Congratulations to everyone at Sienci Labs, we have completed packing the first few Vortex Rotary Axis Kits which are now awaiting shipping or pickup! For more information about the Vortex, please visit our blog here: https://sienci.com/2023/05/08/vortex-rotary-axis-launch-date-june-1-2023/
We’re super excited to get all of the pre-orders out to customers in the next few weeks! We are planning to ship around 40-50 per week until we are completed the queue.
One of the most common questions we get from folks looking to order a LongMill is “What should I get with it?”. This article and video are designed to help you walk through everything you need.
The average order value for customers first purchasing a LongMill and accessories in the past 12 months is approximately $2850CAD or $2190USD, which means that for most customers, you can easily get a complete setup for under $3000. These numbers represent the total value of the order, which includes the machine, as well as most other accessories such as the software, router, endmills, a dust shoe, touch plate, and other items. You should allocate a few hundred dollars for other items that you may or may not have in your shop already, such as a bench, computer, and vacuum.
Here is the breakdown of the most popular items that customers order along with their LongMill by percentage.
If it’s your first time getting into hobby CNC, you might be a little intimidated by what you need to get started. This video is designed to cover everything you need to have in your shop.
Your first, and largest purchase is going to be the machine itself. The LongMill Benchtop CNC is a capable option for hobbyists who are looking for a lot of functionality found on more expensive machines but in a more budget-friendly package. Depending on the size, you can get a LongMill for around $1800 to $2300CAD or around $1400USD to $2000USD, which makes it one of the least expensive options for the size.
While there are cheaper and more expensive machine options out there, we believe our specific machine is best suited for customers who:
Are looking to do this as a hobby, with some interest in production and business work
Need high-quality resources and support
Willing to make a small compromise in cutting speed but still be able to produce the same type of work as more expensive machines
Our main goal as a company is to make CNC accessible to everyone. This comes down to a number of commitments to our customers and products:
To make products that are affordable for the average hobbyist
Provide resources, support, and instructions so that we can make sure our customers can be successful in using our products.
We feel that customers not only choose the LongMill because it is an affordable option, but because we created a helpful and supportive community around our products.
If you’re not sure what size to choose, we recommend considering the working areas of each version of the machine, and determining what size fits in your shop as well as can do the type of projects that you’re interested in doing.
Router or Spindle
The base LongMill kit does not come with a router, since we wanted to let customers choose which router they want to use with their machine. The LongMill can work with several different palm routers, but the one that is the most popular and the one we recommend is the Makita RT0701, as it’s inexpensive, readily available, and has more than enough power for general woodworking use. You can order this directly through us, or at most local hardware stores.
The LongMill also can be retrofitted with an aftermarket spindle, and we provide 71 and 80mm router mounts for larger spindles, however, due to cost and complexity, we only recommend this upgrade to experienced customers. More information about routers and spindles can be found in our resources.
You’ll also need to get some end mills and bits to start off your CNCing journey.
Assuming you have a Makita router, you’ll mostly be using ¼” shank tools, or if you get either the ¼” to ⅛” adapter, or the ⅛” Precision Collet, ⅛” shank tooling as well.
We provide dozens of different bit options and packs on our store. If you’re not sure what to get, we recommend checking out one of the End Mill Sets, such as the Signmakers Set and Machinist Set.
If you’re starting out for the first time, I recommend the Starter End Mill Set, which comes with all of the bits that we think you’ll need and a collet adapter. The Starter End Mill set, which we recommend for first-time users, is about $45USD or $60CAD, and come with 9 different bits and accessories.
Prices for bits vary a lot, especially when you get into high-end tools, but for the average user, you should expect to pay a few dollars for smaller tooling, and up to around 20 dollars for a larger bit.
End Mills & Bits
All our bits are designed and tested specifically for CNC routers and spindles.
The last thing you must get for your CNC is a bench and spoiboard. This is just a large surface you can put your machine on. It should be noted that the surface should be as flat and strong as possible, since any flex or irregularity may show up in your cuts as well. Some people will make a bench from scratch, which can cost $100s of dollars, but even an old sturdy desk or dining room table can work as well.
