Surface scan
- Install a probe at your machine which triggers the Probe pin (A5 at arduino) when touching the work piece surface. A NO (normally open) switch, connected to ground and A5, is what we need.
- Be sure the max. speed settings $110, $111, $112 are not too high - causing step loss
- A homing of the machine is recommended
- Run the surface scan
Some examples of DIY probes:
1 with micro-switch, 2, 3 using a needle, 4, 5 made of brass
The machine can be controlled via
- mouse at the user interface inside the virtual joystick control
- external game pad
The control range of the analoge joysticks are divided into 6 segments to get same functionality as the virtual joystick has. Using the same settings, described below. - control via keyboard is not supported up to now.
The idea is to get a continuous movement as long as the joystick is triggered, and to stop directly. With grbl 0.9 it wasn't easy to implement. My solution was to send every 0.5 seconds a command for a short movement - a distance which could be reached almost within 0.5 seconds. To avoid an extra edit box for the feed rate I designed the control above, which offers 5 different speeds for each direction.