Can Easel be used as the control software for other mills; not X-carve machines? For example, if I were to build my own mill from plans on the net could I then use Easel to carve things?
Thanks!
I think really the only requirement to use Easel is that your motion controller has to utilize a grbl based controller.
Do you mean the stepper motor controllers? Ie. TinyG, smoothieboard, arduino w/grbl shield?
I think regardless of the combination of stepper driver and motion controller you use it just has to be using grbl. The stock X-Carve comes with a Arduino loaded with grbl and a gShield. I’m not entirely versed in the requirements, so I hope I helped a little at least.
Smoothieboard is not grbl based, so if Easel requires grbl then the Smoothieboard won’t work.
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I don’t think that’s entirely true. Here is a post from the developer saying it’s quite possible to use GRBL with the Smoothieboard. I’m not sure if the described issue is fixed, but it appears it’s at least possible to make it work.
From one of the Smoothieboard developers (Arthur Wolf):
The motion control part of the code is a fork of GRBL’s
Which leads one to believe that the remainder of the code is not grbl, but might be modified to make better use of the Smoothieboard’s hardware capabilities.
I don’t know if anyone has ported grbl (it’s open source) to the Smoothieboard, but it should be possible.
Also, begs the question how much modification can you do and still be able to call it “grbl”?