Makerslides not screwing in right with gantry sides

X-Carve Troubleshooting
1

Hi,

I received my x-carve today and got a little too excited while assembling it. The tapped holes on my makerslides don’t line up well with the gantry sides, but instead of coming over here right away I tried to force-screw the M5s in. Here’s the aftermath (I’m at the end of step 04 Redirecting…)

  • Four screws went in perfect. Those were the first one on each side, on both the makerslides, so no alignment problems there.
  • Three screws required a fair bit of strength to drive in but look “ok”. They went in at a slight angle, but ended up all the way in without too much trouble.
  • The last screw is the one that’s getting me concerned (and making me second guess the other three that didn’t go in well). I couldn’t get it all the way in even with a lot of strength, and in the process I stripped the head :
    20160504_004422.jpg4160×2340 1.82 MB

Am I doing something stupid here? Is it to be expected that those parts (makerslides and gantry sides) may not mate perfectly? I was hoping it might be something to be expected because of the tapped holes.

Anybody else had that problem? Any idea?
What should I do if other parts don’t mate well?

2

That happened to me too. Loosen them all, and tighten them in small, even steps.

3

what you said

4

Yep, much better. Thanks!

20160504_104736.jpg2340×4160 1.98 MB

(didn’t unstrip the screw, but it’s sitting flater and went in easy)

5

Just went through the exact same thing, except I had to drill the bolts out, and they sent me a replacement makerslide. (They really are a class crew at Inventables.)

I just finished mine, and it worked perfectly first cut out.

My main piece of advice during assembly is don’t over tighten stuff. After reading these boards for a few months I was totally paranoid, and cranked everything down.

The bolt heads strip like butter, and you will find that sometimes you will have to undo bolts in order to add a piece or change things and it becomes a real bear.

Just my 2 cents.