I assembled my Elite Journeyman according to the official assembly video. After screwing in the front feet, I pushed the X rail to the back to “square up” the machine. I then checked for square running a tape measure from corner to corner as shown on the video.
It appears that on one side, I’m approximately 3/16 of an inch off from the other side. My question, how accurate should this be? How should I adjust to make them equal?
In the official video, it didn’t appear much effort was applied to checking down to the 16th but that could be just for production of the video. I’ve watched at least 4 other assembly videos. Some don’t even check square using this method. But at the end of the day, NONE of the videos talk about how to correct the issue if it isn’t square or what is considered, out of square for this machine.
Any advise from the experienced masses, is greatly appreciated.
With one of the Y rails secure to the table you either push or pull the other Y rail front to back until the diagonal measurements are the same, the closer the better.
Pat
With the screws holes already introduced to the wood, do you think I can make that much of an adjustment without the screw going back into the same piece of wood and pulling it back?
the best thing would have been to search the forum for squaring. As of this writing, the first hit on the search is → this thread from the other day, which deals with rectangularity (“squaring”) of the machine and leads to other threads on the topic.
The key to a squared machine is to first lay out the squared geometry for the holes with a punch, drill the holes and only then assemble the machine.
Best is to rely on the individual measurements made from your machine since the dimensions in the manuals could be not 1000% correct as sometimes the anodized aluminium blocks could be a very little off on the chrome-plated steel hollow shafts. Possibly if the distance between the front and the rear anodized aluminium block is not identical on left Y and right Y rail, you may adjust that first (with the rail on a granite plate), so that the squaring by ensuring identical diagonals works.
By the way, I would not recommend to use the screws for the feet that are delivered with the machine. It is better to use bolts instead. Here is the cross section of a Onefinity CNC foot:
Repair hole: If you have a hole in wood that is not at the correct location, you drill it out to the next larger diameter, glue a cylindrical wood dowel into it, let the glue dry, saw off the excess with a flush-cut saw (dowel saw) or a Kugihiki, sand it, and repunch.
Imagine you mill something that is a rectangle. How much do you want the side not to be square to the front? 1/10th" after one foot? Or imagine you want to mill a wooden box with a wooden lid. How square should it be so that the lid fits? If the box is a parallelogram instead of a rectangle, because your machine is not squared, and you milled the lid upside down (which would be logical as its pocket is on the underside), the parallelogram would be in the other direction, and the lid would not fit. It will only fit if the machine is squared.
Circling back on this. The original post says this is an Elite build, which is supposed to have auto-squaring. @CommittotheIndian were you able to confirm that machined rectangular parts have equal diagonals? Or measure across pins on the diagonals? Would be really great to understand how well the Masso can solve mechanical squaring issues. How much can it account for? 3/16” difference sounds like a lot to me, but still begs the question what is Masso capable of?
Masso’s auto squaring does not allow for or use offsets like some other controller/software solutions. It will depend on how square you make your machine to start with. Once I did that on my machine, I fine tuned it by adjusting the positions of my proximity sensor triggers, and a 60 cm precision straightedge using the 345 triangle method. I do not have an Elite, so do not know if they have allowed for any adjustment of the IR sensors.
Here is how the auto-squaring works. The answer was given by Masso support (@CNCNutz) in their forum:
The squaring of the axis has nothing to do with when the sensor is triggered or the difference in distance travelled to reach the sensor. It has to do with the back off. Lets say the Y axis is triggered first. It stops and waits for the B axis to arrive. Once both sensors are triggered MASSO starts to back each axis off the sensors and it has to do this within 10mm or it will alarm. It is the point at which the sensor returns to low that is the square reference point. As each sensor turns low the axis stops and waits for the other axis. Once both axis sensors are low the axis is now square and both Y & B axis move the specified pull off distance. Once the pull off distance is reached the axis machine coordinates are set to the values specified in the Home Position for that Axis. The pull off distance should not be used as a way to correct sensor position because it forces the axis to twist out of square and then back into square each time you square the axis.
Ah super helpful. That is an interesting method! Not what I was expecting based on the term “auto” in the feature name. This still fully depends on the mechanical tolerances and assembly of the machine.
I just did the 345 method on my Journeyman. Very useful method. I’d like to revisit it with the method in this video, attaching some calipers to a long bar to dial things in even more.
Thanks for the insight @TMToronto !
Easy enough to print new trigger arms longer and trim to desired length, I took great pains to square my machine and have no issues for what I do.
Thanks, Pat
I wasnt saying the switch has ½" movement, i was saying I’ve experienced have about ½" movement before it gets alarmed where y wasnt moving but b was…
You could move the switch forward if you wanted, just play with the screws positions, so you have 3 places they can mount to, at least I’m pretty sure their all threaded the same. Why you would want to do that, i don’t know, but you could.