X/Y Coordinates

My X/Y coordinates do not match, I tried setting them by drawing squares and measuring the engraved output. However, I must be missing something, as a square would be 22mm x 20mm or a circle would be a slight oval.

Any information would be great, thanks.

A bit of terminology to avoid future confusion:

  • A “coordinate” is a particular location in the LightBurn workspace or on the platform
  • The difference between two coordinates is a “length” or “distance”

So the coordinate of the upper left corner of a square would be an X Y coordinate of (100,200), with a distance of 20 mm to the upper right corner at (80,200). The numeric values on a Ruida controller increase leftward and downward, so they seem backwards compared to the graphs we drew in school.

With that out of the way, the most likely cause of what you’re seeing is inadvertently enabling Rotary Mode by clicking the Rotary switch in the toolbar or in the Laser window. They’re easy to click by accident and, because you’re not using a rotary, the indicator is hidden in plain sight.

If that’s not it, report back and we’ll suggest more places to look.

Mine homes to the left/top, so I see a decrease in numbers moving left.

In school we (at least I) didn’t use all 4 quadrants, we did everything in quadrant I.

The home operation determines the machines operational quadrant. Thus the operational quadrant determines if the numbers increase/decrease for left/right/up/down movements.

This is the coordinate system and all machines home to 0, 0.

If, like mine it homes to the back/left, I’m operating in quadrant IV and the number increase going right and down.

Home being front/left puts you in quadrant I, which is were most of our schooling was spent.

Movement up or right is an increase in numbers.

:smile_cat:

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Good point.

Ruida machines homing in the right/rear run in Quadrant III, with the baffling exception of having the coordinates increase to the left/front with no negative numbers to be seen. Sort of Quadrant I in a corner reflector.

Might have something to do with the written languages going in opposite directions along X. IIRC we agree on top-to-bottom along Y, though, which suggests ol’ Descartes drew that axis backwards to begin with. :grin:

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It’s relative to the operating quadrant, which is determined by the home operation…

If Descartes drew it backwards, then nothing would work :man_shrugging:

I guess it comes down to everything is relative.

:smile_cat:

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I have tried “Rotary Mode” and I’m still getting the same outcome every time. If you have any more ideas I could try, then please let me know.

Thanks.


This is the rotary settings that I have found, am I in the right place.

Cut out the square @ 150mm x 150mm. It has been measured out in 30mm square sections, as you can see the ‘Y’ axis is cutting shorter than anticipated.

The key point is to have the rotary turned off, which it is. The rotary icon in the toolbar along the top will have a green dot when it’s enabled.

That picture doesn’t show much detail, but with the usual rotary problem out of the way, an axis calibration may be in order:

Some background:

Ruida controllers use either µm/step or mm/step, rather than the GRBL reciprocal step/mm, but the principle is the same.

Write down the original values for both X and Y before you run the calibration, so you can compare the results and, if needed, restore the original values.

I found settings in the actual machines sub para menu that had rotary settings switched on, i turned it off and all i had to do was recalibrate the x and y axis and is now cutting perfect.
Thank you very much for your assistance you have been a great help

And you know a bit more about the machinery under the hood! :grin:

Welcome aboard …

Being new to Lightburn can explain to me where you found these settings ie sub para menu . I had similar problem ie circle printing oval , longer on the X axis.

Cryptic shorthand for the configuration parameters found in Edit → Machine Settings and Edit → Device Settings.

Thank You much appreciated