Looking at the above, I believe you either have a faulty Z carriage/motor, wiring or controller. Something in that mix is not working as it should.
Whilst I offer the HDZ as an upgrade path for most users it’s not a mandatory upgrade but only one I’d recommend for heavy duty users. The stock axis works well for most (I used one for almost 2 years) and pushed it hard.
I don’t work for Carbide 3d, however I think if you can demonstrate to them the fault over video with no spindle attached they will support you and get you running. Carbide 3d offer the best support I’ve ever had and have always done right by me.
I would not pursue any of the three options above without getting a definitive solution with the stock kit at this stage as there is clearly a underlying issue.
Luke
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Griff
(Well crap, my hypometric precursor device is blown…)
48
What Luke said.
And, to reiterate, a short video is worth a thousand words. Carbide support is peerless, they will get you up and running as soon as they understand the problem.
As for aftermarket spindles, it is my OPINION, as a multi year SO3 owner/operator, they are overkill and unneeded by 95% of SO3 users.
Having said that, to each his own.
I enjoy modding tools I use in my shop if I run into a work requirement that can be improved by a mod. I do not attempt any mods until I’ve learned the operating parameters of the stock tool.
Thank you both for taking the time to reply. It’s great to know there are people out there who have huge experience and are willing to help if they can. I really appreciate it. Hopefully I can pay your kindness forward.
Good point about videos and photos…
It’s early days for me and the 3rd job for my shapeoko after the wasteboard and clamps is the ‘table’ to mount it onto. At the moment it’s on the concrete floor of my laundry. Here’s a video of the smooth and rough motion. It’s audible as the deeper knocking sounds - not the plink stretch sounds of the springs… Sometimes it’s smooth sometimes it’s not… I rechecked tension was good on the v-wheels and the Z tracks are parallel. All the leads look good to the Z stepper. Nothing gets over-hot. The timing pulley on the stepper is very tightly attached. No slip. 2 grubscrews on the stepper timing pulley are well engaged. The Z timing belt is tight (but not too tight). I tested again, and the X & Y do the juddering thing too. Makes me think this is just something that happens with 4 v-wheels engaged with V tracks? Maybe I need some lube? Candle wax or graphite or something? I don’t want to put anything on that will attract dust… The whole system is pretty good at doing that already…
Should I try swapping Z and X steppers to see if the X fails after I do? If the X failed while using the originally Z motor, that would isolate the problem as being the stepper?
Following the link from WillAdams I found this which is the spec for the supplied motors I think?
I note you have 2 sets of springs on there. What happens with one set?
The clunk/grr sounds like the motor engaging - as these are turned it generates a voltage - thats what it sounds like is happening.
Can you show a video of the motor driving it.
I’d not recommend putting anything on the V wheels or tracks.
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Griff
(Well crap, my hypometric precursor device is blown…)
51
Ok, more clear now. To add to Luke’s comments. The juddering in un-powered movement is completely normal. Move the gantry the same, it will judder too (I see on re reading you noted this). Steppers are acting as generators, if you have a Carbide3D probe you will see the LED light up.
If you could video an air cut for us that would be helpful. Pick/make a file with max movement in Z. Set your Z close to the wasteboard and run the file. Something like this but with more Z movement:
You can run a psu up to 35 volts and get more torque and not damage the control board. Obviously, the one you have is 26V, and they’re a little hard to find with a specific voltage and the right connector. Its easier to find one and swap the connectors.
I’ve refit for high torque steppers on my machine, but they require higher voltage to generate more torque, when I did that I also replaced essentially the entire carbide control board mechanism. I have an article in the forum on the whole process. I’m very happy with it. I will say that most of the grbl boards out there are junk - anything less than $20 or so is a knock off of a really nice design with crappy parts, and no support for current grbl. You want this one: ($20) Arduino CNC Shield – 100% GRBL Compatable | Protoneer.co.nz with a real arduino uno r3. The carbide board is actually very good, it’s foibles are minor.
Thanks again everyone for continuing to reply.
Now that you mention it I had read somewhere about the steppers generating power when you move them manually - actually it makes perfect sense that they should! Of course they will use the power to try and hold the step… I double checked by removing the belt from the z axis stepper and moving the Z carriage manually… smooooooth…
This is why it’s so great to have people who have been around the block with this stuff. It’s opaque until you gain clarity through insight & experience. My apologies to carbide for my ramblings due to a misinformed mental model of what was going on.
