Hi folks, and @Onefinity there was a pretty heated topic a few weeks ago about a “bad” X assembly. The user claimed it wasn’t right, and when Onefinity sent him a new one, he again said that one wasn’t right either. 1F refunded him for the machine, but the videos remain up on YouTube. I wanted to see if I could duplicate his “issue”. First try, one take and done. The more I have seen of his videos, the more I feel like there is more going on than meets the eye. Attached is my short video that will help people hear for themselves a more objective impression of what is going on. Spoiler it sounds normal to me. I have been around the CNC hobby for over 20 years, take that for what it’s worth, but if you have concerns please watch the video.
Correct. Its just the sound of recirulating bearings. Perfectly normal on the Gen 2 machines as they have much larger bearings, and larger ball bearings inside bearing channel.
I’m pretty sure the needed free movement of these bearings is the rational behind using low viscosity lubricant rather than packing with grease. That would especially be true were they to be used in metal working environments.
@Onefinity …The oil that was in my machine pack says NOT for ball nuts. What are we supposed to use on the ball nuts? I’m assuming some sort of NGL2 grease?
Sounds crazy, but have only been able to run the laser so far. The only time I usually get is at night and I have to be somewhat quiet. Haven’t been able to cut slats for the spoil board yet. Did a little raster burn last night. Turned out ok but still very fun! Its only about 2" x 3" on scrap 2x4.
To answer my own question. I emailed @OnefinityCNC and they sent me a link to the grease they recommend for the ball nuts and ball screws. For the linear bearings and shafts they want 3 in 1 but the ball nuts they want:
I am not sure where that is in the documentation. I could not find it anywhere.
I didn’t ask but I don’t believe there are any zirk fittings for the ball nut. If you feel your current ball screw with you bare finger you can feel a light film of grease on there. A clean rag and a light coat on the ball screw is all you really want. If you are OSHA adverse like me it will probably get put on running the rag behind the ball nut while exercising the machine. The ball screws don’t need to be sopping with grease, the ball nut will pick up what it needs from the ball screw. I will probably use what they recommend because certain grease formulas won’t play nice together and I’m not smart enough to figure out what is compatible with what and why. I am surprised there isn’t more info on this.
I was really upset when I saw the video. I think Onefinity bent over backwards to help this customer. If I represented the company, I would not have been so kind. I would have required him to try to cut a test file, and if it cut correctly, told him to pound sand, or get a life… The fact that his machine made a noise that he didn’t like, IMHO, is not an excuse for a return. I don’t remember reading anywhere that Onefinity had a 100% satisfaction guaranty. I would have at least had him pay return shipping. In the video, he complained about the cost of shipping. I received my Journeyman two weeks ago. When I placed my order, I thought that $295 for shipping was expensive too. But, it arrived exactly on schedule. It was packed amazingly well. I’ve never seen so much care taken to make sure the 5 boxes arrived unharmed. This is a heavy machine. That costs money! I don’t think Onefinity makes any money on shipping, and if they do, they deserve every penny. After unpacking my machine, I felt that the money was well spent. As a previous owner of a MillRight Mega V, the Onefinity is a spaceship compared to a paper airplane. The design and engineering are truly impressive. Onefinity is a first class operation. I’m thrilled with my purchase.
The real problem in this scenario is that it costs a company money to handle issues like this one. The man hours going back and forth, restocking fees, the return shipping, etc… If this kind of thing is encouraged, or happens often, then it will ultimately result in a more expensive machine, accessories, etc. It hurts all of us. I know that I am influenced by YouTube “experts” and make many buying decisions based on YouTube research. The best response to his video, (since I assume it can’t be taken down) is for 99 current owners to make their own videos and post them. That way, his video will be the opinion of 1% of owners.
Some issues I had with his video: During the assembly portion he doesn’t even properly assemble it before trying to run it. He was trying to test it before installing the motors and didn’t plug in the z axis. He even made comments about not knowing terminology of the parts of the machine. His angry emails he sent made him look like a idiot.
I went down a rabbit hole once regarding the value of creating negative videos, particularly for folks trying to establish a YouTube presence or with an established one looking to increase the monetization value of their videos.
It showed a pretty strong correlation between negative videos and the total viewership being substantially higher than those videos that were positive, constructive or instructive. It’s an odd quirk of human nature, at least culturally in the USA, that we find a certain fascination with pursuing negative things. You’d have to do a lot more research than I did to even scratch the surface of that, but what little I read it wasn’t all for bad reasons, sometimes it’s associated with a willingness to try and understand and solve a problem, as opposed to a morbid interest in bad things.
I watched part of his video and read his posts and wonder if he may have had an unconscious bias towards finding something controversial, then latched onto the bearing noise and ran with it, rather than doing more thorough testing and research?
In any case for what it’s worth I have a Batch 2 Gen 1 Redline system that the X gantry makes the exact same noise, and yet I’ve made a handful of really nice projects so it never worried me. From the world of off-roading it kind of fell into the category of what we call “It’s just Jeep noises”.
The concern is understandable but seems to be demonstrably unjustified.
On its face the video seemed sincere, but after watching it a few times I noticed some things he was saying that were contradictory. On one hand he states he has no CNC experience so he is totally in the dark, then he says he has worked with the CNC for work and in the local maker space. I just don’t think he is as “new” at CNC as he says he is. I’m not here to bomb on anyone, so I will mostly leave it at that. However my experience with 1F has been nothing but good. They have made a few mistakes, but I worked with them and they fixed it quickly.
There used to be an old newspaper adage “if it bleeds it leads”.
Negative or controversial comments generates more comments and “eyeballs” than positive supportive conversation in the internet world hence more revenue.
Regarding the issues experienced as with any machine the setup is crucial.
Was the Y axises parallel and square? Was the base level in both directions?
I’m not an engineer but would appreciate comments from the crowd regarding torsional loading on a full bearing vs the C-shaped one. Sometimes when solving one problem you create another.
From an engineering prospective, in my case not mechanical engineer but as a computer systems engineer, sometimes you make intentional tradeoffs because the net of that decision is positive.
In essence, there is rarely if ever a perfect system, just ones that are as finely tuned as possible given engineering experience, material on hand, and the target price which defines your budget.
And at the end of the day, as you rightly point out, the law of unintended consequences is never very far behind Mr.'s Murphy and Finagle.
