More of a general thing - I’m going to be unboxing my shapeoko 5 this weekend at last, which is great!
I’ve seen various posts randomly dotted around about how the shapeoko 5 skips steps and certain people being upset. Does anyone have any information on this rumour if this is kinda a generally known phenomena I’ve missed - so you can either put my mildly concerned mind at ease or to validate the hear-say?
The majority of the cases (maybe every case) we have seen are:
Having run the FB Group for going on a decade, I 100% agree with @robgrz.
More than half of the time the linear rails and bearings are dry on a machine that has not been maintained properly. Also, the machines look to ship with an anti-corrosion grease on the linear rails. Getting some proper waylube (they recommend Mobile Vactra #2) in the bearing blocks and on the rails after assembly is a good idea.
People pushing the machine harder than it is capable of. It’s what I would say is a prosumer (pro consumer) class machine. If you try to go too fast, too deep, have a dull tool (it has happened to me), or stall a spindle…thus causing skipped steps.
Another one is that the owner does not square up the machine during assembly. That can introduce a ton of friction that causes skipped steps. I admit his has also gotten me. After squaring up my V1 HDM I went from frequent skipped steps in Y, to none in months.
another though that almost drove me crazy: deep narrow cuts. And then an downcut bit. The bit pushes down chips and dust, and gets stuck, one can happen: the bit pulls itself downwards, and out of the collet, causing an erratic deep cut, what of course cannot be managed by the hardware any more. Another can happen: the dust/chip pile blocks the bit from being moved forward, skipping steps and causing a desaster.
To avoid this always design pockets with at least 1.5 times the width of the bit for contours, or just for slots at the size of a bit use the next smaller bit and design a pocket.
Believe me, I was there. And still last night I cut a tray with a pocket as a contour, cut with a roughing upcut bit: still the dust was compressed that hard that I had to scrape it out with a screw driver.
CICworkshop videos provide some speed and feed recommendations from a lot of experience for wood, although from an industrial production approach to save time.
This topic was automatically closed 30 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.