OK, so now I don’t have any rational explanation for why my Z axis sometimes works and sometimes does not. In a typical fusion360 3D adaptive clearing toolpath there is a lot of lifting and repositioning. My Shapeoko with it’s admittedly heavy spindle perhaps works 100 times, and then on the 101st fails to lift the Z-axis you can hear the thunk-thunk of it missing steps. (and another job is ruined)
I have a stepper with more torque but the same amperage etc on order. Hopefully if I swap the stock Z-stepper for a higher torque one, the problem goes away? The next phase if that doesn’t work is mechanical advantage. I’m thinking something along the following lines might be the simplest? Minimal backlash and 3:1 advantage for small $$ I might even make it in plywood to start with to prove the point and then make it properly in aluminium as phase two?
It’s kicked to the side so as to miss the spindle and it’s water cooling tubes etc. (in my pictures I need to move the stepper out a little further out to miss the spindle.
This would be connected with a GT2 9mm belt like the stock Z.
So with this idea, the stock Z is still stock, but on the back where the stepper motor normally sits is a large timing pulley with, say, 60 teeth. The stepper is mounted on the spindle side of a plate so it’s 20 tooth timing pulley can be driving the 60tooth pulley via a gt2 9mm width belt. 60/20=3 so 3:1 increase in torque from the same input force. Because it’s all short timing belts, there should be very little extra backlash / stretch compared to the stock Z setup.
I think the problem would defiantly go away if I did the ballscrew replacement Z axis, But I’d like to fix this for less $ if it’s at all possible!
If it works I might make the ballscrew actuator as a project down the track?
I actually have 3 sets of springs. I tried using just the stock springs. The spindle drops when the power goes off, but that’s not necessarily a problem. I added more springs to see if neutralising the weight of the spindle would help. It does help a bit I think. But I’m still getting missed steps. I think it’s about the right amount of spring because when the power is off, I can position the spindle at any Z height and it does not move up or down. It’s neutral. An industrial designer friend suggested I could use a counterweight perhaps? He envisaged a weight equal to that of the Z carriage including the spindle hanging from a cable going over a pulley and attached to the Z carriage. Although this would neutralise the Z carriage weight it would also double the weight and increase inertia for the X and Y movements, I don’t think I’ll be trying this one!
This video shows cutting going well, and then, failed steps on a -Z move. I’ve tried slowing everything down to a snails pace. I also tried just slowing the Z movements. To be clear, when this happens, the belt is not slipping on the timing pulley. It’s the motor missing steps.
Cool! Google video links appear to drop right in to whatever this forum software is
My decision to buy a water cooled spindle was mostly about not annoying the neighbours with the noise. Secondary was a water cooled spindle is a closed system. No dusty air being forced through the motor. Aesthetically that just makes sense. I have a plan, again mostly for the neighbours benefit to put the machine into an enclosure to minimise the noise. Enclosing a brushed trim router in a very dusty environment seems to me like a fire waiting to happen, or failing that an unhappy medium to run an air cooled motor in. With that said, I also have a plan for a dust extractor, so the dust problem goes away, but the noise problem gets worse!
I’ll do that video of powered Z movement up and down when I get a chance.
Thanks again everyone for helping me out. I’d be lost without you!
Update: I finally received both the high torque stepper and the pulley. I bought the stepper first, then looked again at it’s specs to find it has an 8mm shaft. The one from carbide is 6.35mm. No problem I thought to myself. I’ll just buy an 8mm pulley. I looked quite hard, and couldn’t buy one in Sydney Australia or from an Australian shipper at any price! So I ordered from China… but that means waiting 10-15 days unless you shell crazy money for courier delivery.
I soldered the new stepper to the pins of the carbide-supplied Z cable (I didn’t have the connecter, will rectify that soon…) It seems to work. Before I screwed it into the machine I tried to stop it turning while it was running on the bench. I couldn’t. It is seriously higher torque than the carbide motor. And this is running at lower amperage than the motor can handle. The carbide control board outputs 2.5A whereas the motor is rated for 3A. Someone told me that you can hook a higher amperage motor to a lower amperage driver, but you get an almost linear loss of torque…
The 8mm shaft meant that I had to buy a 20 tooth pulley instead of the 16 tooth one supplied by carbide. Again, slight loss of torque due to it’s slightly larger diameter - longer lever arm.
