Cutting foam sheets... with a needle!

[RHill051]

Thanks everyone, I'm going to try the updated flywheel shared by @sirjaymz, and if that doesn't work I'll give the need holder a try, I also plan to get some better quality bearings to help as well. I'll try to report back with what worked the best for me. Hopefully I don't have any more issues

 

[RHill051]

I have NOT broke a needle since I created this and started using it.

@sirjaymz Do you by chance have a version of this flywheel that would accommodate a deeper motor? I printed your flywheel but my motor sits further out from the mount so the needle would not align with the guide. I'd rather use a narrower flywheel than print a new mount and move the position of the needle in relation to the rest of my CNC as it would cause more issues in aligning my vacuum board.

 

[sirjaymz]

@sirjaymz Do you by chance have a version of this flywheel that would accommodate a deeper motor? I printed your flywheel but my motor sits further out from the mount so the needle would not align with the guide. I'd rather use a narrower flywheel than print a new mount and move the position of the needle in relation to the rest of my CNC as it would cause more issues in aligning my vacuum board.

I can make the scad file adjustable for you so you can make it the depth you’d like. I’ll see if I can do that in the morning and post and update version.

 

[RHill051]

I can make the scad file adjustable for you so you can make it the depth you’d like. I’ll see if I can do that in the morning and post and update version.

I spent a few minutes and mocked up one as well, I just combined a feature or two of the original flywheel and the recessed bearings of your flywheel. we'll see if it actually works though. That's the real test If it does work I'll post it for others to use if they'd like

 

[sirjaymz]

I spent a few minutes and mocked up one as well, I just combined a feature or two of the original flywheel and the recessed bearings of your flywheel. we'll see if it actually works though. That's the real test If it does work I'll post it for others to use if they'd like

Yeah.. I didn't realize at first that I needed to make the flywheel height adjustable. The constraint I think that needs to be in place is that the flywheel thickness can't be any smaller than the thickness of the bearing.
I'll post and updated version of the SCAD.

BTW, I posted the SCAD file out there, so you can edit the file directly in OpenSCAD to make exactly what you are looking for. You don't have to splice together STL files to get what you need. You can edit the original and make it what you want. You'd have to install OpenSCAD , but it's really straightforwards once you understand how it goes together.

 

[RHill051]

You don't have to splice together STL files to get what you need. You can edit the original and make it what you want.

Ahh, I guess I wasn't very clear, I just created a new flywheel from scratch in Fusion360 but used the dimensions and some of the design choices from the two flywheels. This is what I've got at the moment (if I add or make changes the link should reflect those as well) I'm not at all familiar with OpenSACD so its sometimes easier to just recreate stuff in Fusion (even though they crippled their free software.. so annoying) I already printed out an initial test file to see what issues need to be fixed so hopefully I'll have it working and more reliable soon

 

[sirjaymz]

@RHill051 - Interested in what you finally finished at. I saw your link above. Is that what works for you? if so, which motor are you using that on?

 

[RHill051]

Well, I haven't actually run it yet, (so many other projects going on and my family just got a new puppy.. so there went my free time lol) the stroke on this flywheel is a lot less than the one I was using before. I'm not sure if that will make much of a difference though. The other thing I noticed is that the motor I have has a bump out so I really should design the flywheel to have a cavity that it can recess into.

 

[blackkrystal73]

Anyone found a good method to balance the fly wheel? Other than just add weight till you can run at full speed.

 

[Dudley1001]

I weigh the needle, bearing and screw and then I weigh the same amount of lead and press that into the opposite hole using a vise to press it flush with the flywheels surface so the needle doesn't hit it when rotating.

 

[dkj4linux]

Not needle cutting, laser engraved ceramic tile... Merry Christmas, all!

-- David

 

[rkozak]

All,

I've been working to document a procedure for taking FT plane plans and turning them into gcode for use with needle-cutters. It's a bit rough yet but there's been enough interest that I've gone ahead and published it in Google docs...

PDF to Gcode for CNC Needle-Cutters

Please let me know if anything is unclear and/or incorrect. This procedure, like several other previous approaches, uses Inkscape layers to separate the different cut-types presented in PDF plans such as those from FliteTest. This procedure, however, uses the popular JTech laser plugin to generate the actual gcode rather than gcodetools, or other.

