Maisonvi "Build" Thread

[maisonvi]

Bit of an update. I dont get to use the mill as much as Id like, but Ive made a hand full of parts. Few thoughts on things as they are now. I understand this is a hobby mill and have defended Langmuir against some people who seem to expect a $40k+ Haas or something.

That said, paying for full assembly it wasn’t too bad to dial in, and get running, but right now its leaking in 3 separate places, one of them being on top of the controller. Not sure the best plan to seal this, but Langmiur needs to make sure they dont ship parts like this. Its a simple thing to do at assembly, but not as easy now that its up and running.

Also weird thing, not sure what happened, was running a part that Ive run a few times already. Its all done with 1/2" two flute cutter. I watched it do the facing part, then it goes down and clears out the center. Randomly I watched the cutter decide to go down the center hole and just send it into the part. Z decided to just be 1" lower for some reason. No idea what happened. Re-set up a new part and ran the exact same program, and it ran fine. So thats…worrying…

[maisonvi]

Well this is frustrating. 3h in on a 14h machine of a 4140 chunk of 4x4x1.75 steel and the machine decides that X zero is now 4" to the south of where it was. Stepped away for a min and came back to the machine cutting air.

Im using in the recommended window of Langmuir’s stuff. 3/8 cutter with 50IPM and .04 step over, .05" depth of cut. No idea why it just decided to do this, but Im pretty sure it just scrapped a $100 chunk of material. Kinda pissed. No idea if/how Im going to re-zero my Z.

Ive had Z randomly move on me and now X. This is not ok.

[Bigdaddy2166]

I was reading through your post and came across a screenshot of your MR1 computer specs. I noticed that you only have 4 GB of RAM installed. I am wondering if your computer is running out of RAM to finish some of these complex jobs. I have 16 GB in all my machine computers. I don’t know if it is all related to the machine losing its place—just a guess. Maybe Jake could chime in on this one?

Hell, Windows uses almost 2 GB alone to operate.

[maisonvi]

Im not using that computer as I havent been been able to get to get CC to work on it. Using my work laptop.

Im even more confused now. I went back after making that post expecting to have to sort out how to zero it, but the zero was in the same place. So thats good, but also i have no idea what happened.

I re-wrote the program using .025 deep steps and its been running ok for 3h now. Going to take 2x as long, but seems like it will work.

[Bigdaddy2166]

I’m sure you got this. I’m sorry for the 4140 scrap. I have scraped some good metal myself.

[maisonvi]

The hits just keep on coming. Got it all squared up, start running the now 13h program and 4.5h in it pauses and I get this code. Stops the program and makes me re-home the machine.

As you can see, there is nothing wrong with the line of code, so i dont know what it was on about.

Ive only run 3 or 4 small parts up to this point and for the most part things have been fine. Trying to run this part has been a nightmare.

Now i either start it again and let it cut air for 4h, or i try and edit the code to get it to start closer to the stop point. Either way, super fun.

[maisonvi]

Ended up going to try to run a new shortened program. Mill told me i need to home it, i did.

Clicked to load a new program and before it even loaded (let alone me hitting run) the spindle turned on and it took off into my part. Tried to stop it but cut control was frozen. So i had to hit the E stop, which in Langmuirs wisdom is put behind the monitor on the back of the machine. Needless to say, now im out $100 in material and a $50 end mill with nothing to show for it.

Endmill going 50 ips and cutting probably 3/8" deep makes some exciting sparks.

I have no idea what to do now. Even with a new block of material and end mill, i dont trust the machine to run my program all the way through.

[Bigdaddy2166]

I can say that I have never run a 60k line of code part as of yet. I see you are using Solidworks so I am no help there. It has to be a computer problem. Issue is probably not Cut Control but a data processing issue with the computer. I know this does not help. Maybe Jake can touch base with you soon. Are you making a putter? Sounds like a cool project.

[Skipshift]

I have yet to upgrade to the latest CC. Kind of leery of it after reading some of this stuff.
I’ve run over 45k line programs on the LS mini PC and haven’t had those kind of problems.
I have only experienced the touch screen “hanging” and re-touching a button after I’ve touched it. Sometimes minutes later.
Nothing like reaching in to take a part out and having the spindle kick back on by itself. There was a little pucker factor on that one.
Edit to clarify the spindle turning on. I had manually faced off some material and had used the touch screen options to set spindle speed and had pressed the toggle spindle button when I was done. The buttons stay highlighted after you tap them, so when the touch screen glitched it reclicked the toggle and kicked the spindle back on. Ever since, I make it a point to touch somewhere with no buttons on the screen after I issue any commands.

