Is the limitation in the controller, or is it just the lack of rigidity of the entire system? Have you noticed any flex in those tall gantry brackets? I’d still love to see some aluminum cuts with a screw drive x-carve.
Yes yes no. Me too.
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Does this affect the “step” appearance on
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Easel as sender?
Easel dont support arcs and break curves into small straight segments, could that be part of it?
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One possible source of the issue.
I’m a little confused. I am using easel to send, but all my designs are done in fusion 360 or Aspire. Since they generate the gcode via the vectors, the cartesian coordinates should be uniform, regardless of the sender.
You would think so, however most senders don’t just pass the G-code to the X-carve, but instead they do things behind the scenes to “help” the user.
This type of thing happens prominently in Easel to try and make CNC more friendly like a printer driver, etc. But this makes somethings difficult to diagnose.
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The main two factors are:
- Higher holding torque
- More available torque at speed
This will affect the achievable rapids/acceleration rates the system allows.
Wether the carving situation require the added torque is a different matter and may vary on several other factors like rigidity, stiffer Z-axis etc.
Yes. To get more rapid speed out of the system. And some cutting speed. I did have a few people with issues at high rapids but once they adjusted the settings it worked perfectly.
You’re not guaranteed a higher rapid speed with just any motor.
If you get a motor that works well at your power supply voltage which allows for a higher available rpm and torque, then you can achieve higher rapids.
I did an experiment with the stock 140 oz-in, my 270 oz-in stepper and a 269 oz-in stepper and the stock one actually achieved the highest rapid rate (and acceleration) on my Z axis because of how well it is tuned to the 24V. But for X and Y screws, it’s not about the rapids, it’s about the increased rigidity, better acceleration, and control which should allow for faster and deeper carving.
I just recently had a customer call me with a stepper slipping issue caused by rapids being set too high.
What does tuning mean in voltage?
Stepper motor parameters calculate out the ideal voltage they need to drive it. The closer your actual voltage is to this ideal voltage, the better the stepper operates according to stepper motor theory.
Has anyone ever put an oscilloscope on their x-controller to measure the output when the stepper is actually being driven? I’m curious just how stable the voltage and current is.
Hi @phantomm…
I am running a 1000mm x-carve with an added rotary axis.
You can see videos of it running last week at https://www.facebook.com/a.malcolm.stanley/videos/10161249801350464/ and https://www.facebook.com/a.malcolm.stanley/videos/10161249792485464/
Basically to get going I took a stock X-carve, put it on a blue kreg table with a split top so I could mount the rotary below it, and clamped it in place. It has worked fine for the past year while I worked out the rotary axis part of the equation, which turned out to be operationally a little more complex than I had imagined.
I now think I understand the rotary workflow,and have it to the point where the x-carve is now starting to be visible as a weak link. To correct this, I am thinking of taking the next step and specifying a custom integration specifically for rotary axis implementation.
To keep things simple(r), I am thinking of an integration/ combination of the X-carve X-axis and gantry, your screw drive implementation instead of belts, or Phil’s 9mm belt kit if price is an issue, and custom end plates that bolt to the pre-drilled holes on the top deck of the Kreg Table cross bars. That would give me a rigid X, and then I could specify a plate setup for the lower deck of the table cross bars to bolt the rotary to. Z would be a CNC4Newbies Z.
Since I have a working Rotary CNC I think I can CAD this up with real world measurements verified to work, so good starting point. I wondered if you had a CAD file for your screw drive that could be integrated in? Also, since you are making custom end plates already, I wondered if you would be interested in being source for the end plates we would need for this? I sort of see a multi-supplier BOM approach where you source
- the table from I guess Amazon
- the x-carve X as a parts BOM from Inventables,
- the rotary from e-bay,
- the z from CNC4Newbies
- the screw drive and maybe the end plates from you,
- optionally / alternatively 9mm belts from Phil,
- controller could be user choice, inventables controller does not support rotary but any real controller should do…
- sender would be user choice but I would reco Mach3 since I know it works,
- G-code from Deskproto
Eventually the whole thing could doubtless be kitted but not sure that would make sense logistically.
Anyway, this is a long email. Wonder what you think? let me know. /malcolm
LSH What makes you think it’s the weakest link? What are the symptoms?
the toolpath depends on the Y motors locking the x-axis in place
they’ve been in the same spot for over a year now.
under stress, the Y belts will stretch slightly and the toolpath will deviate.
would like to eliminate that, and in general get to a dedicated XZA machine…
Ever think about just screwing the x in place?
Unless you wand the full 3axis motion.
conclusion was that it would be better to cad up some new end plates and pull all that extra stuff out.
I could always use ti for a dedicated xyz machine if I wanted to later…
Can I please get access to the instructions for the screw drive upgrade?
Quick update. Have another delay in restock. My manufacturers material has been delayed so end result is another week delay.
Apologies to all who are waiting.
Hi Phantomm,
Has the supply chain issue been resolved?