Drivers for a Skr board

I am just about to buy my board, but can’t find a consensus on what drivers are working well(and supported) with this board on the mpcnc.

I have TMC 2209 on mine, but the drv8825 will really reduce the complexity. If you’re comfortable with Marlin configuration and tmc drivers, then the 2209 seem like a good choice (which is why I bought them). But if you’re looking for simple, and reliable, the drv8825 are hard to beat.

Whats the main difference?

The price.

I noticed, but i’m seeing a lot of packages with the 2208’s or 2209’s and the 8825’s recommended by Ryan. I didn’t see much of a difference other than noise.

I ended up ordering the 2209’s. They seemed loie a better choice for applications where motors could be loaded. Thanks for the help everyone.

The 2209 has higher current capacity than the 2208. But it probably doesn’t matter.

The TMC drivers have two way communication. So the driver can alert Marlin if it detects a problem. This is my favorite feature of them. It can tell you the difference between a wiring problem, and a heat problem. You can fix these issues with a drv8825 and it probably won’t matter once your machine is really cooking. The trouble is, that all adds complexity, and price.

You won’t notice the silence either, since the router and shop vac are so loud. You should probably turn that off, since it has less torque in the stealthchop mode.

That is a bit glib…

I agree, i wasn’t concerned with the silent running unless I get into lasers. It’s nice to know that the 2209’s have some built in safeties. I have a lot of homework to do before the parts show up. I haven’t actually changed marlin on my printer or dealt with marlin 2.0.

Marlin it pretty easy. I used 2130s as the 2209s werent out. They both have sensorless homing which is a feature i love and use a lot… the 2209s are what i’d get if i were to buy something else :slight_smile:

What version fo marlin are you guys using? I Didn’t see one specifically for this board in the v1engineering git hub page. I did see Teaching tech has one for the LR.

The teaching tech one is pretty old now. I would start with the rambo preconfigured one from v1 and then change it for the skr board and the drivers you picked. My firmware for the 2209s is on my github, but it is pretty out of date by now too (and for the low rider).

Would that be the one for the Archim 32 bit board?

The rambo is not the same as the archim. The archim would work too.

I just got the board and loaded the platform.io software on my laptop. I’ll read some more and try it out tomorrow.

On an other topic. Where did everyone find their tubing? I’v Tried three local places and found none. I haven’t tried home depot or lowes yet, they’ A little farther than I want to go at the moment.

The big box stores are likely the more economical route, but any large construction/farm/lumber supply store should carry EMT. Menard’s, Theisen’s, FleetFarm, Do It Center, larger Ace Hardware stores, OSH, etc. And any local supplier with enough floor space to carry electric contractor supplies should have it.

I actually enjoy the learning on this, but…

  1. I’m concerned I’m going to miss changing one of the settings since i can’t seem to find a one stop this is what you need. I have been learning arduino for a while, but at the noob level. I understand what the changes do, but there are a lot of places to look in Marlin2.0. I don’t want to miss something critical and fry a board or motor driver.
  2. After getting into the software and watching several videos on driver set up for the TMC 2209s I’m seeing some conflicting info that has me confused. Do the pins need bent out/removed like in Teaching techs video, or not? I’ve seen it done both ways.
  3. Will the sensorless homing work with the forces generated during CNC? I can see it working great for 3d printing, but since it’s sensing physical resistance to movement wouldn’t it false trigger pushing a bit through wood/aluminum?

I don’t mind doing the research if someone could provide some links(training wheels)

You’d think it would ignore those high loads in the middle of a job since it already learned where home was when it was asked to find home prior. Maybe they’re not that smart and i’m not either. Just another reason i went with drv8825’s. So much cheaper and simpler to accomplish the same thing.

Sorry I’m not much help. If you succeed, please update this thread.

The tmc sensorless homing is pretty smart. It needs to be homing to trigger. My real worry is that the resistance of the gantry would be high enough to trigger early during homing because of the added weight. But, the sensorless homing limit is adjustable. I have found it kind of a pain to adjust, because you can’t really test it without slamming the gantry to a place where it skips steps. But, you don’t actually need endstops on a cnc, and adding micro switches are easy if you must have endstops and can’t figure out the sensorless homing.

I personally really like using them. But I also like reading the configuration files and I enjoy understanding how they work. I would not recommend them to someone who isn’t willing to get frustrated when setting them up. They are more work, if you see configuring marlin as work.

I ha e 2209s and I didn’t bend any wires. But YYMV. :man_shrugging:

Marlin is generally very forgiving. The boards can’t really destroy themselves (but don’t unplug anything while they are on, don’t short any wires, and don’t push the motors too fast when the controller is off). There are really only two files to configure marlin. Configuration.h and configuration_adv.h. The tmc settings are spread between them, but mostly in the adv file. Each board also has a pins file, but you rarely need to change anything in it. If you do, it is usually one line change.

First off, Thanks to everyone for the help and guidance.
I agree with cnc not needing end stops, but I have a “hands on” family and figured it would be a benefit to have the machine square itself at the start. I have the parts to wire end stops as well, but wanted to explore the sensorless homing since its available on my hardware. I didn’t realize that it was only active when asked to home.

I spent the last couple of nights running through different Marlon 2.0 set up just to see the differences. I actually enjoy learning what’s under the hood and so far reading through the files is mostly making sense. When I first looked into updating Marlin on my 3d printer it looked overwhelming. Now that i’m wading in it’s not that bad. I’d like to learn as much now to be close when the parts are done printing.

I did have one set up question. If I’m using all 5 drivers for dual endstops I need to uncomment the x, x1, y,y1, and z. Do I deed to comment out the extruder?

In configuration_adv.h you can enable dual x and dual y. You set the EXTRUDERS = 0. Marlin will assign X1 to E0 and Y1 to E1. Right next to the dual motor settings are the dual endstop settings.