I just set up the new machine and updated the firm ware. I cut a 32.5” x 32.5” MDF spoil board and centered it in the machine, 1” setback from the front of the Y gantry edge. After homing I place the touch probe on the corner of the waste board, center a 1/4 bit a couple of mm over the probe and hit the “Probe XYZ” button. It probes Z, then X, then Y, and then it displays the “X axis position is -4.777 than minimum soft limit.”
I’ve tried rebooting the machine, I’ve looked up all of the videos on YouTube and searched the forum here first. I don’t know what to do at this point.
The XYZ probe is only for the bottom left, you cannot use it for the center (so it’s assuming your in bottom left). You’ll need to use the eyeball method for that.
I only have the onefinity test file in the drop down.
I just cut the waste board down to 32” and I think it’s working. It slammed home a little hard after the probe, but I didn’t have any errors. Going to try to flatten the wasteboard and see what happens.
charleyntexas
(Charley Thomas (Onefinity/Triquetra Touch Probe))
8
My companion software will allow you to place your touch plate normally (Left Front Corner) and have a resulting Origin (XYZ Zero located anywhere your spindle can reach. This also includes zeroing to the center of a circle. You can also use the touch plate on the right corner and have a right front corner zero location. “Infinite Possibilities” right!?
The file I will be cutting starts at the lower left, which is why I’m attempting to use the touch probe in the lower left corner.
I’m just following the videos I’ve seen and doing a very small number of steps before hitting an issue.
What I’m attempting to do is:
Turn on machine.
Home machine.
Probe XYZ.
There’s no file in this workflow yet. I can’t get the machine to do this basic steps so I haven’t attempted a file.
After cutting down the spoil board to 32” square, I try the workflow outlined above and hit the error for the Y axis now. This leads me to believe I have the spoil board placed incorrectly on the table top (yes, touch probe on lower left corner).
What is the exact distance the spoil board edge should be placed in relation to the front of the Y gantry?
If your cutting the maximum extremes, you can’t use the touch probe because after it probes it will jog the bit to the front left…but since your probing the extreme there is no room for it to return to the front left. Try zeroing without the probe.
I have found it extremely helpful to have a full size wasteboard, home x and y, set up the laser and print a grid of 10mm lines for y and x. I now know where every 10mm crossing is on my wasteboard which makes everything so easy to line up. Now you can pick, say the 200x mm line crossing the 200 y mm line, center the bit over that intersection and 0 out x and y. Use the cross hair lines to line up your work piece, zero z and your good to go. Works very well for me.
@ Ryan You said you set back 1" from the front edge. I’m a newbe also. If you look at the fine line on my spoil board it is the limit of my machine which is about 1 3/16 (+/-) from the edge of the Y foot. You are asking the machine to move past its limit. I have the spoil board topped with another 3/4 MDF scrap which I will call the scrap board. If you are a rookie like me you will chew it up in no time and it is easily replaced. I don’t work to the limits of the machine which is aprox 3 1/8 not 3 1/2 and you’ll see my scrap board starts about 2 1/4 form the limit of the machine. Hang in there it will all work out.
Thanks for the reply. This was from November 2020. I’ve since moved past this issue. What was most helpful was the advice to cut a small mark at the extreme edges of x and y. This helped me figure out the exact cutting area. Next I needed to understand the toolpath and bit size mattered as well when creating a file to flatten the board.
Hello,
I received my Onefinity and have now set it up over the weekend. This is my first CNC. On the weekend, I did 2 test cuts for my threaded wasteboard. Both cuts worked perfectly with no issues. These test pieces were on top of what is going to be my wasteboard and we’re attached via glue and tape method. My wasteboard is screwed down to my table top. I used the probe to probe xyz on both cuts. I then went to carve the full threaded wasteboard and while probing xyz from the front left corner which is also what my file is setup as, I keep getting this error. I also tried moving my work 0 rather than right on the front left corner to just inside the from corner and then just probed Z and again am getting the error.
I use Easel to create the file. When I created my wasteboard, I first put in a v bit to create a small grove around the perimeter of the table so I knew what the maximum cutting area is and then cut my wasteboard and attached it to the table top long the grove.
I am stuck as not sure what is causing the issues.
I guess I am still confused after reading the link to the other topic. I first received Z position error message when using the probe but when I just manually zero X and Y and just probe for Z, I then get the error message about the X axis.
I also created some wasteboard toolpaths in Easel. I created shallow 1" diameter pockets and 5/16" “drills” (pockets created by an endmill) to fit a bunch of 1/4-20 Tee Nuts on the bottom-side of the wasteboard.
I haven’t finished all the operations yet, but I set up my surfacing profile like this:
I set a custom bit at 3/4" diameter, though I’m actually using a 1" diameter flattening bit. I did this to “trick” the Easel software in order to flatten the four corners which would have been rounded-over if I had set the bit in Easel to 1". In this way, the 1" bit will overhang the edges of the wasteboard by around 1/8". I used a 100% stepover value to overlap each pass by 1/8" since, again, the software thinks I’m using a 3/4" bit.
Since my wasteboard is also at my machine home position basically (as it seems yours is too since we both did the V-Bit method to find the full extents of the cutting area), I just jogged the machine to the home position, then on the slow-setting, jogged the X and Y inward (positive, + movement) by a few thousandths of an inch. Looks like you’re showing a soft limit error of about 0.33 mm 0.013"), so manually jog it in maybe 0.5mm in the X and Y directions. Then use the manual zero buttons to set that as your X and Y zero.
Depending on how you set your file up, this may leave you a sliver of material at the edges of the wasteboard to sand/chisel off. This is why I set up the toolpath with a 3/4" diameter bit in Easel, but used a 1" wasteboard bit in reality - to ensure it overhangs the wasteboard.
I also found that these little flattening bits I bought have a pretty short shank, and I had trouble lowering the router low enough to not hit the soft Z limit after probing with the actual bit. My plan here is to either slightly lower the soft limit in the controller setup panel (change it to about 140mm since I had the same issue you’re seeing, but I’ll make VERY sure my actual toolpath doesn’t cause the Z slider to approach the bottom of the Z carriage) or use a 1/4" bit extension that I just ordered. That may introduce runout/wobble, but it will make sure I’m far from the bottom-Z soft limit.
I’m curious how you set up your toolpaths, and how you’re designing your wasteboard.
