Good morning.
I just assembled the Shapeoko 3 this weekend and noticed that when I manually move the X and Y carriage there is some binding that happens with the belts. I did try to relax the tension and also tighten the belts with the same results.
Has anyone had a similar issue?
Note I have not powered up the machine or run any programs yet.
Hi Dereck,
It is a good idea to do a movement test as you’ve described before powering up for the first time.
Is it the timing belt or the drag chain that are binding?
Can you post a picture?
Is it a jerky bind/unbind feeling?
It’s probably the stepper motors back-feeding EMF into the controller board.
It’s normal.
If it’s still binding with the belts removed, then your v-wheels might be a little tight.
I’ve also found that this happens if belt tension isn’t nicely even on the Y-axis belts.
I removed the belt clips and centered the X and Y carriages. Then made sure the belts had an equal amount of slack and re-tensioned them until the belt had a good amount of snap when you pluck them. This seems to have solved the problem. I also relaxed the V-wheels a bit.
Note: My Shapeoko 3 does not have adjustable height stepper motor mounts. So adjusting the height was not an option during the build.
