We’ve had issues with clones, like a more than 50% failure rate.
1 Like
What Barry said. I feel like my chances of success would be better with a genuine model plus I’ve read they are much more durable.
Ok, so I’m noticing some things with Repetier. I have to move the gantry to where I want then close the program, then open it up and open the picture up and play the print. If I don’t do this and click play after moving the gantry, it very slowly keeps moving in a positive direction. I usually stop it as it’s painfully slow and I have no idea where it’s going. It usually moves past the paper and where it would normally start.
Also, without sounding like I want to be spoonfed the info, does anyone have any tips for setting up the FliteTest plans and setting them up for a dragknife? I’ve been doing a lot of reading and haven’t found much info for setting up the knife or drawing. I see the needle cutter is popular but since it’s on the kitchen table for now, I was hoping to give the knife a shot for noise/mess reasons.
That’s it for tonight. Thanks again to everyone for the help so far. Still pretty amazed I got it drawing so easily.
James
It’s going back to its zero point, which is where it was when you first power it on. Usually it will move at the same speed as the last move unless told a new speed. Sometimes I forget this and manually issue a move through the terminal, you know, something like G0 X1500, and it starts moving at half a millimeter per second, or some other glacial speed. Here’s an easy one. In Repetier, click config, then printer settings, then under the scripts tab, click the down arrow. Under script 1 put in G92 X0 Y0 Z0 . Now when you click the 1 under the manual control tab on the right, it will set the current position to zero.
I feel the same. Also, it helps support the Arduino foundation as well.
Ok. Small update.
Repetier is definitely wonky for some reason. I was going to draw a rc plane outline on some foam board. Sometimes it digs with the pen and sometimes it doesn’t. When I laid everything out, I used a 1mm depth for everything so I don’t understand why it is varying so much.
I ended up using Inkscape to ungroup the Flitetest PDFs like I saw on a Youtube tutorial for converting the plans. I did manage to screw up the scaling significantly, but I will figure it out. Apparently you have to ungroup everything then Estlcam the file in order to import it.
So some good lessons learned tonight, but the most important thing will be to set the driver current tomorrow. When I was playing around in a small area, everything was fine. But when going across the entire table, the gantry was either losing steps or just binding. That’s a project for another evening.
James
Would anyone out there be able to tell me why I’m losing scale when importing a file from Estlcam to Repetier? I have a design set up for a 20x30 inch piece of foam, but when I import the design, it fills up the entire surface area of the CNC. I’m not sure why it is stretching out the piece.
Thanks,
James
You have to know what units you saved it as and import it as the same. Typically inches or MM.
Hmmm, wait I read that wrong. Have a look at my getting started and use the grid to make sure your scale is correct in estlcam. Also knowing how far off it is will tell us exactly where the scaling issue is.
Yeah. I thought I had it figured out. For some reason Estlcam was scaling it up by about 3 inches in both directions when importing from Inkscape. I tried saving as dxf and the other one Inkscape uses. I went back and used the grid on Inkscape to make it the size I wanted, then verified it in Estlcam. This time the scale was correct. Then when I put it in Repetier, it quadrupled the size. I will look at it again tomorrow as that was my sign to go to bed.
On the positive side, I tightened the belts ever so slightly and as evenly as possible and it quit skipping or hanging up or whatever it was doing. I think one was looser than the other and it was binding on higher speeds. This time it moved the entire table size and didn’t miss a beat.
Slowly I’m getting there.
James
3 inches and it is supposed to be how many? What units are you using in inkscape (you have to be careful it uses pixels by default I think)?
Yea, pixels, or picas, whatever weird measurement system graphic designers use. I believe it also changed in the last version or two, which confuses people even more as not all the how-to’s have been updated to the new conversion factor.
I have tried setting it up in inches and mm, and also pixel. I have been following a tutorial on YouTube for converting the PDF to a cut. But of course, the tutorial is older and I wonder what has changed in newer revisions of the software.
The foam is 20x30 inches, and since I’m not starting in the corner of the machine, it’s going about 3-4 inches past the foam and crashing the gantry. I forgot to grab the laptop today to mess with it here at work.
I appreciate you helping me out since this is software related and not hardware. I was hoping someone here may have tried this with a dragknife. The machine seems to be working fine, with the exception of some vibration in the lines when drawing not parallel to an axis. I will work on that and post a pic if I can’t get it figured out. I’m guessing I still don’t have the belts tight enough.
