ERC TimSav - Cheap DIY CNC Foamboard Cutter

[Foamforce]

here is the code that it puts out.

How are you generating that? Are you going to file>save? The gcode is generated by opening the extension from the extensions menu, entering the path and file name, and clicking Apply. Is that what you’re doing?

 

[Flying Farm Kid]

How are you generating that? Are you going to file>save? The gcode is generated by opening the extension from the extensions menu, entering the path and file name, and clicking Apply. Is that what you’re doing?

Here is a video I made showing my steps to generate gcode

 

[Foamforce]

Here is a video I made showing my steps to generate gcode

Ok, you’re just looking in the wrong place for the file. When you have the plug-in open, the path and file name in the plugin popup is where the file goes. What you saw at the end was just when you saved changes to the original SVG. In the pop up, you were saving to c:\users\public. You’ll find the file there.

PS, posting the video was a great idea!

 

[Flying Farm Kid]

Ok, you’re just looking in the wrong place for the file. When you have the plug-in open, the path and file name in the plugin popup is where the file goes. What you saw at the end was just when you saved changes to the original SVG. In the pop up, you were saving to c:\users\public. You’ll find the file there.

PS, posting the video was a great idea!

Thanks I will try it tomorrow

 

[Flying Farm Kid]

It worked I found it thanks!

Ok, you’re just looking in the wrong place for the file. When you have the plug-in open, the path and file name in the plugin popup is where the file goes. What you saw at the end was just when you saved changes to the original SVG. In the pop up, you were saving to c:\users\public. You’ll find the file there.

PS, posting the video was a great idea.

 

[Foamforce]

I cut vinyl today and it came out better than expected. The cut was very clean and applying it was easier than expected. This is Dollar Tree vinyl, so $1.25 for a 12x48” roll. I used about 20”, of each color, so this is about $1.

 

[luvmy40]

I cut vinyl today and it came out better than expected. The cut was very clean and applying it was easier than expected. This is Dollar Tree vinyl, so $1.25 for a 12x48” roll. I used about 20”, of each color, so this is about $1.

That looks great! How did you hold it down for cutting?

 

[Foamforce]

That looks great! How did you hold it down for cutting?

It didn't take much because the needle doesn't move it around around or pick it up at all. I just put a few pieces of scotch tape around the corners. However, it may have helped that my pattern lends itself nicely to hiding any imperfections. It it had to be perfectly flat, I was thinking that a bit of temporary spray adhesive would work, because that would go on the vinyl's removeable backing.

 

[azamKL_2]

Hello...
I think I'm the last to do it, but it was a nice job and I had good experiences. I drew the counter parts completely myself, of course my visual source was Timsav
I made the first cut today. I think I will do good work. Many thanks to my friends who helped me.

The Z Axis with a stepper motor is something promising. Do you anywhere can I print the STL for it? If possible to also guide on how to control the stepper motor with it. That would be great.

 

[Foamforce]

I've updated the Inkscape extension to work with Inkscape 1.3. I started with the updates that @CapnBry made in this post, which added the ability to create the full cuts, score cuts, and all other types of cuts in a single file. After that, I made the following changes:

• Fixed scaling issues.
  • Explanation: Up until Inkscape .91, the internal resolution of Inkscape SVG files was 90dpi. Version .92 changed the internal resolution to 96dpi, which is what caused the scaling issues we saw. 90dpi was hard-coded into the plugin so I switched that to using an Inkscape API that performs the appropriate conversion using either 90 or 96.
• Fixed an issue with missing cuts in SVGs made in new versions of Inkscape.
  • Explanation: Older versions of Inkscape appear to have always put the path's stroke color in the style attribute of the path and that's where the plugin expected to find it. At some point a newer version of Inkscape switched to putting the stroke color in a discrete attribute. I changed it to look for style attribute first and then check for the discrete attribute next.
• Fixed a warning about a deprecated function called simpletransform.composeTransform().

I only did light testing on this. I tested with older files created in Inkscape .91 and with newer files created in Inkscape 1.3. That said, there are certainly going to be bugs and crashes when more people try it.

Could somebody give it a shot and let me know if it works? Please only try with the latest version of Inkscape (1.3).

Update 10/27/23: No sooner than I processed my next file, I found a couple bugs. I've updated the attachment with the fixes.

 

[Flying Farm Kid]

Hello everyone
I am having issues with the vacume pad that I made. It id not getting enough suction for it all to properly come down. What size of vaume are you using and any other tips would be appreciated. Thank you!