Attached are a couple of template files that set the appropriate document size, "landscape" orientation (I think this may need to be "portrait" for Edward's TimSav machine), units, and pre-defined layers. These are put in Inkscape's "templates" directory and then loaded in the first step of the procedure. The JTech laser plugin and instructions for installing it are found on JTech's website.

-- David

EDIT: The attached foamboard templates zipfile contains 4 templates: A1-landscape, A1-portrait, DTFB-landscape, and DTFB-portrait. These all use "mm" units. The "portrait" versions will work best for Edward's ERC TimSav machine... with its longer Y-axis than X-axis. Machines with a longer X-axis than Y-axis will be better accommodated with the "landscape" versions.

Hi and Happy New Years

I been following your very well & detailed PDF for processing layers and generating gocde. All is going great and makes sense except for one issue (I think it's an issue). On step 14 when I click the "Join selected end nodes with new segment" icon, after I've select the nodes (dashed line) for a score cut , nothing appears to happen. I was expecting to see the dashed score cut line turn into a solid line. Inkscape claims to have done something because the "Edit > Undo" give me an option to undo the "Join Segments". Am I missing something? The plan I'm trying to process is Grifflyer's F-22 Raptor. I've attached svg for sheet 1 and it's at the point where all lines are moved to the appropriate layers for your reference if you wish to take a peek.

 

[dkj4linux]

Hi and Happy New Years

I been following your very well & detailed PDF for processing layers and generating gocde. All is going great and makes sense except for one issue (I think it's an issue). On step 14 when I click the "Join selected end nodes with new segment" icon, after I've select the nodes (dashed line) for a score cut , nothing appears to happen. I was expecting to see the dashed score cut line turn into a solid line. Inkscape claims to have done something because the "Edit > Undo" give me an option to undo the "Join Segments". Am I missing something? The plan I'm trying to process is Grifflyer's F-22 Raptor. I've attached svg for sheet 1 and it's at the point where all lines are moved to the appropriate layers for your reference if you wish to take a peek.

Unfortunately, I did these instructions over 2 years ago when I was trying to help the ERC Timsav crowd get started processing PDF plans and cutting planes with Edward's machine. I've not been a part of this activity since and rarely use Inkscape anymore so remember little about the specifics of processing PDF plans in Inkscape. I would suggest that you describe the issue in the ERC Timsav FB group or possibly the ERC Timsav FT thread. Folks that are using Edward's machine are still having to process FT's PDF plans so I'm sure the "dashed score lines" issue has been resolved.

At 75, I've simply been away from needle-cutting activities too long and remember little. I'm sorry I can't be more help.

Good luck. -- David

 

[Dudley1001]

Hi and Happy New Years

I been following your very well & detailed PDF for processing layers and generating gocde. All is going great and makes sense except for one issue (I think it's an issue). On step 14 when I click the "Join selected end nodes with new segment" icon, after I've select the nodes (dashed line) for a score cut , nothing appears to happen. I was expecting to see the dashed score cut line turn into a solid line. Inkscape claims to have done something because the "Edit > Undo" give me an option to undo the "Join Segments". Am I missing something? The plan I'm trying to process is Grifflyer's F-22 Raptor. I've attached svg for sheet 1 and it's at the point where all lines are moved to the appropriate layers for your reference if you wish to take a peek.

The dashed lines are tough and its usually just easier to delete them and draw in new lines. Your svg file was just the dashed lines so its tough to fix it for you. What I do is ungroup until I can select the dashes and delete all but the endpoints of the lines then stretch one of the dashes to the other then combine the 2 parts with a control K.

 

[sirjaymz]

Hi and Happy New Years

I been following your very well & detailed PDF for processing layers and generating gocde. All is going great and makes sense except for one issue (I think it's an issue). On step 14 when I click the "Join selected end nodes with new segment" icon, after I've select the nodes (dashed line) for a score cut , nothing appears to happen. I was expecting to see the dashed score cut line turn into a solid line. Inkscape claims to have done something because the "Edit > Undo" give me an option to undo the "Join Segments". Am I missing something? The plan I'm trying to process is Grifflyer's F-22 Raptor. I've attached svg for sheet 1 and it's at the point where all lines are moved to the appropriate layers for your reference if you wish to take a peek.

