I’ve set my zero to the lower Left and made sure X,Y & Z are set to zero. When I start the job the Z motor moves off to the left of the work piece, what am I doing wrong? I want to use the CNC rig to drill PCBs, the hardware is a 3018 Pro CNC which is GRBL 1.1F (£139 from Ebay).
For a standard 3018, the zero position is back right. You can set an arbitrary position as 0,0, but the direction of the axes don’t change. You would need to invert all axes to get this behavior.
I’m going to show my utter lack of knowledge, but how would I invert all axes? Thanks…
Hello and Welcome,
LightBurn as a laser controller does not have a drilling operation. Are you running our new CNC app MillMage?
The Z-Axis is usually vertical. Occasionally the assembly instructions are weak for these devices. Are these instructions online? Do you have a link handy?
Reversing the direction of the axis is possible on most controllers but there are likely much better paths to your goal. .
There are settings that may be available depending on how the manufacturer has set up the firmware in the controller. The axis settings are critical and there are three sets of them. If the controller allows you to adjust the settings, the settings may revert to the ‘factory settings’ when the device is restarted and/or when the settings are reset by the RST commands.
Thank you, we all start somewhere.
Before considering reversing the axes, a test to confirm the coordinate system matches the device is a recommended step.
In LightBurn (or MillMage), open the Move window and set the jog distances to 10mm and the speeds to 120mm/min. If you’re working in inches, 1/2 an inch and 30 inches/minute are fine for this test.
Use the jog buttons in the Move window to Jog the device. Confirm that the device is applying the correct units and is moving the spindle relative to the work area correctly in all three directions.
A 3018 can be disorienting because jogging the Y-Axis Down (Toward you) moves the bed of the device Up (away from you). The spindle is closer to the front edge of the work. In terms of where the spindle is compared to the workpiece, the behavior is expected and correct.
When the origin setting is not identical to what the device is expecting, any axis can behave as if it is reversed. It is vital to test the jog behavior in the Move window and confirm the origin is set correctly before proceeding.