I have a awc608 controlled laser cutter that I am trying to operationalize. Initially I tried to use LaserCAD but the combination of the docs and manual made it really hard to fully understand what knob controlled what precisely. Switched to lightburn, went through setup and have it working with the controller.
I have however run into several issues that I am not sure how to fix or how they ‘should’ work:
Machine settings in Lightburn. The vendor settings dropdown is empty. Based on other posts my understanding was that it would have vendor settings for this controller but I don’t see them. In case it makes a difference, Lightburn could not find the machine and I had to add it in manually.
Home position issues. Using LaserCAD I was able to setup machine settings so that the panel does the right thing (mostly) however setting a consistent origin has been a royal pain. Right now, it will start at the midway point for X and Y0 and will declare every cut to be out of bounds or range. If I do manage to get something in range, it will reset to the end point of the cut and set origin there. There seems to be no rhyme or reason for this and I have not been able to figure out what’s going on there. To be fair similar stuff happens on LaserCAD too. The Reset button on the panel is of no use. Panel setting for origin is set to machine zero.
End stops don’t work. As far as I can tell when the end stop is mechanically triggered, the signal goes high on the stop, and the controller all the way to the motor controller. Having said that the motor doesn’t actually seem to stop.
Any help in debugging or workarounds would be great. I have been perusing these and buildyourcnc forums and have not been able to find answers for this.
When you go to Edit > Machine Settings, in LightBurn, do you get anything at all, or is it just the ‘Manufacturer Settings’ heading that has nothing in it? On my 708C, I see this:
The ‘Manufacturer Settings’ part is just a heading - the important bits are in the X / Y / Z axis stuff under it.
If you press the Stop and Shift buttons together on the controller, you might get access to the same settings, but a more complete set of them. My 708c does this, but I’m not sure if the 608 does, as it has a smaller display. The hard limits aren’t enabled by default, and I’m not certain if I expose the settings for those yet - I’ll have to look into that.
It sounds like you might not have your origin / directions set properly yet. I don’t have docs for the AWC written up, but I do have them for the Ruida, and the basics are the same - you have to get the limit, direction, and keypad polarity all set properly, then the step lengths, speeds, accelerations, etc.
Ah I didn’t realize the Manufacturer settings was just a header. I assumed there would be something underneath it. Thanks for clarifying that.
I will play with the XYZ settings. I don’t think I have a Shift button on the 608 controller pad, but will take a look tomorrow.
Regarding the hard limits, I read elsewhere that on the 608 they are software enforced by LaserCAD, but have not really been able to verify that in any way whatsoever.
IC. I sort of figured that, but to be honest from the LaserCAD docs could not quite figure out what these things meant in the context of the machine and there were too many knobs to turn individually to see what happened not directions as to what combinations of settings did given a particular layout.
I will take a look at the Ruida docs and report back.
Thanks for the link to the docs. They were extremely helpful and I was finally after a bunch of tweaking able to get stuff working. Of course without the end stops working a bunch of things don’t quite work as they should.
I am just wondering if there is any way to use the travel distance to enforce the clip window without the stops? This would of course be a controller task, but wondering if lightburn supports it in some way?
Unfortunately no - If the controller doesn’t know where it is, the coordinates it reports aren’t accurate, then I can’t check them against clip bounds.
There might be an interactive diagnosis screen where you can check if the end stops are being read properly. There is on the 708, but I’m not sure about the 608.
