11hours? Something is very wrong. Can you share the v-carve file? What toolpath did you select to cut this with?
That doesnāt look like. V-Carve toolpath to me. Looks more like a profile cut with a vbit.
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