I will start off by saying, I am not great at the settings in LightBurn or very computer-savvy in general. So if it seems like I’m confused on something, I probably am. I’m not totally useless with computer stuff, but I know enough to get by and I make my best attempts lol.
I have had my laser for a year now. Its a C02 100w, 900x600mm bed with a Ruida controller, “No Name” machine straight from China. It was practically plug and play, I was using it with LightBurn pretty quickly upon setting it up. I don’t use the controller much, basically only use it to position and I do the rest from LightBurn. I learned using a diode laser over two years ago, so this is just how I learned to operate with LightBurn. A few weeks ago, my auto-focus motor was starting to run slow occasionally and eventually start working normally again later on in the day. This was almost every day. It was a little annoying because it made the focusing not work well and I would manually have to focus. I should have just rolled with it, because I opened up a whole can of worms. I was pretty sure it was a software bug, so I contacted the manufacturer of the machine (via WhatsApp messenger, seems that’s how the Chinese prefer to communicate). They wanted to send me parts, but finally I convinced them that I want to try a reflash or update first before paying for the shipping of warranty parts. With my past experience working on cars, it just made sense to me. So they told me to do a factory reset on the Ruida controller, and told me how to do it. But they didn’t think to warn me to backup everything in my program first, and I didn’t think of it myself either. This wiped everything it knew and it was way out of whack, rendering the machine unusable. I didn’t expect it to wipe everything, it was not quite what I was asking of them. So after several nights of going back and forth with them trying to get the settings right using their preferred engraving program “RDWorks”, I was able to use the machine again. The machine at least knows its boundaries and homes as it should, but it now engraves as if it has a bad stepper or loose belt. I checked everything, all seems fine. And knowing it was working fine BEFORE the reset, I began suspecting its not hardware. So I ran a test in RDWorks and also in LightBurn by engraving a square with each. It engraves great in RDWorks, but looks poorly in LightBurn. Basically, the engraving using LightBurn has gaps/lines in it and is not smooth and even all the way across. The engraving settings are the same in each program. Sometimes the engraving in LightBurn will start out fairly smooth and then the lines start, or the opposite…but the lines seem to have no real steady “rhythm” or pattern to them and are random, if that makes sense. The squares shown are using a 90/vertical path. I tried a 0/horizontal path (in LightBurn) and that seems to make jagged lines, which is shown in the image of the bible verse. I don’t want to resort to RDWorks, I can’t seem to open any of my projects there due to incompatibly with all my LightBurn files, and overall its confusing to me. If someone out there can help me figure out what’s going on and what settings may need adjustment, I would really appreciate it. If you have the LightBurn parameters/machine settings file that is for a 900x600 & Ruida RDC6445SC, that would be fantastic. I looked over the settings some, but honestly, a lot of it still looks like a foreign language to me, and I would just be playing around for days trying to get it right. I can provide more test photos and screenshots of settings in each program, if needed.
Thank you in advance for any help you can provide.
You said you used the same settings in both - Can you post a screen shot of the settings used in both apps? (double-click the Cuts/Layers entry in LB and take a screen shot, and do the same in RD, so we can compare).
Alternately, click ‘Save RD File’ in LightBurn, and click ‘Save to UFile’ in RDWorks, and attach both files here. (You’ll likely have to change the extension to .txt so the forum will allow them to be attached).
Screenshots below of each program’s output settings. These settings are what was applied when I engraved each square shown in my first post. It is a little hard to see, but the top square (LightBurn), is mostly smooth at first and then the lines show up. This happens with everything I engrave, portions will be smooth and other portions are not. Also, notice the image below that (with the words) and you can see the jagged letters. Though it may appear so, its not hardware, because if it were, it wouldn’t be so smooth the whole time in RDWorks with that bottom square. I checked over the belts numerous times and the stepper motors were fine before this whole reset went down. To help show the issue more, I have included another test sample photo below. Notice the lower box. That one was engraved at a horizontal (0) path, which is how the bible verse was also set to engrave. The lower square has jagged sides (ignore the little slither coming from the lower right of the square), this is LightBurn. The one above it is RDWorks, just stopped the machine before letting the square finish. And another image I attached of a lone square, that one is LightBurn as well, another partially-smooth square engraved vertically (90). Also, Since I didn’t screenshot it, I do not have it on flood fill, or anything crazy set on the advanced side in LightBurn.
If the photos are not showing up on your end, let me know. They are showing up for me in the preview.
The owner sent me a message at 11 pm (in his timezone - 9 pm for me) that he was going to look at the files himself with the engineering tools. He’s answered two other questions from me already this morning. The support team is six people (give-or-take) I’m guessing that he might be nearly through his morning list if he started at 7.
The time from when he starts to look at these files until he has an answer is absolutely and regrettably unknowable. It’s like chasing a spelling mistake or a missing page in a phone book. It could be 5 minutes or 5 hours. I’m quite hopeful it’s not going to be 5 days because I know he could write a phone book in 3.
He also answers questions while writing software all weekend. It’s downright amazing from where I’m sitting.
What doesn’t seem right?
I’ll take a quick look and make sure the files aren’t absolutely identical. I know they’re encrypted so that’s as far as I can get.
to the first part of your reply: okay, sounds great.
the second part: this replay was to “jkwilborn” telling me how to change the extension by just renaming the extension to .txt. I tried that and replied to them with those files in case they could find a solution with them. Looks like .txt file as it sits on my desktop, but uploading it here, it still appears like an RD file on my end. Maybe there’s more to it than just simply renaming it. I can’t open it like a .txt file in my computer either, so I don’t think that’s right. Just to reiterate for everyone, not a computer genius. I don’t know how to make something not “encrypted”, if that means something else.
I’m an inveterate lurker and random poster on this forum, I read every new post on the off chance I might learn something new. To that end, I downloaded and opened both files in Lightburn. They both work in line mode but not fill (your LB screen cap shows layer 01 set to fill)
, as I get an error when I try to preview it with that layer set to fill (282 ends not closed). Just out of curiosity, are you trying to fill in a square or are you trying to draw a bunch of lines close together (i.e. the higher Line Interval)? My interest is piqued so I’m going to follow this to see how it plays out.
This is because the RD files do not contain fill or line information in the normal way that we think. Rather, it’s the actual path information being sent to the controller that LightBurn imports as line paths.
You could recreate the content by making a square in LightBurn, set to fill, save as RD file, then reimport.
You can get to a similar place by creating the square, set to fill, selecting the square, then Edit->Convert to cut (debug).
Coming back to post just so this doesn’t get closed without a solution. Still having issues with the machine and have had to resort to my old diode just so business can keep rolling
