Beacon Bed Level Sensor not having enough accuracy whilst bed is at temperature.
Hello, I have recently made my V-Core 4 400. I was going through the commissioning guide and was trying to start the first layer print. This print was not able to go ahead due to a sample spread error with the Beacon.
I have tried to go through the setup and calibration guide for the beacon, and this lead me to believe that the error was only present when the bed was at an elevated temperature. I have the logs in a text file attached. A photo of the temperatures of the printer during this experimentation have also been attached.
Have others experienced this issue? and if so have others been able to find a solution. I have also had a look at the bed and nozzle during these levelling attempts, this has shown to me that there are collisions occurring from dripping filament.
The only thing that I am thinking that it might be is that I printed the parts myself out of PETG which has a lower glass transition temperature that the ABS that were supposed to be used, could this cause the errors?
I have also noticed that the hot-end cooling fan is not turning on even when the hot-end is above 150°C, Klipper seems to think it is but I have not seen it turning. I have attached a photo of the wiring that I have used (It is plugged into an EBB42 CAN board tool-head). I have also not cable tied the USB-C plug to the tool-head, I have these coming tomorrow, however I do not think this would be how this issue would present itself.
23 Replies
the hotend cooling fan should definitely be coming on. I would get that working first then retry the beacon setup.
That sample spread also looks ridiculously big. Double check everything that would affect z-height, the printhead, the z rails, everything. Tighten screws and make sure things move smoothly
Hello TheTik, thank you for your response. I have made sure that everything is tightened, even when at temperature. I have also found that the .cfg file was set up incorrectly. In Step 61 of the electronics guide it says to attach the fan to the toolboard (Pin PA1). I found that in my RatOS.cfg the part cooling fan was set incorrectly, I have updated it to the following and it is now working:
Hotend cooling fan
[heater_fan toolhead_cooling_fan]
heater: extruder
2-pin fan connected to 2-pin header on Octopus V1.1 - input voltage pwm
pin: toolboard_t0:PA1
The pin was set to "PE5" previously. I think I must have done something wrong but I don't know where I would have made that mistake in the setup.
On reflection this is clearly where I made the mistake:
Glad you figured it out! Were you able to do the beacon calibration without the "sample spread error" ?
No, I have managed to narrow it down to only being present when the bed is heating
heatED or heatING?
heating
That is a readout from the console. Whenever the bed was heating the beacon probe was very innacurate
I have found that there are more interesting things with this beacon:
The Z heights that it arms and triggers at vary wildly when the bed is being heated
In the commissioning guide there is also conflicting information. it says to run the command "BEACON_RATOS_CALIBRATE" however this is not recognised by the printer, when looking into the further information I try running the Initial calibration and that is what I am trying to do again now with the heated bed on.
I have just had this message pop-up: Could this be related? I am using a raspberry pi 4b 2GB version, is this what the mcu is referring to, or would this be the octoput V1.1?
I also am using a 250W 24V power supply that did not come from RatRig. Is it possible that when the power is being drawn for the relay and the heater cartridge that there are issues being caused by that?
I am really struggling to understand what might be going wrong
That error is referring to the raspi, correct
Maybe? If you've got a multimeter or even better a scope, I'd check for voltage sag
Unfortunately I do not have an osciloscope, however normally when the voltage sags I get a "low voltage" warning on the RPI. I did not get this, this has also not happened again so I have not persued it further.
I have since tried to move the USB cable that goes to the rpi away from the motor cables, this seemed to help somewhat but to a lot. My question is what is actually occurring during this POKE Test? Is the printer looking at the current on the Z motors for the point at which the hotend hits the bed? If so I might try to isolate the cabling to the Z-motors better.
I am still having the issue, is anyone able to tell me what this is actually used for? It is rather annoying having to do this at the start of each print
is there anything in teh start Gcode that would allow me to get rid of this step?
There are similar issues like yours all over this forum (regrettable, they are all named differently.... so hard to find.... also look in the RatOS-support thread). I see the DEV's respond to that and they are usually correct in their statements, so maybe do a search and start reading these other forums? I also see your latency at 7? This could be much better I think (n my Vcore 3.1 I get 0 or 1...). Before further trouble shouting the MCU Shutdwon error, I would secure your USB cable to the bracket, cause movement of that USB connection could cause that issue (It looks like there are tierap cutouts on your mount for that?).
Also, chasing loose bolts is a verry, verry, verry fine art.... I have stuck my head in my printer 50 times (during prints,... mind you,..) for a rattle... In the end, it was one of the two screwas securing my beacon to the head that came loose and caused sooooooo many isues that where solved with a bit of loctite and a screw driver,... Keep on chasing bolts and reporting here. Make pictures of your setup and hope others pitch in as well.
Also, do a forum wide search on
Sample spread too large
There are some pictures of my toolhead.
Thank you very much for your reply, I have elevated the issue to the ratos-support thread. I saw some potential issues there but I haven't found the solution yet
As for this message; how much power are you drawing from your Raspberi's USB ports? I remember having similar issues, that could have to do with USB ports resetting due to to high power draw (or something,... I am no expert). As I had the EBB42 and an unpowered hub on the Manta M8P (and with that, a USB webcam and Beacon on that unpowered hub). I switched it around a bit and now it is a bit more stable. Also, I bought a powered hub, but haven't installed it yet as currently it is stable.
I am not drawing any more power than the 3 USB cables that were supplied in the kit, the EBB42 V1.2 board the octopus V1.1 and the beacon.
However @miklschmidt explained the cause of the issue and helped come up with a solution. I have explained it in the Ratos-Support thread here: https://discord.com/channels/582187371529764864/1302778490692829217
Thank you very much for all your help @Arthur_C and @TheTik
Mikkel and Helge are amazing... Dont know where they get the time and energy to keep on pushing forward and finding answers.