I was wondering if it could be possible to add a message (E-mail or SMS) to warn us that the job has finished. Often, I start a job and run back in the house (too cold to stay in the garage in a Chicago Winter), and would like to know when a job is finished carving.
LOL - Angus, its has taken me a long time to get to this point to just watch it burn… 
I’ve put a Raspberry Pi in my CNC shed as an Ethernet to wireless bridge so my Linuxcnc computer can be accessed from the house. I have a camera module in the Pi so I can stream video of the running job to wherever I am - just in case.
Not running yet as I’m working on dust control first.
Angus, yes, I have WIFI that is reachable from my garage. I don’t think it would be to hard to add a little bit of code to send the message. I have a Bosh Colt as my spindle and waiting for a relay to automate my spindle.
Im just starting out, so I have only worked with Easel. Do you have any recommendations?
Very interesting, I was thinking of doing that with a Arduino nano. What flavor of Linux are you using? Im with you on the dust control, I been looking around to get a shoe, but I saw one that kinda caught my eye. Linn from the Darbin Orvar channel uses an X-carve https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYe4zA_Qx1M. I have a Bosh Colt so Im going to start on the dust collection this week.
On the Pi, I just run standard Raspian. Camera module control is in python.
On my Linuxcnc machine used to control the X-Carve, I run an older version of Ubuntu.
I have the Pi set up as a bridge which is connected to a small switch so i can use other ethernet connections should the need arise. The Pi connects via wifi to an access point in the house.
Thank you for the prompt reply, I was not sure if the easel software was going to run on a Linux box,(been busy with work, so try) but thank you for letting me know that it works. If this works then it will be really simple to remote desktop to the cnc box and not need the camera. Although the camera would come useful to see the carving process.
@LuisLacayo I’m not running Easel or an Arduino controller. My system is Linuxcnc driving a Gecko G540. For design or tool path creation, I use CamBam and Fusion360.
Sorry for any confusion
I did this for the first time last week. Started a carve then was too cold to sit outside and watch it. But since I’m still new to the machine, was too scared to just “trust” it to finish the job without issue.
What I did:
- Faced my laptop towards the XC in the shed and turned on the webcam and had it take up half the screen.
- Had the Easel job open in the other half of the screen so could see the webcam and the X button in Easel if I needed to cancel
- Downloaded Teamviewer on the computer
- Downloaded Teamviewer app on my phone
- Connected phone to computer over wifi using Teamviewer and then from my phone I could the webcam and easel job and control the mouse if I saw smoke on the webcam and needed to cancel/pause the job.
Worked nicely! Got to enjoy dinner and warmth in the house during the 2hr carve!
Just last week, a family visitor had one of those new-fangled video baby monitors. I tested out the range to the garage and it worked very slick. Great picture and pretty good audio quality. That’s what I’m doing.
The one I tried was fancy like this: Infant Optics 2.4 GHz Digital Video Baby Monitor with Night Vision - about $95 but I see a cheaper version like this might work also : Levana Lila Digital Baby Video Monitor with Night Vision and Talk to Baby Intercom - about $70 at Walmart now.
I don’t know if a simple webcam would work too well with my limited bandwidth connection out there.
Michaywood, that is a good Idea. I use team vier all the time. I have an IP camera, that is another option. I am glad you got to enjoy dinner… Stay warm.
Thanks. I did toy with the idea of baby monitors (and the like) but opted for Teamviewer for 2 reasons:
- It gave me access to the X button in Easel so could quit the job from my phone if I noticed an issue
- It’s free for personal use
Both are good reasons, I would like to be notified when the job is complete. I agree with having teamview being able to stop the job is something is wrong. How often are you looking at your phone to check on the progress?
I run my Gcode off of a Raspberry Pi. When I run jobs, once I’m happy with the way things are going I’ll go upstairs to get other things done (still within earshot of the X-Carve just in case, of course).
On my Mac, I just use “Share Screen” to see what my Raspberry Pi is doing.
On my iPhone or iPad, I use VNC Viewer to do the same thing.
Windows has a VNC client by the same company as the iOS app.