XY-Plotter 2.0, with laser kit waiting

#1

I’m about at my wits end here, I have followed so much stuff from here going in circles.
I went through the setup without much of a problem but decided I should stop before adding the laser kit to be sure everything was working.
I loaded up one of the firmware images first using the benbox software, all I got was studdering when I attempted to move the plotter.
Guessing that perhaps it was something with benbox, and after finding something that said the benbox stuff was for advanced users, I went back and installed some arduino code onto the board, one of the many gcode sketches available. I got the same result, but managed to get the x axis to move fairly reliably. The Y axis however does nothing but jump around. Shortly after this, the stepper stopped working, and pushing the head I could easily move it around along the Y axis. So I made the assumption that I did something wrong, and seemed to be able to narrow it down to the stepper driver board by moving things around and testing. I ordered 2 new ones, which showed up but also found the current adjustment. using that I was able to get it to hold position well, but am unable to get that axis to move reliably, the way I expect. Clicking the same direction makes it jump back and forth over about an inch or two, randomly changing directions. I also purchased another stepper, however it behaves the same way.
I have also tried adjusting the tension on the timing belts, to no avail. always the same result.
If there are any suggestions, please let me know otherwise I guess I will be putting all this junk away and working towards purchasing a real unit.

RawLiquid

#2

Hi @RawLiquid,

Please follow the instruction to check whether you have the wrong connection of wiring. Especially for the microstep resolution of stepper motor driver.

Instruction, http://learn.makeblock.cc/laserxy2/

#3

And the sequence of the stepper motor wiring is also very important. Please do not misorder it.

#4

Thank you for the reply, I did check and re-check that I had the wires correct, I even swapped the motors since the X axis works fine, and the problem stayed with the Y axis. What is even more strange is that while it seems to be possibly too much load, I even tried disconnecting the motor coupling so there is no resistance, and it behaves exactly the same way.

#5

Thanks for the reply, Yes I did verify that I had this set correctly, and had very limited success by increasing the step size, however while it somewhat reduced the erratic behavior, It didn’t eliminate it, so I put it back to the HHL position.

#6

I don’t suppose you know which board is the most recent one, and which is a better one to be using between the uno based Orion, and the leonardo based base board?

#7

Hi.I am so sorry!
There is a tip for you to adjust stepper motor.
1.For Stepper motor, you can adjust the screw (knob) in + direction to increase the electric current, and increase the output torque of stepper motor.

2.The new version of the software is still some BUG, so we still suggestions that you use an older version of the software.
http://learn.makeblock.cc/laserxy2/

#8