Thought it may be a great kit to start on so I bought one and finally got it all put together. Total noob, first time with the hardware and the software. I have a few questions I have been unsuccessfully searching the forums for. HARDWARE/SOFTWARE? My first project was a single letter M in 1/2 in. MDF, but I had to do some sanding because the 1st pass was slightly off from the rest of the passes (it made 8 passes, probably shouldn't have checked that one box). I can't figure out why the first pass was "off" though. (It was just a little farther to the left than the rest of the passes.)? SOFTWARE? The second question was how to make the 3D projects? Say I wan't to make my single letter M have dimension. Or make the water drop like the demo picture? The SketchUCam tutorial says that the drawing needs to be on a single plane or it won't work. Or I just didn't listen close enough. So how do you go from 3D Sketch to G-Code to put into GRBL Panel? SOFTWARE? Okay, last one, until I get some limit switches I mean. Wiring my stepper motors incorrectly/backwards on a couple of axes and hearing the grinding/clicking noise when running some test g-code made me research limit switches. Anyway, the software question is why won't the GRBL Panel keep my changed settings? I have changed them 100 times to match the picture, but they keep reverting back to the originals. I have double clicked everywhere, tried clicking the refresh buttons located elsewhere (Those settings seem to stay changed.), but the $ settings all revert back to the originals. The only thing that I haven't tried is getting the arduino software to try and update the settings outside of the GRBL Panel software, but I will do that if it is my only option. Thank all you CNC gurus out there for any help you're willing to give. I'll keep searching for answers. I bought the C-Beam Bundle w/ stepper motors, CNC Pro V2 controller/driver, and 12v power supply from the OpenBuilds part store.
Hardware: Check your axis run smoothly and easily I.e your eccentrics are not putting too much pressure on the wheels. Also check your pulleys are not slipping. If you have the m3 grub screws in them, remove and drill and re tap to m4. If they are m3 but you don't believe to be slipping now they will do in the future so my advice is do it right away and save yourself the annoyance later. Software: afraid I cant much having only toyed with grbl, it's pretty much all been forgotten. I'd recommend a post titled xpro settings would be your best bet. Good luck
Thanks for the recommendations Mr. Norris. The axes run smoothly, but not really easily. That part is tough to judge from watching the video. When I put the plates with wheels onto the c-beam I turned the eccentrics so that I had to consistently push for the plate to move. If I didn't push, then the plate didn't move. I'll try backing them off a bit per your suggestion. Also, I just have the grub screws that came with the flexible coupling, so I'll have to double check the size they came with. Thanks again for the suggestions / tips. I appreciate it.