I use Inkscape to only get the PDF / SVG / JPG, or what not into the correct sizing of my cnc work surface. so 20"x 30" to match the DTFB dimensions. Then I import that into EstlCam with the same dimension settings as the work space. Much easier to assign all the different depths/lines and save the appropriate gcode.
Depending on what you are using, either a CNC or a ERC TimSav cutter, you either do not have to edit the gcode, or if you are using a ERC TimSav, edit the gcode to reflect the commands for the arduino.. it's a little difficult to explain, but easy to do once you understand the slight differences.

 

[Dudley1001]

I

I use Inkscape to only get the PDF / SVG / JPG, or what not into the correct sizing of my cnc work surface. so 20"x 30" to match the DTFB dimensions. Then I import that into EstlCam with the same dimension settings as the work space. Much easier to assign all the different depths/lines and save the appropriate gcode.
Depending on what you are using, either a CNC or a ERC TimSav cutter, you either do not have to edit the gcode, or if you are using a ERC TimSav, edit the gcode to reflect the commands for the arduino.. it's a little difficult to explain, but easy to do once you understand the slight differences.

I am doing much the same, I stopped using the gcode generator in inkscape and export the svg file to a program called Laserweb4 to do the gcode as I found it to be much better as far as jumping all over the place. I am just trying Lightburn as well as I just bought it for my laser. The inkscape gcode generator works and there have been a few different extensions that ERC timsav users have developed that have helped but I am using GRBL 1.1h_servo and it seems to screw up and the servo goes nuts unless the nodes in the file are fixed 100%

Both laserweb4 and lightburn require doing a bit of setup to use with a servo. They both have to be set to M3 for the command to activate the servo as they both are expecting to use the M4 command used for laser work.

 

[sirjaymz]

I


I am doing much the same, I stopped using the gcode generator in inkscape and export the svg file to a program called Laserweb4 to do the gcode as I found it to be much better as far as jumping all over the place. I am just trying Lightburn as well as I just bought it for my laser. The inkscape gcode generator works and there have been a few different extensions that ERC timsav users have developed that have helped but I am using GRBL 1.1h_servo and it seems to screw up and the servo goes nuts unless the nodes in the file are fixed 100%

Both laserweb4 and lightburn require doing a bit of setup to use with a servo. They both have to be set to M3 for the command to activate the servo as they both are expecting to use the M4 command used for laser work.

Thanks for pointing me towards Laserweb4. I hadn't seen that one previously. I'll have to play around with that to see if it works into the workflow better than EstlCam. Seems like it could.

I am in the process of building my ERC atm, as it's been sitting in a box for over a year. Have had everything 3d printed, and have played around with the Inkscape SVG methods to cut lines for it with various planes.
I have have been using my MPCNC for the most part, but looking to change the tool completely on that, but not lose the needle cutting function.. so.. ERC.. here I go. I got one of the last kits from Edward, so it should be straight forward for me.

 

[iGull]

New Perforator Head

Hi all

Thought you might be interested in this version of the perforator head that I've been working on.

My previous laser cut version 1.1 worked really well (still works after all these years !), but had a few annoying issues - mainly the software chain, the size of the thing - it takes up a whole 1200mm table, the amount of cabling involved - and finally the cost of the hardware - especially vee wheels and rails (at the time, they're a bit cheaper now).

The latest idea was to change from a marlin based RAMPS 1.4 3D printer controller - with all the annoying firmware changes to something GRBL based. It also had to have (like my RAMPS 1.4 setup) a display screen with an SD card interface - absolutely NO controller computer attached. I ended up using a CAMXTool v3,5 GRBL board (think they're used in some of the 3 axis el cheapo Chinese CNC machines) with an offline controller board to give the display/SD interface.
It was also destined to be cordless )

Bearing in mind that we're not producing parts for the medical, military or space programs, there seems no need to go to the extent that some folks take their projects ) To that end, I've kept the parts count to a minimum - the addage being that the best engineering part is no part at all )

The software chain
My previous chain was - Adobe Illustrator to SVG, the free Inventables web based Easel software to convert to the SVG to Gcode - then my own DIY post processor (written in Xojo) - really just to replace all the Z axis commands with servo commands for the RAMPS board. While that all worked well, it was a bit of a PITA. I wanted something a wee bit sleeker and went for Lightburn software as the main item. I do still use Adobe Illustrator for the main drawing as all my laser stuff is done in that anyway, but it can just as easily be done in lightburn - what a wonderful bit of software, I wish it had been available when I was building my own CO2 laser designs back in the day - the Chinese software stuff was (IS !) just awful and only runs in windoze and not Mac. All you need to do is tell lightburn that you're driving a diode laser and you're done - how easy is that ! You could drive the GRBL board directly from Lightburn I suppose if that's your thing.