Some different ideas and inspirations can be found in our resources.
You’ll also need a spoil board or wasteboard, which acts as a consumable surface for your projects to sit on. We recommend ¾” MDF, as its cheap, readily available, and dimensionally stable. You should be able to buy a 4×8 sheet and cut it into 2-3 wasteboards for about $60.
Computer and Software
There are two main pieces of software you’ll need with your CNC machine. First is the gcode sender. We build gSender as a feature-filled, powerful sender specifically for the LongMill. This program lets you send jobs, change settings, control your machine, and integrate with accessories like the touch plate and inductive sensors. Best of all, it’s completely free!
There are other gcode sending software, such as UGS and Openbuilds Control, but we think you should use gSender.
I recommend checking out our resources where we talk about different CNC software (Broll of scrolling through the resources, https://resources.sienci.com/view/lmk2-choosing-software/ or checking out our video on software to help you choose which software to get.
If you want to read about our thoughts on Free vs Paid software, we recommend reading our article on the topic.
Dust Collection
CNCing can be really messy, which makes dust collection an important part of your setup.
At our shop, we use a Rigid Shop Vac and Dust Deputy, both of which can be purchased for about $200. This sort of set up will be more than capable for hobby CNC dust collection use.
To help clean up dust while cutting, we have the Dust Shoe, a $60USD, $75CAD attachment which goes on the front of the machine to suck up dust while your job is cutting. This particular one works with the 2.5in hose from the Rigid Vac perfectly.
To keep parts from flying out while cutting, you’ll need some form of work holding. Certain methods, such as using screws or hot glue, are very inexpensive and are easy to use.
Some users will set up a t-track table on their wasteboard which allows you to use t-clamps and ¼” bolts to have a fast and adjustable system for workholding. A full set costs about $100USD or $125CAD.
I should note what makes our t-tracks unique is that they use ¼”-20 bolts rather than t-bolts which are harder to find, so that you can buy different size bolts from the hardware store if you want to make your own t-clamps.
There are a lot of workholding options, so I recommend checking out our resources page for different options.
Touch Plate and Inductive Sensors
When starting your job, the LongMill needs to have a set origin point. You must choose a starting point for the machine to start from, and it will perform the movements sent by the computer from that point, in relation to the starting point.
The important thing is to setting the starting point. You can choose the starting point manually by just jogging the machine to the place you want to start and “Zeroing” the machine, but we’ve created the touch plate to help semi-automate the process.
We currently have a simple touch plate for around $30, and a more advanced AutoZero touch plate for around $100.
Additionally, you can add limit or homing switches to your machine. These are sensors that are set up at specific corners of your machine so that you can return the machine to a specific position over and over again (Broll of homing). For the LongMill, when you shut off your machine, it does not remember the specific position relative to itself, and so by having a specific homing position to return to, you can use this to reference the positions of the machine automatically. For example, if you want to set up a job in the same position over and over again, you can home your machine and find the origin of the part relative to the home position after you’ve shut your machine off.
You can get an inductive sensor kit for about $50-60 dollars from our store, however, we generally recommend this to only advanced users, since the setup and process for using it can be complicated, and we generally recommend users who are already familiar with their CNC machines to use it.
The LongMill also is compatible with other accessories, like the Vortex Rotary Axis and LaserBeam add-ons that provide additional functionality. Over the past few years, we’ve developed these add-ons to plug and play with the LongMill. We plan, over time, to continue to create new add-ons and accessories that help our customers do more things.
For a full list of other add-ons and accessories you can get with your LongMill make sure to check out our add-ons section in our store (https://sienci.com/product-category/addons/mk2-addons/).
Maintenance Items
The LongMill requires some regular maintenance which is easy and straightforward to do. Recommended maintenance checks can be found in our resources.
There are only two consumable items, the Delrin Ant Backlash Blocks and Delrin V-Wheels which we recommend replacing every 1500-2000 hours, roughly once a year of regular use. Some customers choose to have them on hand just in case.
I hope this helps answer the “what should I get with my LongMill” question we get all of the time. If you have any other questions, please feel free to reach out!
