Strange ghost behavior

Community Support
1

Does any one else have a glowforge that starts centering all by itself when it left on. ?

I have been struggling with the Internet being lost and now this strange centering issue on it own.

I have had no issues for close to 3 years but now things are acting strange.

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2

It does that sometimes when it updates software. Not all updates require an automatic restart but some do.

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3

Could an interruption in the wifi connection cause it to recenter?

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OMG I though I have been going crazy. I have a whiteboard next to my GF and note when I run into oddities. This past week my GF Plus has started re centering itself randomly. It has happened about 3 times between Tuesday-Thursday this past week. My GF Pro was running at the same time and stationed right next to it but never started centering.

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5

Yes. If it reestablishes a connection it will recalibrate.

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Glowforge never admits to any updates,
But it leaves me completely lost as to what is happening.

7

This is more than likely your cause. They are related.

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Honestly, in my experience with GF any setback I have has been towards something greater. So I have a more optimistic outlook to it all and when the centering stuff started happening I was thinking “ohhhhh I can’t wait for the things I have yet realized”

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@coalakida I’m sorry to hear your Glowforge is having issues with staying connected to the wi-fi and is centering on its own.

If you can give me a date and time of when this happened I would be happy to take a look at the logs for you.

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Really went crazy last night about 1:30 am must have done 50 times loosing the internet
than it went into centering about 10 times during the night

Very confused do you think this could be related to a bad ribbon cable. ?
We have a perfect Wifi : 1000 meg download and get 640 on the Iphone and 890 on the PC.

The date would be the 7/25 /2021 about 11:00 to 1: 30 am ,

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I’m sorry for the ongoing trouble and that your unit isn’t staying connected. I saw that you had multiple forum threads which touched on this subject, so to avoid confusion I’ve closed the other ones and our team will help you in this thread.

I checked your unit’s most recent logs, and I didn’t see any entries which would suggest an issue with the white ribbon cable that connects to your print head. We also haven’t released any recent updates which would impact your unit’s ability to connect to our servers.

I looked into the logs for any error messages, and I did see a few recent messages that indicate your unit’s print head might be having trouble measuring material height. This would be unrelated to any offline issues, but I’d like to look into it. May I have a photo of the bottom of your print head similar to this example?

704×709 221 KB


Regarding the offline issue, I saw that you’ve already tried the initial steps we recommend such as restarting your router and other devices on the network.

While network-specific Wi-Fi challenges may occur for a number of different reasons, I do have a few additional suggestions that may help:

  • If your Wi-Fi network includes several access points, it’s possible that your Glowforge needs to re-establish its connection whenever it ‘hops’ from one access point to another. As a test, you could try creating a dedicated access point for the Glowforge to see if that helps.

  • Since Glowforge only uses the 2.4GHz frequency, a connection will be harder to establish and maintain on a crowded 2.4GHz network. Other devices using 2.4GHz, like cordless phones and microwaves, can cause interference and an unstable connection. You can consult your router settings to check the performance and traffic on your 2.4GHz network.

  • In your network settings, check the channel you’re using for the 2.4GHz band. Trying a different channel may provide a more consistent connection.

  • Though less common, DNS or name resolution conflicts may also cause intermittent connectivity problems. If you use a custom DNS configuration on your router, you might want to try default DNS settings to see if that works better.


If you’re still having trouble, there’s a test you can try that will help us narrow down the problem. If possible, could you please create a Wi-Fi hotspot with a cell phone and use that network to connect your Glowforge to Wi-Fi? This is a good way to rule out signal interference, since you can set your phone right on top of your Glowforge!

You can find instructions online to help you create a Wi-Fi hotspot using a cell phone. Make sure that you set it up to be a 2.4 GHz hotspot, since that is the frequency your Glowforge uses.

Once the Wi-Fi hotspot is broadcasting, you can connect to it by following these steps:

  1. Turn on your Glowforge.

  2. Wait 30 seconds. Then hold down the button for ten seconds until it glows teal.

  3. Go to setup.glowforge.com and then follow the steps to connect your Glowforge to Wi-Fi. When prompted to connect, select the hotspot you created.

  4. Once Wi-Fi setup is complete, go to app.glowforge.com and try a few prints.


To see the Wi-Fi setup process in more detail, go to Connect Your Glowforge to WiFi.

Let us know how it goes!

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It’s been a little while since I’ve seen any replies on this thread so I’m going to close it. If you still need help with this please either start a new thread or email support@glowforge.com.