I have searched the forums and can not find what I need to know where I understand. I have endurance lasers and need to connect the ground and pwm signal, where on the board would I plug these in and is it already flashed for pwm laser support?
2nd I can not get Rambo connected to lightburn no matter what I try, am I missing a setting in Lightburn or a driver maybe?
In the latest version of the V1 maintained firmware (509) for the Rambo board, laser support is enabled. So I’m going to assume you either have this version or are willing to update to this version. In this version of the firmware, the laser is assigned to Pin 45. This is a 5V pin. I was reading on the endurance website that their laser driver will handle a wide range of voltages for the PWM input down to below 3.0V, so you should be fine using this pin. Here is an image showing this pin as well as a column of ground pins you can use:
If you are running older firmware and don’t want to reflash your board, you can use any of the three fan pins and use M106 and M107 to control your laser.
All pins on the Rambo board share a common ground.
Nope. I don’t have a laser and have never used LightBurn. I’ve just kept track of the laser info that has come across the forum. My assumption is that LightBurn would work like EstlCAM in that you would save g-code from LightBurn and then use Repetier-Host or whatever other g-code sending solution you use for your milling to deliver that g-code to your control board.
Lightburn will actually run the machine in addition to generating the gcode. It’s been a while since I set mine up - I’ll go back and see what the connection process is like. I don’t recall having trouble getting it to talk to the CNC shield that I used to replace the “brains” of the K40, but like I said, that was a while ago.
Since it does connect directly to the board, if you (Gary) are having trouble connecting, then the first I’d check is the baud rate. For Marlin it is 250000.
Baud Rate is under the Edit->Device Settings menu.
What driver do I need for the Rambo 1.4, I think that’s what I’m missing
Sorry - I’m running an Arduini/CNC shield stack and grbl, so don’t know what the proper driver would be for the Rambo. I’d guess Marlin, assuming you’re running the V1 firmware.
Repetier-Host treats the Rambo as a COM device, so no special drivers are required…at least for Windows 10. I would assume Lightburn is the same way. It is possible that somewhere in Lightburn you need to select the COM port of the Rambo board. Does Repetier-Host communicate with your Rambo board? If so, until you figure out your problem, you could have Lightburn output a g-code file and deliver the result to your board using Repetier-Host.
Lightburn takes full control of the machine. I need to get back into it this week and see if I can get it connected
Lightburn is probably a g-code sender, so you can deliver your g-code directly to Marlin from within Lightburn, but I doubt that it “takes full control.” Unless Lightburn has its own firmware that completely replaces Marlin on the control board, it has to be talking to the control board using g-code just like Repetier-Host…and talking to Marlin uses a COM port. So the first step will be making sure the COM port is set correctly and the baud rate is set correctly. Tom says above that those settings are under Edit->Device Settings.
Lightburn is a combination of gcode sender, design workspace, and materials library (for managing cut speeds, power levels and per-pass Z adjustments). You can create designs from scratch, import artwork and add cuts, or pull in existing gcode. It works with a variety of firmware variations. It does not, as far as I know, have its own firmware to install on a control board.
Firmware type is specified when creating the device using the Device button of the Laser window (I think of them as pallettes, on my PC they show to the right of the workspace, I don’t recall what exactly Lightburn calls them) that is enabled or disabled using the Window menu. You can have multiple Devices defined and choose between them in the Laser window. The baud rate for the currently selected Device is adjustable under Device Settings.
When I say take full control I mean I can control the machine, change settings on the fly, yes it is a g code sender, workspace designer, editor etc. It writes and sends the code without flip flopping between programs loading unloading cards. One of the most popular laser software programs out there. Unlike carving, with the laser it is nice to change power levels without having to stop rewrite gcode load back into RH and run again.
I made the distinction because it is important in troubleshooting your problem. Lightburn is not doing anything “special” with its connection to the control board. It is using the same interface as Repetier-Host. If you can talk to your machine using Repetier-Host, then you should be able to talk to your machine using Lightburn with no additional drivers. I’m guessing your issue is a setting(s) in Lightburn associated with the COM/Serial communication that needs to be changed, or that something else is locking up the COM communication (like Repetier-Host).
Lightburn has a known bug connecting to Marlin, see link:
My workaround is to open Lightburn, disconnect (change port) leave LightBurn open, then open Repetier Host, Connect to Marlin, once successful close Repetier, return to Lightburn and select correct port and if all is working, it should connect.
I cannot tell you why this works but I saw this in another post in the Lightburn forum and it works for me.
@robertbu probably I only got to mess around with it for a little bit and since then I’ve been in the workshop filling orders for our side business, must be tax season because orders the past few days have been a weeks worth in a day each day. I cleaned the router table back off as I had to use it for 2 more 3d printers to help the load so maybe tomorrow, crossing fingers