July was a bit of a slow month due to the Vancover port strike holding up shipments for us to ship LongMills in the queue. However, now that parts are back to arriving again, we’re picking back up with our regular routine.
We have a lot of news to cover, especially with the pending release and shipping of the Vortex Rotary axis and new development around the SuperLongBoard.
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UPS reaches labour deal with Teamsters before strike
This July, we found out that Teamsters working for UPS were preparing for a strike in August, which would have disrupted shipments going to the US. However, UPS and Teamsters have settled on a new UPS contract which increases worker wages across the board and improved working conditions.
We are happy to hear that a resolution has been made, especially as we get into the busiest part of the season for our business.
LongMill and Extension Kit Orders
July has been a slow month for us shipping out LongMills as we have been affected by the port strike that delayed our shipment of controller boards. However, I’m happy to announce that we will receive the boards today and expect to clear the queue in the next 2 weeks.
The large majority of the pending 100 LongMill orders have been packed and are waiting to have the controller boxes done to have them shipped out.
Some LongMills waiting to be shipped
As some folks may know, we’ve continued to work on smoothing out the process of dealing with customs for shipments going to the US. Recently, we’ve been assigned a single contact with UPS to handle all of our LongMill shipments that need customs clearance going to the US. We found that some items were being miscategorized for duties and taxes, and we suspect it is because a big part of this is a manual process that causes human error. We believe that having a single contact who is familiar with the line items will speed up the clearance process with fewer mistakes.
A few new design updates on the LongMill MK2 design include a focus on phasing out of using M3 bolts in the assembly process and replacing them with M5 screws, including parts such as the couplers and ACME locking nuts. We are phasing out components using M3 screws in the LongMill assembly process because they are prone to stripping the heads more easily. Eventually, a full LongMill will be able to be assembled with just one M5 Allen key and our special wrench that we provide (as well as a drill and bit to mount your LongMill to a wasteboard of course).
Some new prototypes of the assembly wrench for new hardwareNew T8 locking nuts replacing the brass ACME nuts
We are also starting to use longer Z motor cables for the motors so that LongMill 48×30 kits, which are now the most popular variant, will not need a motor extension cable, simplifying the assembly process as well.
Additionally, now that the design of the LongMill MK2 has matured over the past year or so since its launch, we are moving to figure out injection molding parts for it for the first time. If you didn’t know, we 3D print several components for the LongMill MK2, including the dust shoe and feet. We found that due to the large number of feet we print, moving to injection molding would be a natural next step to reduce our need to rely on the 3D print farm, which is harder to scale production for.
We are entering into the first day of August with around 100 pending LongMill orders, but we expect to clear the queue in a week or two, after which we expect to shorten lead times again.
Vortex Rotary Axis
The last of the Vortex Rotary Axis parts have arrived at the end of July and we are now starting production and assembly!
First batch of machined parts looking beautifulTest assembly of the Vortex kitSwitch assemblies for Y axis to rotary mode
Our team has been continuing to work on different areas of the Vortex so that when they get into the hands of our users, they’ll have everything they need to get started. This includes:
Thorough assembly and installation instructions. We just completed initial trials and tests of the assembly process to make sure that we provide clear instructions to make it easy to put together. We found that everything came together really easily, except for the cam clamping system for the t-track, which we are currently working on to make it less finicky. We estimate that most users should be able to put it together in about 30 minutes. Full instructions will be found on our Vortex Resources soon.
Video content about the Vortex. We understand that not a lot of how-to and tutorial content exists for rotary CNCing. Our video production team and the engineers are working on the next steps for creating content so that our users can learn how the Vortex works and how to use it.
The gSender team continues to work on completing Rotary Axis implementation into the gSender, including homing and visualization for rotary. These features will be in gSender Edge at the time of launch and will be merged into the main version of gSender down the line. You try and learn about the latest version of Edge here.
We will start to trickle out Vortex Rotary Axis kits over the next week or two as we iron out the last bits of details. We expect the first batch of kits to start shipping out at the end of this week or early next week.
