I have just setup a Hypercube Evolution with Re-arm and have the machine mostly working. Note I went straight to Re-arm and did not setup with arduino.
What is causing me problems is my z axis.
When I print it seems like my z-axis is moving the smallest amount and that overtime it looks like the plate is drifting downward. This is only an issue while printing. When the printer is not printing the bed stays perfectly flat.
I do have a heavy build plate (400x400mm ceramic tile) but compensated with high power 1.7A stepper motors and 2.2A DRV stepper drivers.
The other question is that I do not have an LCD and dont really need one except for one thing. I have a Prusa i3 mk2 and it has the feature live z adjust. I would go and purchase an LCD but wanted to confirm Smoothieware has this feature.
If your motors are 1.7A, you have to set the current at exactly 1.7A, so it doesn’t matter if your drivers can do 2A or 2.2A.
How many motors are you using for your Z ? Does each motor have a driver or do they share ? Is your current set exactly at the right value for the motor ?
About LCDs, Smoothie has a panel system, and allows for adjusting the Z height, but I’m not sure how close it is to Marlin’s feature as I don’t use either.
I am running two stepper motors off the same driver.
Current limit = Vref*2
So by that calculation. Since I am running the motors in parallel I would be looking at setting Vref as 1.7V or am i missing something here.
On the Z-adjust. Can you adjust the Z-height/offset while a print job is running?
Well if those are 1.7A steppers, and you have two, you want the driver to output 3.4A. But it can’t, so you want to set it at the maximum it can handle.
You’d think it’s 2.2A, but it’s *not*. You are using pololu-type drivers. Those have a ridiculously bad thermal dissipation. This means very likely they are overheating, and going into overheat protection mode, leading to the problems you are complaining about.
Pololu-type drivers ( including yours ) typically can’t handle more than ~1.3A without a powerful fan aimed at them, maybe ~1.5 with the fan, total.
This means even in the best circumpstances you can’t get even half the current you need to to your motors. And in the worth circumpstances ( what you are doing now ), you try to send too much and the drivers freak out.
You need to use one driver per motor, or to use an external stepper driver.
On the Z-adujst I really couldn’t tell you, I would assume it has it, but I can’t be sure.