[MichaelRytter]

Hi Folks....
I have had my laguna Swift for 4 years now, made probably about 500 crib boards without a glitch, and now suddenly in the last 2 days, on the hole drilling toolpath, it will be humming merrily along....AND SUDDENLY DIVE straight down.....this is random....I can be running multiple boards, and it will have nicely completed the drill path on number 1, running along nicely on the second....and suddenly, randomly dive!

It also does it when I am just running single boards.....sometimes halfway thru, or 1/3.....just random.

All the other paths seem fine...cutout (profile), 3d roughing and finishing....all seem to work well.

I checked for lose wires going to the Z motor, all fine.... And I haven't changed any settings in Aspire....plunge is 30 mm/sec, using peck drilling, retract is 0.02, pass depth is 0.25, cut depth 0.4......

This is so strange....one would think that if Aspires path output files were messed up, the whole drill path would not work as it should at all. And if the controller is getting flakey, why does intensive stuff like 3d cut fine?...(It would really be a mess....but it seems fine)! It is just the drill path (so far)!
Thanks for ANY HELP (LOL!)
Mike
Here are a couple pics of what it does....
Attachment 337308
Attachment 337310

[mactec54]

MichaelRytter

Post the program it may have something that is a that is causing this

[MichaelRytter]

Thanks! I pulled the head cover off to see if the drive pulleys on the z motor and the z screw are maybe slipping once in a while, and they're not (they have keyways as well as tap screws into the pulleys), but in doing so, I discovered my Z screw bearings are rough and grindy...with metal shavings in one (pls forgive my terminology...self taught...I'm guessing as to what everything is called! LOL!)

So I have pulled and am replacing them. I am also checking the stepper to see if it is weak or maybe dropping steps....

As for the file...how do I do that in Aspire? Do you want the saved .crv3d file, or the output file for the machine? (in this case for the Laguna, a .mmg file) or is there some way to generate the plain G code and save it as txt. I also have a desktop shark and I think it's control panel lets you do that....(save the Gcode as txt..or at least look at it line by line before you run it)

The thing is, the reason I think it may be mechanical....this is happening randomly on all drilling paths in multiple different projects...and if I do run the same project twice, it happens in entirely different places each time. If a line of code was bad, wouldn't this happen in the same place every time the project is run? (Again, just guessing here.... self taught and maybe completely wrong! )

What would make Aspire suddenly produce bad code just in one toolpath type? (I'm asking cause I really don't know....) If this isn't mechanical, I am worried it may be the controller (RichAuto A11E), or maybe the Z driver, all of which are easy to replace, but probably hard to get! (And expensive). Thing is, I am not getting any errors on the controller. Thanks for any ideas you guys have....I'll keep you updated as I go...hopefully it is the bearings...

Michael Rytter

Posts: 2
Joined: Tue Jan 31, 2012 8:58 am
Model of CNC Machine: Shark Pro Plus

[mactec54]

MichaelRytter

If the Ballscrew is bad then that could be the problem, it could be jamming and loosing steps, but that could happen any time not just at the end of the last few holes, for posting the program open it in note pad, Ctrl A will select the whole program then Ctrl C and past it in a reply here, it would not be the first time a program has a problem it is quite common even it worked many times before they can still have problems, and it to could be the controller also, just eliminate one thing at a time and you will get it in no time