Alignment Randomly Unreliable

[terecch]

Why does this keep RANDOMLY happening to me? My Glowforge is unreliable and I am wasting expensive proofgrade materials. Thanks

so much.

[terecch]

This is the Glowforge Aura, BTW

[beerfaced]

It looks to me like you have overlapping files.

[terecch]

Thank you. It does look like that, but I don’t have overlapping files. My .svg is clean

[chris1]

Keep in mind the Aura needs multiple passes. Looks like an offset happened between the first and second.

[chris1]

It looks pretty clearly like your print head got stuck at some point during the print. When this happens, the machine doesn’t know, so everything after that will be offset.

There have been a few recommendations for this. Clean the rails, first of all. It seems pretty sensitive to any residue causing the movement to stick. There have also been some reported problems of the ribbon cable catching on things, or issues with the magnet that snaps it back to take up the slack. I’d carefully inspect those mechanisms, while manually moving the print head all around (always with the power unplugged) to see if you can find or feel anything unusual.

If you haven’t already, get in touch with Glowforge support so they can walk you through the recommended steps and if it comes down to it, get a replacement started.

[chris1]

I should also add: watch the print the whole time. It’s tedious, but maybe you can catch it happening and the cause might be more obvious.

[terecch]

Hmmmmm. It does look like the printhead got stuck and that’s when everything went downhill. Thank you so much for the advice on cleaning and will do.

[rbtdanforth]

I really like the image as well! Is that the original Grateful Dead (before the other guys got famous)?

[terecch]

LOL, it’s The Beths :^)

[PrintToLaser]

I’ve had that happen after the 3rd cut, I make it a practice to wipe the rails every operation with a rag with a spritz of alcohol on it.
If you were using proofgrade, I would see if they wouldn’t replace the material.

[terecch]

It worked! Thanks, all, for your help. New user here and I had no idea about how quickly dirt built up on the rails. It also explained why it was random. The dirt was building up as I was going.

[PrintToLaser]

Normally with lasers, it’s the optics you have to watch, with the Aura it’s the rails. With the power off, you can feel any drag slowly moving the head back and forth before you power-up and commit.