My lowrider has been running nicely, al of a sudden the z steppers click and do not turn smoothly. At first I thought it was the rambo board drivers but a little debug I switched the y and z connections on the rambo board . Then when I control the z the y moves cleanly but when I control the y the z mother’s still click and do not turn correctly
So I am assuming I fried the z steppers does this sound correct. Can I fry the steppers?
Maybe, do you have a lot of weight on your gantry? Do you have a photo of your setup?
Are the brass nuts that are on the lead screws loose? Those two small screws holding them on should not be tight or it could cause binding
Thanks, I tried to disconnect the lead screw from both sides so the motors have no load on them. Same issue,. I just tried again to switch the y and z connector in the Rambo and the z terminal moves the y clean. But the y controls the z and same issues. So I think I am narrowing it down to the Rambo board is not broken otherwise the z would have caused the same issue with the y steppers. I am going to check the wiring to the z steppers tomorrow but I haven’t touched them but maybe something got loose.
That is odd. It could very well be that they are fried but I’ve sure put mine through hell and they keep going. When things go bad they just skip but then when I fix my mistake they keep going. Hopefully it ends up being something stupid that is easy and cheap to fix.
The steppers are really dead simple and they almost never fry. My guess is that this is a wiring issue. There are two ports labeled ‘Z’ on the rambo. Only use one. Share a photo of the board and what you can of the connections.
Thank you
Let me try later today to get your pictures
Like I said it has been working so I need to undo the wires that are going through the pipes.
Also I might have had it go down too hard on some 2x4s that I use to level it above the spoil board.
But 1 step at a time, I don’t think it’s the board due to my previous debug. Now going to check the wires
I will return with some pictures
I took apart all the wiring today and found a black wire that was loose. Once connected back up all looks good. Thank you for all your knowledge and helping out understand that it’s hard to blow a stepper 
Her is a picture of the setup
That LCD mount looks kind of…
Nice. I’m glad it is working. Nice cnc.
