I’ve searched and searched, while most issues suggest adjusting the potentiometer and others have found success in it–I have not.
During y-axis movements, there’s a moaning sound that has a higher pitch during straight movements and it dulls out when slowing down (approaching the end of a curve). I’ve adjusted the potentiometer, checked the wiring for loose connections and I’m not sure what else to do. It started after moving the power supply and had to disconnect the g-shield.
I turned up the pot 3-4 times, slight movements each time, but decided I’d ask for more information to avoid damaging something–I’m good at that.
I posted a video to instagram to see if anybody had any suggestions, so here’s that too. Justin Haugens on Instagram: "X-Carve y axis has started making a weird groaning noise when moving, any ideas what this might be? #inventables #xcarve"
Another observation: The moaning appears to only occur under a load, I moved the gantry in Easel and it was smooth with the typical noise.
I’ve noticed that mine does that too, it’s almost like it’s singing when it’s doing curves. I don’t see a decrease in performance, so I’d say just adjust the belt tension, v-wheels, and pots to whatever gives you the best performance and enjoy the song.
1 Like
It wasn’t doing that in the beginning, at least I don’t recall, which is what made me nervous.
Mine “moan” too. A completely different sound than the X axis. I think it started when I adjusted the pots because of missing steps.
That singing or moaning is typical of stepper motors. It’s the cogging effect of going from one step to the next. Increasing microstepping quiets that down but has other effects on motor performance. At slow step rates that singing goes into more of a moan/groan since the frequency of steps decreases. Stepper motors also experience resonance at lower step rates as the magnetic poles swing the rotor back and forth before the rotor settles in the magnetic field of each step. All of that resonance and step frequencies then propagate throughout the frame making the noise. Even a stepper motor with no load and not attached to anything will make some singing noise as it’s turning.
That’s not to be confused with parts grinding due to assembly or poor adjustment. But your video sounds like the typical stepper noise I described above.
2 Likes
I think it’s normal also. If you run straight square, you don’t even notice. When you run circles or arcs, steppers receiving double command, “slow half way down and wait for other axises.”