The perforator head
It has a servo to move the whole internals up and down as a Z axis as before. An ESC to control the brushless motor and a brushless motor. However, rather than have all the connections and cabling to all these items, there are only three connections - 0V, +12V and a 0-100% PWM signal. This signal is derived from the 'laser' output connector on the GRBL board - there being no servo output like the RAMPS board. To this end, I had to write some arduino code for a nano that handled this. It takes the 0 to 100% signal from the laser output and converts that to the depth of cut for the foam - 0 to 100% = 0 to 8mm. The ESC signal is set to a single value to handle (in my case depron) the number of dots per millimetre that will be cut in the foam - ie, the speed of the brushless motor. The motor only comes on when there is a signal greater than 10% and switches off when the signal drops below this. I haven't bothered to do a full 0 to 100% depth in firmware as the foam only needs a full cut and a half cut - YMMV as they say and can easily be modified in the arduino code.
The needle cutter therefore emulates a diode laser I suppose I guess you could just plug it in to one of those diode laser machines that I just hate LOL ))

It's been through a couple of iterations. My original v1.1 worked REALLY well - NEVER broke a needle - mainly due to the use of TWO bearings with a spacer washer rather than attempting to grind a slot around a bearing (why would you want to do that ???).
As folks found, there was a minor heat issue with this needle setup (caused by the side-to-side movement of the needle touching the MIG head), so they added a series of bearing to alleviate that and attempt to get the needle reciprocating rather than flailing about. Rather than go that route, I originally added a small heatsink to the MIG head - this fixed the problem, the temp was only around 30degC - fine for foam.
One issue however, was that a lot of folks used CNC machines to control the head - moving the whole thing up and down on the Z axis. This meant that the needle was at full extension when driving in to the foam and caused (still causes it seems broken needles.
As my setup wasn't a CNC machine and used a servo to drive the whole NEEDLE driver up and down (within the confines of the MIG head), I didn't have this problem. I went one step further and added what in essence is the same as a sewing machine 'presser foot' - a foot that STAYS DOWN on the surface of the material permanently. It's just an end piece from a 28mm copper pipe 'stopped end' and is simply soldered to the MIG head. It gives a large heatsink area and also give a further BIG benefit - as it's down on the foam all the time, it keeps the foam level - you DON'T need to hold the foam down in any way - no vacuum beds/pins/nails/tape.
This setup has proven to work well and is the reason I stayed with it in v2.0.

I had originally wanted to use 'real' needles - ie, sewing machine needles (as that's what they were designed for ) - I ended up using a 'scotch yoke' setup on a pair of rails to drive the needle vertically - it DID work, but was rattling the house to bits as I couldn't get it balanced at all. The weight of the yoke was just too much (the pix show the original yoke which rode up and down on a pair of 3mm ground rods - the 3D printed yoke used 4 oilite bearings and a pair of 3mm rods as the yoke). The 'big end' just couldn't be balanced with enough weight to make it smooth.
I scratched that idea for v2,1 - and based on the parts count, dropped the rails and scotch yoke and simply bent a scotch yoke in a bit of 0.7mm (22SWG) piano wire (music wire USA) that the crank pin yanks up and down as the needle - in a linear fashion, NOT side to side as the restrained original in the bearing. The heatsink is under a lot less strain now and only gets barely warm. The 'scotch yoke' is held against the crank pin and can't move due to the 3D printed face of the wheel and the MIG head.

I haven't mentioned anything about the new XY framework for this setup as it's still incomplete - time is the issue (being retired means that you now have ZERO time to do anything ) Suffice to say that it's based on hardware store 20mm square section aluminium tubing and 3D printed 'bearings' - I say bearings in it's loosest sense - just PLA sliding tubes really with some added bits to hold the perforator head and the electronics together. The electronics and the two steppers ride on the Y axis 'bearing' in a setup similar to the ERC Timsav 'T' shaped layout (but move with the Y axis) - which is in essence the same as the old 'drawing machines' we used to build way back in the late 90's. There is an option to have it 'cordless' - just a 3S/2200 LiPo or plugged in to a 12V walwart. Having the cordless option is good as you can then take it anywhere - I mean, how many times do you cut foam planes ??? It's also foldable. I'll eventually get around to doing some drawings for this.

