I am having a strange problem with my shapeoko 3. I am fairly new to CNC. I created a sign last night and I wanted to go a little bit deeper with the V. I changed the max depth and doubled it. I saved the GCode and ran it but no matter what I do the depth did not change. I exited carbide 3D, reopened it, and the same with motion but the only way I could clear the issues was to power off the shapeoko 3 and power it back on and rerun the file. Anyone else have this issue? Could this be a firmware bug?
Hi @Mcobbjr,
Welcome to the community!
It’s extremely unlikely that this relates to the controller firmware or even to that machine power cycle. The Shapeoko controller runs GRBL firmware, which basically only does what it is told by the commands sent over the USB interface. How deep the cut will go is dictated by a) your Gcode file, b) the Z zero you set and c) the GRBL parameters for how much the Z stepper motor shall turn to move the axis by 1mm.
On a), are you positive you used the exact same G-code file the whole time ? Did you maybe re-generate it from CC at some point ?
On b), I guess you did not alter the Zero reference throughout this test ?
On c), this is set once and for all when you do the “Send Configuration” as part of machine assembly, and then those parameters are memorized in GRBL, even when power is off.
When in doubt about a particular G-code file, it is quite useful to use a G-code viewer to go and inspect what was generated. I like to use ncviewer.com, you can then navigate through the toolpath and see what G-code command this corresponds to. So for your example, by inspecting the G-code you could navigate to the deepest point of the vcarve cut, and check what Z value it corresponds to.
You should also note that v-carving is special in the way it enforces the max depth. Standard V-carve will go as deep as required such that the sides of the vbit touch the features you selected. Advanced V-carve can artificially stop before that depth, have generate flat bottom surfaced at the specific max depth. But in no case can you go deeper that the “natural” (standard) v-carve operation. Is it what happens here maybe?
Upload your c2d and .nc files here, along with information about initial depth and new depth you want to achieve, and we should be able to check.
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