[paranoid56]

i would say move that estop to the front. no idea why that is so hidden. one of the first mods i ever did. after braking a nice 3/8" bit in half i moved that damn thing lol

[maisonvi]

Once I had to make the steps smaller, this opp with the 3/8" cutter is 168k lines long. Its for sure not short. G-code simulator says it 14h long.

And yeah, the goal is to make my brother a putter for christmas. Im glad I got a jump on it, because I might have to out source it at this point.

[maisonvi]

Yeah, its a really dumb design and they should either add a 2nd one, or move it to the front on future builds. Ill have to look into doing the mod to add one, I havent looked at what it takes.

[AnimalMother]

at this point id have to suggest its the GRBL being the weak point. think that big of a 3d adaptive might be too complex for this basic level control. just a wild ass guess I have nothing to back that up with

[maisonvi]

Well I posted on FB because I didnt have my computer, but again, the machine decided to destroy stock and a $40 cutter this weekend. 8.5h into the program and it was running great (13h total estimated time)

I look over to the mill and there is some serious steam coming off, which is odd. Turns out, it decided to lose its X position by about 1/2" for a couple of steps and was taking 1/4" full slotted cuts or more right into my part. I didnt catch it at first due to all the flood coolant blocking the view, but when I paused it to see why it was cooking coolant I saw my part and tool ruined. Checked the zero after I was done and it was shifted ~1.5" off to the left, so the motor is losing position some how. Same thing happened in the y direction on the last part.

At this point Im just pissed off. Its now ruined $80 in cutters, $100+ in material, and at least 20 hours of my time. I have nothing to show but some scrap metal blocks, and have no direction for a solutiuon. And at this point, and not really confident enough in the mill to actually work well enough to justify putting things in it that it wont destroy.

Ive said that Ive pushed back on people thinking this machine should be a $40k Haas, and that its just a hobby mill, but at this point, its not much more useful to me than a show piece in my garage. Maybe an aluminum only type mill.

I checked my code and its fine as best I can tell. I sent an email (slightly angry at 10pm at night after 9 hours of working on a part) with my code and some pictures to see if they have any idea what to do, so we will see.

All in all, I think Im just very disappointed that using Langmuir’s recommendations, and giving it all the time to make a nice part, I just end up with wasted money and time.

Here are the settings I used. Maybe someone can tell me where I messed up if I did. I can even post the code if anyone wants.

4140 Steel.
3/8" Carbide 4 flute cutter
3700 RPM
25 IPM
0.04" Max step over
0.08" Max depth of cut

Open to suggestions on what to do to make me not just look at selling this and trying to find a used Tormach or something. I know Ive had a few complaints (leaking seals, terrible door design, lack of canned g code in Cut control) but for the price, if it worked, this would be a killer machine.

[maisonvi]

It was suggested that I might need to move to the high power drivers. I wonder if this would fix my issue? Annoying to have to spend another $200+ to make the machine work, but if that would do it I would be happy to have a reliable working machine.

Still partially waiting on Langmuir to see if they see something else wrong with things before I spend the money

[langmuir-jake]

Hey I just replied to your ticket in our online help system so take a look there when you have a minute. Looking at the forum posts I agree that high powered drivers would definitely help your situation. 25IPM is on the higher side of what we recommend for 4140 so the motors are likely skipping steps.

[maisonvi]

Thanks for getting back to me, I just replied to your email. For reference to what I asked in the email, I used what the recommendation for feeds and speeds were on your sheet. I just took ~20% off the high end and assumed it was good (25IMP vs 30 and 0.08" depth vs 0.1). Is there a recommendation for what is a “safe” speed and feed to know for future? Just put it in the middle of the range?

Thanks

[langmuir-jake]

No problem. Back 20% off of the max feed rate is a good call so the standard drivers must have just been on the edge. If you’re taking the full cut in tougher material then I would start on the low end of the suggested feed and see how it cuts. If everything is going great, then you can start increasing it while the program is running to find that sweet spot.

Thanks again for your patience.

[paranoid56]

also what cutter are you using?

[maisonvi]

https://www.nemic.net/p/fire-3705/398658

This 3/8" cutter.