Hello Im trying to set up a Chuck rotary system for the first time with Lightburn. Ive connected the rotary and the test works and the settings are being read. I’m having an issue with trying to set the steps per rotation. When I have it set to 100 steps it rotates about 4 times when I press the test button and then I lower the steps to 90 and it wont even make a full rotation. Im
also trying to find the steps by cutting a square the circumference of the tumbler but when i send the cut to the laser I am getting a frame slop error. Im using a CamFive Laser CMA5136KT with a Ruida DSP.
Assuming you are using the Y axes for the rotary.
The idea is to replicate the same Y movement as the table on the rotary. This is usually termed ‘surface speed’.
You need to know how many steps the rotary motor needs to rotate one revolution.
You can look at that axes motor driver and determine the steps/rotation.
Once you have the steps/rotation you need to multiply that value by the gear ratio of the rotary.
Some ‘chuck’ types are direct drive, meaning one turn of the motor, one turn of the chuck. Some are not and require you to adjust it by applying the gear ratio in the computation.
If there is no ‘ratio’ to be dealt with the rotary should move one rotation and return with the ‘test’ button.
This is under ‘Tools → Rotary Setup’
My rotary is a ‘wheeled’ rotary and the gear ratio is 2.5.
With the steps/rotation and the gear ratio (2.5 * 2000 = 5000) sets how many steps to rotate the ‘wheel’ one complete turn. In my case I need to enter the ‘wheel’ diameter and the setup is complete for any size object.
For the Object diameter, use the the chuck diameter for testing.
In your case you will have to enter the diameter or radius for the computer to compute the surface speed when the diameter changes.
Make sense?
Thank you that seemed to help the steps per rotation but Im still have issues running the actual design and getting the frame slop error.
The machine still thinks you are using the ‘Y’ axes, so it can only move within it’s ‘work area’. You are attempting to ‘rotate’ it past it’s available work area. That is the ‘slop’ error. The Ruida sometimes it tells you which axes is ‘slopping’.
It’s probably where the Y axes are set prior to the attempt to run the job…
I probably do mugs and cups more than anything, but I’ve done 3/4" acrylic tubing also…
You will develop you own ‘way of doing things’ but here’s the procedure I use and should get you started…
I set my ‘Job Origin’/‘Start From’
Rotate the Y axes to the center of it’s Y range. My Y axes will go to 344mm, so I ‘move’ to about 1/2 that or 170mm and press the ‘origin’ button as my ‘user origin’. This is the ‘center’ of the Y ‘work area’.
Because I"m starting the job from the center left of the ‘design’, I place the object in the rotary, centering where I want the design and check alignment with the ‘frame’ option.
For a mug, I put the handle straight down centering the design opposite the handle. Or with a ‘stamped’ stainless logo mug, the logo goes up and I place the design above it…
Make sense?
Don’t forget the ‘press origin’ step 
When I was using a CamFive 1080K machine, our chuck rotary used a setting of 20,000 steps from the factory, so you might experiment around with that.
We tried that yesterday and it was pretty close but it did come out slightly skewed so Im going to try a little less and try again but this did help.
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