Carriage slowly drifting to rear left
I thought I'd fixed my problems and then new ones showed up.
So I managed to get a decent benchy printed at last, then a friend recommended I switch nozzles back to a 0.4 for the initial tests. I did and after some fiddling with the bltouch probe I got it back in working order.
Then as I went to do a first layer print, the carriage scraped the bed and after that I've been noticing the carriage has been slowly drifting to the rear left of the printer whenever it moves diagonally to the front right. When it did the initial bed levelling, it drifted further until the bltouch was off the bed and it collided with the carriage.
I had prior taken the belt system apart and reassembled it. All layer shifting was cleared. This started pretty much immediately after the first layer test scraped the bed. I retensioned the belts and they feel even, but I'm not sure the cause anymore.
Direct movement up or down, left or right is smooth. No stutters, no shifting along another axis. It's only when it moves diagonally and only seems to be when moving forward-right.
62 Replies
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
It sounds like one of your motors is stalling. This can happen due to too high belt tension. Unfortunately I've seen a lot of bad advice on the internet about belt tensions and unfortunately the ratrig instructions just say "make it right lol".
There are a few other issues it could be but for now we should focus on belt tension. First of all I would loosen both your belts a fair bit. Then I would attach an accelerometer and run the belt tightness macro.
Btw on mine by the time they were tight enough to strum, the motors would stall which causes the behaviour you're describing with drift.
I saw that recently somewhere else. Was told I could get a good result using a spectrometer on my phone to get it between 40 and 60hz?
Is that 👎 a "no"?
And thank you for the belt Tightness macro. Didn't know that was a thing!
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
No! Use the belt tightness macro! XD I did that too. Loosen both up though make sure you're not making it worse.
Also there is a printable apparently that helps measure belt tension..very cool gadget
I did see that!
Sorry but what should I look for for the macro? Not sure what it would be called or how to read it.
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
Sure. it's often hiding in settings and must be enabled, but once there it'll be called "Belt tightness graph" or something like that
AFAIK there's only one belt tightness thing
Ah so is it in the printer config profile?
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
no no it's just a macro. You trigger it and it runs on your printer for a while until it has all its data
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
https://i.gyazo.com/aca8fadb0217f772b7264bb25d19ee2c.png this is what it looks like in the software
Oh!
And how to enable?
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
@blacksmithforlife 🇺🇸 @miklschmidt I'm going to write a tutorial for this. If y'all were willing to put it up on the website so we can link to it rq, that would be great
@vausch you go to settings -> macros, then find the "Installation" macro group (It can be any but you should use "Installation"). Then you click "edit" and then find "measure corexy belt tension" and click add. Close the settings and it should be there!
if you can't find "measure Corexy belt tension" in the settings options, make a thread in ratos support.
Thank you so much
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
but you'll still need your accelerometer hooked up to make it work. And no worries! Please document the belt tuning process (IE write down what you're doing) so it can be documented for other users. It's a shame that so much of this knowledge is passed down in "Oral tradition" these days.
I'll write the tutorial but It's been too long since I've done it so I don't remember the precise steps, just general guidance.
I don't have that ability. I just do pull requests but Mikel is the one that runs the show
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
Where's the website's Github? I'll make the PR if the public has access to the github
worst case scenario I just send a word document to someone xD
https://github.com/Rat-OS/RatOS
I believe is what you want?
GitHub
GitHub - Rat-OS/RatOS: The preconfigured Raspberry Pi image that ma...
The preconfigured Raspberry Pi image that makes it easy to run Klipper + Moonraker + Mainsail on your printer. - GitHub - Rat-OS/RatOS: The preconfigured Raspberry Pi image that makes it easy to ru...
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
it'd be cool if it could live here: https://i.gyazo.com/4883f472c336d02d7b934c3976313825.png
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
I don't know what operates that but that'd be a good place for it
https://os.ratrig.com/docs/installation/
https://www.klipper3d.org/Measuring_Resonances.html?h=cust#testing-custom-axes is basically what the macro does FYI
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
sure but it'd be cool to have an end-to-end tutorial we could just link someone whenever there's a need for it.
I never even knew the macro existed, I just did it the klipper way
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
nice. Yeah I remember looking into that and having a micro panic attack
Another cool wish: a bot that we could say /bot belt_tuning or something and it posts the link.
Talk to a moderator
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
sorry for stealing your thread @vausch lol
Hey if my problem gets help for others I'm happy!
Unfortunately I don't know how to read this, haha.
And the carriage kept stuttering as it was moving to the center for the z homing so I had to do that manually. Stuttering/drift was worse than ever after I loosened the belts. Tried retightening them a bit but no avail.
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
basically your goal is to match those up as much as possible. iirc loosening it makes it go down, tightening it makes up. One of them is left motor, one is right, I forget which is which
you'll want to go DOWN in tightness
On the stepper -> board wiring harnesses, what kind of connectors does the board side have?
Says the orange is the upper so that should be the left
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
fair nuff!
you'll be able to see which one does what pretty quick haha
I think they're the default duponts
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
I have bad news for you
was thinking about switching them to JSTs. I did that with one of the Z motors but I got frustrated because I kept messing up the pin crimping. Then I found out what I was doing wrong
Duponts no good?
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
hope you like crimping xD
yeah, duponts no good
Crimping's fun
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
yeet
the duponts get yeeted*
you might find your servo reliability goes up significantly
I bought all the good crimping tools when I saw TeachingTech on youtube build his ratrig (what pushed me to build it over a Voron first)
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
though I still think it's too tight
well, good to know!
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
hey Teaching Tech took me here too haha
He makes it look so darn easy XD
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
BTW it's possible that the belts are too loose and slipping in the belt mounts but I very much doubt that
when I tuned my belts and switched to JST it no longer skipped (But it skipped when I started out, like you!)
interesting
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
I hope one of those is at fault for your issue
alright, I have a project again. I'll update tomorrow after I finish work.
Legit surprised JST connectors aren't the default ones. They plug into JST ports.
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
Yes. It's been my hobby horse ever since I discovered it. It bugs the HELL out of me and theres nothing in the directions that tells you about it.
It should be visible by default. The right way to fix this is to modify the mainsail theme. I'm pretty sure i already did though.
Yeah but if you upgrade from a older version it doesn't add it
True. There's a "reset settings" in the mainsail UI i believe.
Well aside from a small tension adjustment I didn't change anything besides swapping the JST connectors and no skips so far. Gonna run a benchy now and if this fixes everything then you're officially my hero.
meantime this was the latest tension comparison
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
Your higher frequencies are still a bit whack but the low frequency stuff is mostly good so 👌 lol. Hope it works, fingers crossed!
Yeah probably just need to turn the top belt a quarter turn
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
just as a heads up, they can still stall even if they're "Perfect". if they're still stalling you should try lowering both sides tension 3-10 turns and matching again.
Welp, you're my hero.
Having a little trouble getting better than this, but that benchy alone felt so good to get right.
welp. Did a base acceleration tower test and it went fine. Then ran the accelerometer and suddenly deja vu
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
?
The blue one needs to be a hair tighter. But you're 90% there
or looser
I don't remember
we need to write a tutorial
also when you said "Deja vu" do you mean it broked again?
I think I overtightened. Loosened the belts a bit and it printed an acceleration tower flawlessly
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
sweet
That's without having done the resonance tuning?
Bottom without, top with.
foreign-sapphire•2y ago
Sweet
well, my help isn't free
the price is exactly 1 tutorial
or something that I can put into a tutorial myself lol
Or just write down what you did so another person can do it haha
Righto!