I'm sure I'll have missed some important bits of info, so just ask - the pix should be self explanatory 'though.

Cheers

Neil

 

[dkj4linux]

New Perforator Head

Hi all

Thought you might be interested in this version of the perforator head that I've been working on.

My previous laser cut version 1.1 worked really well (still works after all these years !), but had a few annoying issues - mainly the software chain, the size of the thing - it takes up a whole 1200mm table, the amount of cabling involved - and finally the cost of the hardware - especially vee wheels and rails (at the time, they're a bit cheaper now).

The latest idea was to change from a marlin based RAMPS 1.4 3D printer controller - with all the annoying firmware changes to something GRBL based. It also had to have (like my RAMPS 1.4 setup) a display screen with an SD card interface - absolutely NO controller computer attached. I ended up using a CAMXTool v3,5 GRBL board (think they're used in some of the 3 axis el cheapo Chinese CNC machines) with an offline controller board to give the display/SD interface.
It was also destined to be cordless )

Bearing in mind that we're not producing parts for the medical, military or space programs, there seems no need to go to the extent that some folks take their projects ) To that end, I've kept the parts count to a minimum - the addage being that the best engineering part is no part at all )

The software chain
My previous chain was - Adobe Illustrator to SVG, the free Inventables web based Easel software to convert to the SVG to Gcode - then my own DIY post processor (written in Xojo) - really just to replace all the Z axis commands with servo commands for the RAMPS board. While that all worked well, it was a bit of a PITA. I wanted something a wee bit sleeker and went for Lightburn software as the main item. I do still use Adobe Illustrator for the main drawing as all my laser stuff is done in that anyway, but it can just as easily be done in lightburn - what a wonderful bit of software, I wish it had been available when I was building my own CO2 laser designs back in the day - the Chinese software stuff was (IS !) just awful and only runs in windoze and not Mac. All you need to do is tell lightburn that you're driving a diode laser and you're done - how easy is that ! You could drive the GRBL board directly from Lightburn I suppose if that's your thing.

The perforator head
It has a servo to move the whole internals up and down as a Z axis as before. An ESC to control the brushless motor and a brushless motor. However, rather than have all the connections and cabling to all these items, there are only three connections - 0V, +12V and a 0-100% PWM signal. This signal is derived from the 'laser' output connector on the GRBL board - there being no servo output like the RAMPS board. To this end, I had to write some arduino code for a nano that handled this. It takes the 0 to 100% signal from the laser output and converts that to the depth of cut for the foam - 0 to 100% = 0 to 8mm. The ESC signal is set to a single value to handle (in my case depron) the number of dots per millimetre that will be cut in the foam - ie, the speed of the brushless motor. The motor only comes on when there is a signal greater than 10% and switches off when the signal drops below this. I haven't bothered to do a full 0 to 100% depth in firmware as the foam only needs a full cut and a half cut - YMMV as they say and can easily be modified in the arduino code.
The needle cutter therefore emulates a diode laser I suppose I guess you could just plug it in to one of those diode laser machines that I just hate LOL ))

It's been through a couple of iterations. My original v1.1 worked REALLY well - NEVER broke a needle - mainly due to the use of TWO bearings with a spacer washer rather than attempting to grind a slot around a bearing (why would you want to do that ???).
As folks found, there was a minor heat issue with this needle setup (caused by the side-to-side movement of the needle touching the MIG head), so they added a series of bearing to alleviate that and attempt to get the needle reciprocating rather than flailing about. Rather than go that route, I originally added a small heatsink to the MIG head - this fixed the problem, the temp was only around 30degC - fine for foam.
One issue however, was that a lot of folks used CNC machines to control the head - moving the whole thing up and down on the Z axis. This meant that the needle was at full extension when driving in to the foam and caused (still causes it seems broken needles.
As my setup wasn't a CNC machine and used a servo to drive the whole NEEDLE driver up and down (within the confines of the MIG head), I didn't have this problem. I went one step further and added what in essence is the same as a sewing machine 'presser foot' - a foot that STAYS DOWN on the surface of the material permanently. It's just an end piece from a 28mm copper pipe 'stopped end' and is simply soldered to the MIG head. It gives a large heatsink area and also give a further BIG benefit - as it's down on the foam all the time, it keeps the foam level - you DON'T need to hold the foam down in any way - no vacuum beds/pins/nails/tape.
This setup has proven to work well and is the reason I stayed with it in v2.0.

