I tried to use flattening and surfacing wizard in the control software to level my waste board. It was leaving 'waves" between passes, not lips or edges. I had tried to square up the makita router as best as I could prior to using the utility. I'm using a 1" bit and only changed the bit size and outside dimensions, and cut was only 1mm deep in the setup. Any suggestions? Thanks in advance!
Have you got a pic you could post? Difficult to tell from your description, but the commonest cause of problems with spoiler board levelling is router/spindle alignment. Alex.
Agreed a pic would help confirm, but yes, to get a good level, you need the bit to be perfectly perpendicular to the movement of the axes (So if you use a square to level the router, make sure to level against the rails, not against the bed for example) - you want it to be perfectly plumb on the Z axis (ie exactly 90deg to X beam and Y beams.
I didn't think this photo would show the "waves" very well but here it is. If you run your hand over the surface it feels like it has "rolling waves". I did try to use a square level to align both x, y axis's but I could only align the mount for the router. I'll check again at the bit once I get a smaller "L" level. Also needless to say this isn't the bit I used in the router but this is the mount I tried to square up. Thank you for your time.
Try it again with a lesser depth of cut, say something in the 0.1mm-0.2mm range. The questions I have would be are the ridges parallel or perpendicular to the x-axis (can't tell from the photo) and what is the length of your X-axis?
What I do it a 0.5mm pass as fast as it can without bogging down, then a lighter 0.2mm skim. If the load is too high, the Z axis will actually till sideways which is what introduces the valley/radius.
Also (you don't say what machine you are using so can't be very specific) but check for play where the X axis C beam is attached to the Y axis and play between the spindle and mount. Alex.
Alex, it's a workbee lead screw, 750 (x axis) x1000 (y axis). The pattern seems too symmetrical to me to be play, but I will certainly take your advise and check. Thx
@Kevon Ritter's advice is the most likely solution anyway but if movement is possible it can cause similar symptoms. I forgot to mention the possibility of play between the wheels and rails (adjust eccentrics). Alex.
You're using a 1" bit but the photo shows otherwise? If you are using a 1" bit, there appears to be no step-over in the process which would have helped (hard to judge though from the photo to be fair) but I would suggest you use a 1/4" or 6mm bit for surfacing anyway.
This was the built in surfacing feature of the control software. I left the default at 40% overlap. However, I'm not sure if that is what you mean by "step-over" or not. I was under the impression for such a large board, that most people were using 1" or larger bits to flatten the surface with. I can and will certainly look into all the suggestions above and if I don't find anything will try a smaller bit. I do appreciate all the feedback Thx
I'd stick with the 1" bit unless you have a lot of spare time (I use a 19mm router bit - too mean to buy a special bit) but take lighter cuts - at 1mm you are putting a lot of force onto your Z/☓ axes. Alex.
Thanks Alex and others, will do. It was interesting that the default value was 3mm deep ( lowered to 1mm) but maybe it was because it only had a 6mm diameter bit as well. I will check all the other suggestions as well. The machine didn't seem to have any play but I never rechecked anything after I ran it around a bit to break it in some. There were some things on the x axis wheels I didn't really like when adjusting the eccentric spacers.
A crude calculation, but your 1" bit has 17 times the area of a 6mm bit. One 17th of 3mm is 0.18 mm (approx). Alex.