I have high hopes that this is all I’ll have to do to make my setup work reliably. While I was shipping pulleys from China I bought the belt and larger pulley so I can do the mechanical advantage thing I explained above if I have to. (but I’d prefer not to!)
There is one more thing I didn’t mention. I found a recipe that made the machine with the stock stepper work…
I was talking it over with my wife (who tolerates my interest in CNC with some grace). She said “have you tried swapping out the computer you are driving the machine with?”. Err, no… So I did. It worked! OMG something about my old laptop I guess? After kicking myself for not doing this earlier, I got to work on the routing job that had been on hold. I got my mouse from my old laptop and setup the new job on the new computer. Then, OMG it failed. Wait a minute, it worked reliably before (I did a 3d toolpath with loads of z-axis moves for about 45 mins.) The only thing that had changed was the new toolpath and the mouse… I unplugged my USB mouse and tried again. The job worked!!
I’d be interested to know if anyone else has had issues with other USB devices messing up their shapeoko? I’ve not read anything to that effect, but it’s pretty obscure. Probably I fell asleep before I read that thread! Also I never would have guessed a USB mouse might interfere.
I’ve not actually had a moment to try driving the shapeoko from the old laptop without the mouse. (and i’ve gone and messed up my control experiment by swapping the stepper in the meantime)
So after some serious frustration and the Shapeoko stopping randomly mid job, Carbide support said I was getting electro-magnetic interference or a ground loop problem. After looking up what those meant, I got a multimeter out and discovered nothing is earthed on the shapeoko. The control board is supposed to be I believe, but I could not see it when I tested. Fortunately I had added a Z-probe, one side of which is grounded. So I ended up making a holder from aluminium hanging off a grounded copper water pipe near my shapeoko. Now that my touch plate is stored in a grounded state, (still attached to the ground pin on the touchplate connection on the board, the machine works perfectly even with the old mouse that gave me gyp earlier… So weird you have to discover and jump through these hoops to make the thing work…
I grounded everything together on a marine grade grounding bar. 120v, 240v, VFD, spindle, frame, and control board. Run spindle power through my drag chain without shielding. No issues, and don’t need a ground clip for my probe.
Just installed the spindle and VFD and cannot get it to work.
If I go step by step using steveandrews settings the spindle starts up when I enter the value of 1 for PD001. I have to hit the stop button to make it stop and it never runs again. Ignores everything from the Shapeoke board and entering the value of 1 again does nothing.
Are there any updates on how to get this working? I am pretty sure I have it wired correctly since the same PWM signal starts my power supply relay just fine
Miglo mentioned needing a jumper J1 over V1. Could someone clarify this? Does he mean a jumper between them?
I think I found the jumper Miglo was speaking of. Changing its position did not help. Also, each time I power up the VFD the spindle starts and I hit the stop button to halt it. Pressing run or any series of M3 commands not the Spindle On button seems to start it again.
Setting the jumper on 1-2 keeps the spindle from starting on power up
Which of Julien’s posts? I’m having the same problem you are, and want to make sure I’m referring to the correct one. Did using his settings resolve your problem? I’m about to give up on the whole thing and get a new machine that was purpose-built to use a spindle and computer speed control.
Dan, Thanks. That’s the thread I was thinking of. I’m still having the same problem you were having; as soon as the VFD boots up, the spindle starts running, and that is with the jumper in the correct (Pin 1-2) position and PD001/PD002 both set to 1. I hit STOP on the VDF, and the spindle never runs again. I’m seeing the correct voltage from the CM board, measured both at the board with the VFD disconnected, and at VI / ACM when connected. I tried a PD 013 reset and re-entered everything, but still no joy.
I know you said you re-entered everything, it’s just a double check. Having PD011 set to something different from 0 would produce the same effect you are seeing. This is the “Frequency lower limit” parameter: the idea is that when you have an air-cooled spindle, it is important that the spindle never goes below a given minimal RPM, because then the fan would not produce enough airflow to cool the spindle when running. Since we are working with PD001/PD002 set to 1, this essentialy means that the “Run” button is ignored, and the spindle runs at whatever RPM is commanded by the VI signal from the Shapeoko. If PD011 was non-zero, when the Shapeoko sends 0V (as it does while idle), the VFD will spin the spindle at the frequency set in PD011, not 0 RPM.
This is assuming you are indeed using a water-cooled spindle. I’m sure people here who use air-cooled spindles could comment on how they setup their VFD parameters.
