Hi Hopefully someone can solve my dilemma here. Little bit of history and what going on, About 3 weeks or ago my Blackbox stopped connecting with the USB, Openbuilds replaced the unit (great customer service) right away. Now here is the issue. With the old controller my cnc ran flawlessly, clean cut smooth operation. hen the controller broke i hooked up the new a few days ago and my plasma was jittery when i ran a program to cut. I checked everything on my table ( wheel for binding, wiring, rails, screws for tightness) which is only a few months old and everything checked out fine. i took all the nema 23 motors off the table unhooked the lead screws and slid the grantry on the y and x axis and everything glidded effortlessly. I brought the motors and equipment in the house hook them up on a table and ran a program with the same results. as you can see from a videos i get the same results. I tried increasing and decreasing voltages on the power supply and controller, i tried different usb cables, a new power supply and i get the same result. i also ran several different jobs and on two different laptops all with the same results. At this point i'm at a loss. Any help would be appreciated. here is my equipment. If you closely to the videos the events all happen at the exact same time. the pictures show the clean before cuts and the rough later cuts. I tried uploading the videos but they too big so i created a youtube post for the two videos nema motors on table on cnc machine Nema 23 High torque motors LRS-350-24 power supplies i have two of them only run one at a time on the controller i bought one spare Blackblox controller
The jitteriness om the second video, around the 3min50 mark is buffer starvation, PC isn't feeding GCODE fast enough, buffer runs empty, it pauses in place, waiting for new data. 1) Make sure your CAM is setup with "not too short" of a segment for any straight lines, and uses G2/G3 arcs whenever possible. Longer moves, prevent buffer underrun 2) Make sure the PC is running optimally, if its a little slow you can disable the 3d Viewer or try an alternative, lighter, sender like UGS
I will try that, however my pc and software setup has not changed at all, and the stake that is programed in the video has been cut multiple times with both 11 and 14 gauge steel. I also had it hooked up to another laptop with the same results. here is a link to the video i just created using my toshiba laptop, with the same results, i completely understand buffering however i could be wrong but i find it odd that im running the exact same cut on different laptops and im getting the same result. I am extremely confident in your wealth of knowledge, i just find it odd that the motors are jittering like that and that they almost sound like they're really struggling (almost like they're starved of power or torque), I have the power supply at exactly 24 volts. i have also upload the file that i used here is another video this with my toshiba i also have another desing at the end of this video Main Laptop DELL G7 Windows 10 NVidia Geforce GTX 1050 Processor Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-8300H CPU @ 2.30GHz, 2304 Mhz, 4 Core(s), 8 Logical Processor(s) 16 gig ram Toshiba Satellite Laptop Windows 7 Regards Patrick
Did you maybe configure slightly different Grbl settings on new BlackBox? Ie faster max rate / acceleration, machine now runs faster than before with your old parameters. Thus revealing the buffer issue. Post the GCODE file too
Hi Peter Thank you for the help and patience, i feel like I'm being a pain in the but here. I am pretty sure (not 100%) that the settings are the same, if not the exact same really close, as you can see I'm pretty new to this stuff i posted the onion2.gcode that file came from my dell laptop, the next 2 are from my Toshiba laptop, i will take screenshot of the Blackbox setting in the morning. if there is a way to upload the Blackbox settings i don't know how to access that file to upload. Here are the 3 Gcode files that i used today. Thank you again for the help much appreciated, i'm kinda getting a little frustrated here because the original setting was dialed in and running like a beast. i was able to easily cut 24 by 30, 11 gauge without any issues at all, i literally took my whole machine apart trying expecting to find a burned out bearing or something binding and everything is working perfectly. and now i cant cut a small very simple garden stake without it looking like a steak knife, i believe these are the files you asked for, if there are others that you are looking for i may need help to find the machine files.
Use the Backup Settings button in CONTROL to get a much easier to read txt file out, use the Upload a file button below the reply input to attach that We'll see from that if anything looks off
thank you that seem to have worked, now i can get my m3 m5 commands to works, i will now have to look at that FML, that command was working now its not, I doubled checked the relay jumper was in the right place, gonna change the limit switch with another but i now have zero power coming out, the tool on light turns on and you can hear it turn on and off at the box but no voltage change (measured with a volt meter) at the pins, i even used the turn on and off buttons with no results just weird.
M3 needs an S-word, eg M3S1000 (if $30=1000) Using the relay as plasma trigger? It is a relay. No voltage involved. When the relay activates it closes COM to NO. Like a switch. refer the Plasma section of docs.openbuilds.com/blackbox
yes im using the m3/m5 relay and it plugs into the relay port on the blackbox, im using it as the trigger switch, and yes the command has has m3s1000 to turn on and m5 to turn off, as the Blackbox runs through the program i can hear it click on and off at the begin and end of the cut. Just went back outside plugged the torch back in and it’s working so idk weird. But it’s working again thanks so much sir Here is a sample of my cut today