I had originally wanted to use 'real' needles - ie, sewing machine needles (as that's what they were designed for ) - I ended up using a 'scotch yoke' setup on a pair of rails to drive the needle vertically - it DID work, but was rattling the house to bits as I couldn't get it balanced at all. The weight of the yoke was just too much (the pix show the original yoke which rode up and down on a pair of 3mm ground rods - the 3D printed yoke used 4 oilite bearings and a pair of 3mm rods as the yoke). The 'big end' just couldn't be balanced with enough weight to make it smooth.
I scratched that idea for v2,1 - and based on the parts count, dropped the rails and scotch yoke and simply bent a scotch yoke in a bit of 0.7mm (22SWG) piano wire (music wire USA) that the crank pin yanks up and down as the needle - in a linear fashion, NOT side to side as the restrained original in the bearing. The heatsink is under a lot less strain now and only gets barely warm. The 'scotch yoke' is held against the crank pin and can't move due to the 3D printed face of the wheel and the MIG head.

I haven't mentioned anything about the new XY framework for this setup as it's still incomplete - time is the issue (being retired means that you now have ZERO time to do anything ) Suffice to say that it's based on hardware store 20mm square section aluminium tubing and 3D printed 'bearings' - I say bearings in it's loosest sense - just PLA sliding tubes really with some added bits to hold the perforator head and the electronics together. The electronics and the two steppers ride on the Y axis 'bearing' in a setup similar to the ERC Timsav 'T' shaped layout (but move with the Y axis) - which is in essence the same as the old 'drawing machines' we used to build way back in the late 90's. There is an option to have it 'cordless' - just a 3S/2200 LiPo or plugged in to a 12V walwart. Having the cordless option is good as you can then take it anywhere - I mean, how many times do you cut foam planes ??? It's also foldable. I'll eventually get around to doing some drawings for this.

I'm sure I'll have missed some important bits of info, so just ask - the pix should be self explanatory 'though.

Cheers

Neil

Truly impressive, Neil. Scotch yokes have been mentioned a few times over the years but most that have tried building it ended up with a "flailing mass" that never panned out. With just the needle's mass in your latest iteration, it looks promising. Hopefully, it'll be durable as well.

At 75, I'm pretty much out of the needle-cutting "business". However, just the other day, I was rummaging through some of my junk boxes and found the following relic that I'll posit as my "latest and greatest"...

I'm still messing about with CNC stuff... primarily laser engravers these days. But, like you, I moved on to GRBL from Marlin when I started playing more with diode lasers a few years ago. And, like you, I've fallen in love with Lightburn as well... it is, indeed, fine software.

Thank you for the update. Though I'm no longer actively needle-cutting, I think there are still folks dropping in nowadays that are... and I'm sure there will be interest in how your new "perforator head" works out. To show how great minds... whatever... here's a link to a 2012 Phlatforum post where I presented for the first time my "perforator" foam cutting head (yet another version of the relic above) to the RC community. Though I'd built a couple of CNC machines and bunches of needle-cutters for my late flying buddy and I by that time, there simply weren't yet enough RC'ers with CNC interest/experience for the idea to take off. A few years later and once I discovered the MPCNC and started using it as my development platform -- and started this thread -- the idea finally started to gain momentum and it's now got a life of its own.

Well done, Neil! And, thanks again!

-- David

 

[catter1234]

Getting ready to deliver this last MPCNC to my buddy, I've gone back to the hard-mounted MPCNC foam cutter for a little more rigidity and mounted a 2822 1200kv brushless motor. The lower kv rating of the motor better utilizes the servo tester's potentiometer range. I've used the 0.035" copper welding-tip in my latest 3-point floating needle guide holder. Feed rate is 609 mm/min and cutter is running a more relaxed 6000-7000 rpm. This is a successful attempt to stay below the point where the guide tip heats excessively and the needle begins melting the foam. All in all, this seems a good combination... good quality cuts in DTFB (paper on) and everything running pretty stress-free. -- David

dear DKJ4linux,

love you machine very much,
I have bought ramp 1.4,But I have some questions,

1. which verson of the fireware should I use?
2.How to cheat the fireware,the temperature has done?
3.Is there tutorial?
4. how to modify the fireware,Is there anything change?

thanks a lot,waiting for your reply.

have a good day.