Have a Creality Falcon Laser, which has a USB-C only interface. Would be nice to convert to either wifi or bluetooth. I haven’t found anything yet, but obviously, this is something you can’t install any BT/Wifi drivers on - so it would need to work “right off the bat”, and be powered by the USB-C interface on the unit. LB Console says it is a ESP32S2_V1, so any current draw (if there is ANY USB output at all on this board), would need to fit within the abilities of the board.
Any ideas?
If your board has exposed pads or pins for a serial connection you might be able to connect an ESP8266 to those and use IP with Wifi to connect. This would be basically the same as what LaserGRBL does. I suspect you’d want to use the Telnet to Serial model.
See here for reference:
WiFi with ESP8266 – LaserGRBL
Keep in mind that I have not seen anyone successfully using LightBurn with IP configuration on GRBL systems so far. Check here for background:
I have heard of Bluetooth Serial to USB modules and believe there are references to some successes on this forum for such setups. I think theoretically there could be a similar Wifi Serial to USB solution but have not seen any commercially available. I suspect a Raspberry Pi could be configured to behave this way but haven’t seen any examples of this.
Thanks - due to the dearth of information I’ve found so far, I figured it was not too successful…
dagnabit
You may want to check out this video. He describes a way of virtualizing USB devices via IP. It’s a more generalized solution but I suspect would work well. I’ve seen similar bluetooth virtualization strategies.
Converting Any USB Device to A Wireless USB using Raspberry Pi Zero - YouTube
Wow, this is a really good find.
Take some good pics of the control board. If that ESP32 has a shiny metal box around the chip or an antenna socket or circuit board trace that could be used for an antenna you may have all kinds of options. xTool has a Shiny metal box and an antenna foil on theirs but that would be an exploratory process where ‘you’re on your own’ for that one.
This is a very interesting controller. Thank you for posting.
Bottom left I see Creality, and higher on the left-hand side I see, V2.2.S2.113 ESP32-S2-MINI-1.
The ESP32 chip looks like the Dev board seen in this video.
The line on the top edge of the board in this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eq6LS3RGOrI
(Right hand edge in your picture) is the WiFi antenna.
If the box isn’t metal, you may be able to talk to the ESP32-S2-MINI-1 by WiFi. If the box is metal (or conductive) you may not be able to communicate with the existing case.
I’m not saying that the case is the only obstacle either, but it’s great to see a WiFi capable processor.
Creality hasn’t released(yet) a firmware that enables wifi on Falcon(don’t know about Falcon 2, I got the 10w version). I tried to go wireless with it using a raspberrypi zero and Virtualhere( this is a good explainer video on how to do it), but the laser either stalled after connecting with Lightburn or didn’t connect at all. I also tried all forks and iterations of USBIP. Tried both Windows and Mac. I ended up getting a 10m USB cable, connected the laser, a keypad to control it and a usb cam, everything works like a charm:)
Yes, the box is in aluminium. Would it help if i 3D print a box in PLA or something else ? How do i activate the wifi on the mainboard ??
If the firmware is not enabling the wifi it wont be very easy
Even if you could, many times the telnet port is not open
The ESp32 dont have a lot of memory to play with so some features are disabled usually
@tundrwd
Have you considered maybe going a easier way with more added features like
That is always a alternative but not right… I want to use items that i already have and dont always have to buy new stuff for something simple as a connection for my laser either with Ethernet or Wifi, soon i can start my own shop and sell things that i have that not working as intended.
understandable. Seems a feature request for Creality firmware in this case.
I would submit though is not as “simple” as it sounds, and is not advertised as such either in their product page.
I do get your point fully though
Did you look at your wifi network and see if the wifi module is transmitting? You should see it on your wifi if it’s transmitting.
Nothing here picked up anything, i tryed with my computer and phone… but it can be hidden ssid too…
I would be pressed to think the wifi is fully disabled to save on GPIO
The ESP32 is quite limited on I/O unless you go with IO expanders, which is a new layer of complexity and hardware costs.
IMHO, if it’s on, it would be stupid to hide it…
It seems to have plenty of I/O ports and clearly shows where the antenna is located…
Not all that IO is open to real use, a lot of it is internally reserved depending on the features you want to set on or off. Of course, at times the reason to close those ports is also because you MUST make it a stable platform for serial coms! Which is part 2 of the headache.
I recall, we had this issue on OLm3, and lately in Delta development, the only way to get past it was to employ IO expander code and hardware. A massive pain in the behind and we are using ESP32 S3s
Is it possible to solder in a separate ESP32 and if so, where should it be soldered to on the mainboard ?
Far from me to guide you away from a challenge, but
it won’t work, unless you have access to the source code of the firmware
And then you develop your own ESP32 to ESP32 serial coms. The 2nd ESp32 becomes a sort of repeater of GRBL stream code from lightburn to your 1st ESP32.
You will have to deal with latency of wifi, buffers… Really is just not worth it!
I would get in touch with Creality support, and ask if you could upgrade your motherboard for the 2 pro they just launched and IF that has WIfi integration with Lightburn
If not, ask if they could make it happen.
Better use of your time - imho!
