My machine keeps saying soft limit

[Cbelena85 (Chase B)]

I am seeking help from anyone who knows. I am still new to this I tried to setup my rotary tool. I did this once before with no issues now I keep getting a soft limit alarm. I tried to go to do another project and changed the settings back so I can cut some flat basswood board and I am still getting soft limit alarm. Any info is appreciated.

[baricl1317 (Loren Baric)]

Try using “Current Position” instead of “Absolute Coordinates”
Here are instructions i wrote for using a rotary.
This is a word document so remove the .txt at the end of the file name

HOW TO CUT MUGS WITH YOUR ROTARY CHUCK.txt (405.4 KB)

[thelmuth (Tim Helmuth)]

Here is an explanation for what I think is happening.
If you have a 100mm graphic, but your starting Y axis position is 90 the rotary will stop at 90mm.
You need to check the Y axis position in the move panel and rotate the rotary until you have more than enough space to run the graphic.
Let’s assume your bed is 400x400. If your origin is on the bottom of the graphic, rotate until your Y axis is close to 400. If you use center origin, rotate to 200. You don’t need exact numbers, just close, so there is enough room to run the graphic.
Your machine doesn’t know there is a rotary attached and has unlimited range of rotation, it only knows what dimensions are programmed into it.

[Cbelena85 (Chase B)]

Thank you I will try this and respond with results.

[Cbelena85 (Chase B)]

I will go back and look. Thank you.

[MikeyH (Mike Hembrey)]

@thelmuth is right, the rotary has infinite limits in the Yaxis. It also has no limit switches, so you have to turn off the Home parameter ($22=0) and soft limits ($20=0) if turned on. In Lightburn, you need to turn off the Auto-Home on Startup.

I made Macros (“Yaxis Mode” and “Rotary Mode”) to take care of the GRBL parameters.

Take a read at this, it may help.

Setting up a Rotary Chuck or Roller

I now have both a Chuck and a Roller rotary unit. I have done some testing in an effort to make some sense of the needed settings. The Chuck rotary is an xTool RA2 Pro and the Roller rotary is an Atezr KR. Both machines used are the Sculpfun S30 Pro and the SF-A9 (GRBL controllers). Because most rotary units use the same size stepper motor, this information may be relevant to nearly all setups. But no warranty. I will not get into all the stuff you have to switch when attaching the rotary here.…

[Cbelena85 (Chase B)]

I went back and looked I ended up having some of the wrong information in the wrong spot in the rotary setup. In addition I ended up turning of soft limit and auto homing. Thank you for the information I will kepp this in mind on my future projects.

[Cbelena85 (Chase B)]

This helped. I also had some of my information in the rotary setup in the wrong spots.