Ooooo, I like your way too, especially for large things!
1 Like
I have found it’s a bit different depending on the thickness of the material so I did two - one for the bed (paper on top) and one for 1/4". There’s a click difference on my machine.
3 Likes
Nicely done. When I was making something this morning I tried something like that, only I forgot you have to go in the opposite direction…
Oh, there is a problem with placement? I did an engrave on leather today and it was way off center but thought it was something I did wrong.
Did you enter the correct height of the leather into the Unknown Materials slot? (If it was not Proofgrade leather?)
Having that correct height measurement in there can really affect the placement results with the lid camera.
3 Likes
Three things:
- In order for placement to work, the material height must be correct.
- Then, you may find an error of a few millimeters (less than a quarter of an inch).
- After a large number of prints without rebooting, the error may increase. This is a known bug - rebooting will reset the problem.
cc @rita in case I got some of this wrong.
18 Likes
Yup, a lot of people are not getting this, it needs to be emphasized. A $20 pair of digital calipers works wonders. A couple of thousandths, not a big deal but enter a number that is way off and focus and registration goes to hell.
11 Likes
Could this be fixed by using the head cam to home to the same exact spot every time?
1 Like
I only have Proofgrade materials right now. I used the teardrop keychain pattern from the catalogue and cut that shape out. I just left it in there and let the system re-read the bed again then placed in my image to engrave just like I had done with the proofgrade maple.
I hit the print and off it went. The pre-render thing looked off but by then it was already lasering and too late to save it so just let it finish. Was really just proof of concept really to see how it looked.
A previous one I had done on maple centered perfect.
6 Likes
Instead of cutting the keychain shape out first and then trying to add an engraved image to it afterwards, try this instead…
Open the keychain file and immediately click the Add Artwork button to import your image. Resize the image and place it inside of the cutlines shown in the file, and center it there as well as you can. (Use the zoom to get good placement.) Then take both the cutlines and the artwork and run the job at the same time, engrave first, then cut it out.
I think you’ll like the results a lot better. It helps to get the relationship between the parts set up before performing the operations.
16 Likes
I will try and do that in the future, but I had already done one in wood that was perfect so was just odd that it ‘moved’ even after my extreme zooming and positioning. I am a stickler to accuracy.
2 Likes
Different height on the wood and the leather. It can really make a difference in how the lid camera focuses.
5 Likes
It was all proofgrade 
1 Like
I’m not sure that you wouldn’t have to reset that based on the different heights of the materials. If you used the after-image to place the leather instead of starting from scratch with a different height that correctly focuses the camera, the placement can be off.
Did you create a jig for it, or did you try to line it up again using the afterimage?
Definitely a challenge to align perfectly an imported bitmap, resized or otherwise on an already cut shape. I am successful most of the time but otherwise not. Placement of an entire image file, bitmap and vector together works pretty good. Hence all the discussion about accuracy. I can usually place an image on a single small bit of material and ensure that it fits, but usually there is enough margin for error. Dead center under the lid camera and exact height of material helps. @takitus’s suggestion is good for a quick alignment and is pretty accurate.
I wonder if some of these issues are due to creeping alignment issues if the Glowforge has been on for many hours and done many different operations.
4 Likes
These were done on different days and I have been turning off the Forge between projects.
And yes I let it run its initial setup each time before I do anything 
Don’t know what to tell you, one moment the image was perfectly aligned, start printing then it wasn’t.
Hmm, really thinking hard it did say everything was ready to go and for just a moment the message came up about re-aligning but that was after hitting the button on the Forge. Maybe that is a bug?
It didn’t get shifted by the air assist did it?
Hey @zerbyte, why don’t you give the procedure I described in the first post of this thread a try, and determine what your machine’s offset is. It might get you to where you want to be. Any time I’ve had issues similar to yours in the past, it turned out to be that for one of the instances I moved the object to match the already cut or engraved outline, without taking into account my machine’s offset amount.
2 Likes
Nope, it was still in its cut out location.
Of course I am also talking to support about the founder ruler not having the hash marks show up and the numbers barely visible. Hoping my machine is ok.
1 Like
Is this because of potential missteps on the stepper motors? Just curious for my educational purposes and not to problem-solve. 
1 Like