James
The belts will wobble when cutting, if it’s not skipping, don’t worry about it. Too tight causes issues as well. Also as for inkscape, it might be importing too big too. Look through here if you haven’t already seen it.
James,
I doubt I can add anything regarding the scaling issues between apps you’ve seen… you’re getting good help there, I think. I saw scaling issues, especially with the intro of Inkscape v0.92, but most seem to have gone away with a clean install of v0.92.3 on my LinuxMint box.
Since you’ve specified wanting to work with FT plans and have familiarity with the needle cutter, I’m assuming you’ve spent time on the FT forum. Jason Hitesman (jhitesma) has done several videos detailing PDF preparation for needle cutting using Inkscape and Estlcam… are these the ones you’re following?
Also, in post 1447 of my needle cutter thread, Shurakair describes PDF preparation of FT plans using Inkscape… he provides a foamboard template and describes moving the color-coded linework to different layers to control cut order and depth for different cut types using the Gcodetools. Check it out…
I don’t know of anyone who is actually cutting planes with a drag-knife on a regular basis… though several of us have certainly entertained the idea. One of biggest drawbacks is the need for corner compensation to avoid mangling sharp corners when cutting material as thick as foamboard (simple illustration is to stab butter with tip of knife and twist…). Donek Tools makes drag knives that can do the job and have also provided videos that demo not only cutting foamboard (note the lift actions on corners) but also explain the need for, and use of, their Excel-based “post-processor” to add the appropriate corner actions…
You might also find some useful info in the tangential knife thread in this forum.
I certainly recognize the problems with running a needle cutter on the family’s kitchen table but, apart from the noise, it is probably the quickest and most inexpensive way to get relatively clean and accurate cuts in foamboard.
Good luck.
– David
Hey guys. Thank you so much for the help. Unfortunately I haven’t had time to try any of the linked techniques since the last time I was on here, but I have been doing tons of reading and watching all of the videos. While I haven’t seen anything I was doing wrong in particular, I have a list of things to try.
I am going to try to change the power regulator at work this week so I can give it a shot with the sd card at some point.
The only question I have this go around is this: Is there an online source for .dwg or .dxf files? I figured if I download something known to work, maybe I can work backwards and figure out where I’m going wrong. I am hoping there’s something like a Thingiverse for routers perhaps.
Thanks again to everyone for the great help. I hope to get back on this project this week and make some progress.
James
Well I had some free time due to the rain tonight. I finished soldering some extensions for the steppers together and replaced the voltage regulator (Thanks Ryan!). I also tied the wiring harness together and ran it to a corner of the machine. It is so much easier working on it without the wires draped all over and getting in the way. It’s also much easier to be able to use the SD card on the display instead of having to plug into it every time with the laptop.
Anyway. I decided to start simple and got some Ford Mustang sketched off of Google and practice the rendering. I have figured out Estlcam and have a 1" grid set up to verify the size of the finished drawings and they are coming out to fit on a standard letter sized paper. Unfortunately, it is still coming out almost double what it should be. Maybe 1/3 larger than the paper.
I uploaded a cnc file of the Mustang Fastback I’m working with in case any one is willing to look at the file and see if it’s Estlcam or Repetier blowing it up. I cannot find any information on this problem. I even counted the teeth on my pulleys to make sure I didn’t order the wrong ones by mistake. Everything is leaning towards it being a setting issue I can’t seem to figure out.
Again, I appreciate any advice on this.
James
generated-1.nc (93.1 KB)
Also…
Maybe someone has a know functional cnc file of a ruler or something I could draw on a piece of paper they could post, that would be very helpful as well. I could then measure it and see if it’s pre or post Repetier.
James
Ryan’s crown file is a known good set of gcode. Don’t forget to manually test distances by stepping in Repetier-Host some fixed amount, then measuring the distance traveled. If you ask for 100mm of movement and it moves 200mm it’ll mean one thing, if it moves 103mm it’ll mean something else entirely. 
Oops. That didn’t even dawn on me… Will do that. Thanks
James
Ok. That shows something. With the ink pen mounted and touching paper, a 10mm jog comes out at 20mm. The 20mm jog is 40mm.
Could someone please tell me how to drop the settings in half please?
Would this be because I have some off brand drivers?
Thanks to everyone so far. I’m pretty excited to see if this fixes it.
James