 

[catter1234]

I was in the process of making some plans and ended up with a Full Cut SVG, a Score Cut SVG, and was starting a new SVG for labeling the parts and putting reference lines and I said what the heck am I doing here this is a mess. In the spirit of "Do not spend an hour doing something you can spend 100 hours automating" I present MULTICUT:
View attachment 167641

This updated extension allows you to just have one freakin' drawing and have all of them in the same file. It uses the path stroke color to determine what type of cut it is.

• BLACK - Full cut
• RED - Score cut
• BLUE - Blue cut
• GREEN - Green cut

The last two I didn't name "reference" or "guides" or whatever because you can just use them for whatever you want. Blue is FULL BLUE (0, 0, 255, 255) and green is FULL GREEN (0, 255, 0, 255) in the stroke definition. No need to put things in layers or have separate SVG files any more, just make sure the line colors are what type of cut you want and export once. No copy pasting gcode files together either! The paths are all sorted to try to minimize travel moves, so all the cuts will be mixed in together instead of being completely separate passes. Note that the light blue color FT uses to declare A / B / C fold is not considered blue. Only fully blue things are blue!

IN ADDITION! If there is a file named "header" or "footer" in the destination directory, those are prepended and appended to the gcode file automatically. I have this as my header to pause 10 seconds then start the motor

G4 P10
M4 S70

and this is my footer to just stop the motor

M4 S0

Hopefully this will save everyone some time going through the files multiple times and deleting a bajillion lines and oops I saved over the wrong file.

INSTALLATION: Just extract the two files from the ZIP and put them in the Inkscape extensions directory (Inkscape/share/extensions/) not a subfolder, and it has the same title as ERC's (MI GRBL Z-AXIS Servo Controller). Note that it still has issues with the latest Inkscape (both 1.0 and 0.92) so Inkscape 0.91 r13725 should still be used.

Not everytime,but happen sometime,what's wrong? inkscape0.9

 

[Flying Farm Kid]

Not everytime,but happen sometime,what's wrong? inkscape0.9

Same error I am having it happens on all plans that are not SPONZ plans I am currently updating to 1.3.1 to attempt to fix

 

[Flying Farm Kid]

I've updated the Inkscape extension to work with Inkscape 1.3. I started with the updates that @CapnBry made in this post, which added the ability to create the full cuts, score cuts, and all other types of cuts in a single file. After that, I made the following changes:

• Fixed scaling issues.
  • Explanation: Up until Inkscape .91, the internal resolution of Inkscape SVG files was 90dpi. Version .92 changed the internal resolution to 96dpi, which is what caused the scaling issues we saw. 90dpi was hard-coded into the plugin so I switched that to using an Inkscape API that performs the appropriate conversion using either 90 or 96.
• Fixed an issue with missing cuts in SVGs made in new versions of Inkscape.
  • Explanation: Older versions of Inkscape appear to have always put the path's stroke color in the style attribute of the path and that's where the plugin expected to find it. At some point a newer version of Inkscape switched to putting the stroke color in a discrete attribute. I changed it to look for style attribute first and then check for the discrete attribute next.
• Fixed a warning about a deprecated function called simpletransform.composeTransform().

I only did light testing on this. I tested with older files created in Inkscape .91 and with newer files created in Inkscape 1.3. That said, there are certainly going to be bugs and crashes when more people try it.

Could somebody give it a shot and let me know if it works? Please only try with the latest version of Inkscape (1.3).

Update 10/27/23: No sooner than I processed my next file, I found a couple bugs. I've updated the attachment with the fixes.

how do you do this on a mac?

 

[Foamforce]

how do you do this on a mac?

Sorry, I haven’t used Inkscape on a Mac. Search on Google for “How to install Inkscape plugins on Mac”. At a glance, it looks like Macs use the same plugins.

 

[Flying Farm Kid]

how do you do this on a mac?

the extention wont show up in the extentions tab do you do the same process that you would of done for 0.91 thanks

 

[Flying Farm Kid]

Sorry, I haven’t used Inkscape on a Mac. Search on Google for “How to install Inkscape plugins on Mac”. At a glance, it looks like Macs use the same plugins.

Yea I just switched over and am still finding things I put it into the extentions folder and nothing happened
the same place I put the one for 0.91

 

[Foamforce]

Yea I just switched over and am still finding things I put it into the extentions folder and nothing happened
the same place I put the one for 0.91

In the Windows version, I noticed that the extensions folder moved. It probably moved on Mac too.

 

[Flying Farm Kid]

In the Windows version, I noticed that the extensions folder moved. It probably moved on Mac too.

I found the folder but when I put it in it did nothing.
Do the files have to be in the folder or separate to work?

 

[Flying Farm Kid]

In the Windows version, I noticed that the extensions folder moved. It probably moved on Mac too.

did you install yours the same as in the 0.91 version?