I have a Shapeoko 4 Xl, and just received my upgrade to the HDZ tonight. After following Winston’s YouTube tutorial, and initializing the machine, I could hear the stepper hum, but the ballscrew wasn’t spinning. I found online (reddit?) that there was another case of this a year or so ago, but they needed a new board. Luckily I didn’t. An hour after e-mailing support at Carbide 3D (at 6:30 PM EDT), I heard back from Brandon with a suggestion to check to see if the motor was spinning. Before I took it off, i noticed that one of the set screws that hold the ballscrew to the motor was loose. I tightened it, and was off to the races.
I’m sharing this for two reasons.
1.) In case it happens to someone else.
2.) To give a shout out to Carbide 3D Support. These guys are absolutely fantastic. Fast response. Good trouble shooting. Even a video call to help me out with a previous issue. I can honestly say I have never experienced support like this before, and I couldn’t be more impressed. The machines are great for what I want to do, but the support is simply amazing. To all of you that provide it, THANK YOU! You rock.
The first run i did with my Pro XXL, the bit worked its way down in the collet and on the final pass, drove straight into the spoilboards and aluminum hybrid rails. My machine did the same thing. After about 45 min of trying to figure it out, i realized the screws holding the two together just needed to be tightened back up. The bit and aluminum rails…well they werent as lucky. But the company overnighted me two new rails and i was back to running right away. Outstanding customer service.
I used to work for Oracle. In the service department Oracle’s policy is the customer broke it and was never Oracle’s fault. Oracle really did not care if customers got mad because where were they going to go if they had millions invested in Oracle databases.
C3D takes the opposite approach that they accept responsibility even if the customer goofs up. The difference is night and day between C3D and the giant Oracle in service philosophy. Maybe that is why people love C3D and hate Oracle. Many people in the IT industry that have to deal with Oracle support usually spit when they say the Oracle name.
Keep up the good work C3D. It is much cheaper to keep an existing customer then it is to find a new customer.