Good evening. I was wondering if this ever happened to anyone. I have made hundreds of wood flags with no problems. Today, I made a large flag that I have done several times and the stars came out and much smaller than they normally do. I ran through my set up a second time and it worked fine. Just curious what that could’ve been thank you.
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Difficulty in how the zero was set when changing to the V tool?
Lost steps after the tool change due to mechanical interference?
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Thank you. Must have been one of the two.
When I carve the stars, I like to set my Z-Zero in the center of the Union. The wood is never 100% flat, and by setting the Z-Zero in the center, I have found that the stars look more even.
I started doing that after I had a union where the bottom left was about .0625 lower than the top right. The stars looked weird, and the lower left was a lot smaller than the upper right. Now, I set Z-Zero at the center of all Unions.
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Hello Anthony- I use a bit setter and have never set Z-Zero in the center of my union- Please excuse my ignorance but how is that done? Im assuming after I set x,y in the lower left with the bit setter I manually set zero in the middle of the union?
Set your X,Y,Z as usual.
Once it cycles through the bit setter, I manually Jog the machine over to the center of the union.
Put a piece of paper below the bit and lower the bit onto the paper until it just gives some resistance as you slide the paper back and forth. Then set just the Z again.
Alternatively, you can just set the x and y with the bit zero. Then repeat the z in the center of the union.
Thank you. Appreciate it!
One last question- I promise. I will be doing a college flag tomorrow using your method for the stars. I typically do the stars first- after the stars are complete do you set zero again in the lower left before you do stripes, logo, wording etc.?
I believe the lesson from this is any design aspect which is sensitive to surface variations should have the Z-axis origin re-set at the central point of the design.
Usually stripes are cut deeply enough that where Z is set won’t matter.
Yes. Makes sense. Thank you again.
It depends on how warped the wood is.
I usually only set the z-zero in the center of the union because of the pattern of the stars. It’s easy to see if the stars get distorted over the Union area. Most logos do not have a repeating pattern, making minor imperfections harder to notice. If there are some minor imperfections, I can manually sand them out.
Wow! Followed your advice on a wood flag today- stars came out perfect!. Everyone was same size and had a razor sharp point. Wish I asked about this sooner. Thank you again for the help! This forum is awesome.
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Well, I may have spoken too soon lol although each starhas a sharp tip, The stars on the top of the union are about quarter of an inch smaller than the ones at the bottom. I set the zero in the middle so obviously that was the High Point and then above and below that we’re obviously lower. I guess there’s not much I can do about that.
Another trick is to group the stars in either rows or columns and reset the zero for each toolpath.
IE select all the bottom rows of stars, set your z-zero, and carve. Repeat for all the rows.
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Honestly, sounds like the wood you are using varies too much in thickness and in straightness. I’d recommend surfacing your material, first, too remove that issue.
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