LaserBeam
LaserBeam production continues to move along smoothly, with most orders shipping out within a few days. We have stock available for the LaserBeam ready to ship now.
SuperLongBoard
Work for the SuperLongBoard (SLB) continues on. The team has been able to successfully test the main functionality with excellent results. However, we found our initial tests with the onboard compute module to be unsuccessful, as the Broadcom and Rockwell-based processors used on smaller compute modules to not be powerful enough to accommodate the visualization of g-code directly onboard.
Revised SLB
While additional software development was able to make significant speed improvements, we felt that the compute module would most likely need more headroom in the future if we were to implement other features down the line such as having a camera monitoring system, which we felt would be difficult to add due to a limitation of system resources.
We have now started looking at higher power compute modules, single board computers, and other hardware that we feel would ensure that the onboard gSender experience would be smooth and seamless, as well as provide headroom for future applications. However, the downside is that higher-power computers also cost more, and while our initial budget was around $80CAD/60USD for the compute module, we expect the computers to cost somewhere around $100-$200USD depending on the specs and configuration.
That being said, since we don’t need to have certain components and other parts to support the onboard computer directly, some of the cost of the computer is offset by the lower cost of the SLB itself.
We’ve decided to split the development of the SLB into two parts, one for the board itself, which will use grblHAL, a new, more advanced firmware and all of the improved motor control and drivers, and the computer itself. This means that the computer will live off the board in one fashion or the other.
While it would have been really cool to have the whole system integrated, we believe that by dividing and conquering, we can have the main portion of the SuperLongBoard out of the development process and into production first, and focus on the computer addition after. We felt like we could tackle some of the main problems with the current LongBoard with the new controller, and that it would be better to have the improvements we’ve already developed reach users sooner rather than having everything wait on further development on the onboard computer side.
This means that users will still need to connect their computers to the board to control their machines when the first batch of SLBs release, but better communication protocols, electronics, and shielding will make the USB connection significantly more reliable than before. Andrew, our main developer on this project, assures me that unreliable connections that cause issues with some users with the current board will be a thing of the past.
This version of the SLB natively supports communication over Ethernet, as well will have onboard storage which allows for streaming onboard rather than through a cable, which will improve reliability as well.
We are making the final design changes to prepare this version of the SLB for prototype production, and we hope to have production boards available near the end of the year. If you want to learn more about the SLB, please read: https://sienci.com/2023/04/10/first-look-at-the-superlongboard/
Last week we wrote about a port strike that was going on in Vancouver that was looking to impact the delivery times for our control boards and rotary axis parts. I’m happy to share that the strike has been resolved. However, the ports are still backed up and we are expecting some delays in receiving the rest of our materials.
In the meantime, we’ve ordered another batch of controllers to be produced and shipped rush in the case the delay for controllers causes a major delay in delivery times for pending LongMill orders. We expect this batch to be ready in around 3 weeks.
As we shared in the last update, while we don’t have an exact timeline on when the parts will arrive, we are optimistic that our shipment will be one of the first to be on its way toward Toronto as our container has been unloaded from the ship and is waiting in the railyard. Additionally, since we’ve been approved for ERS (express rail service), which prioritized our cargo first, we expect that this shipment will arrive before the rush order for additional controllers will arrive.
That being said, we still are not sure of the overall impact of the strike, and the backup order should allow us to continue production in the case that delays extend. We’ve received word that parts for the Vortex are already on the way and are expected to arrive end of next week, and we are still waiting for word about the controllers now we have received confirmation that we will receive the controllers around July 28th.
Due to a major strike happening in ports on the west coast, some of our shipments coming in from overseas have been delayed. This affects the arrival time of LongBoard controller and certain parts for the Vortex Rotary Axis.
We’ve communicated with our shipping companies who have assured us that our items, due to the timing of the arrivals, are in the railyards awaiting to be sent by train. Thankfully, this puts as one of the first shipments to start moving once the strike ends, but we do not know how long the strike will last.
Based on our research and communication with shipping companies, there is a lot of pressure to resolve the strike, as it is estimated by Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters that the strike is disturbing $500M in trade per day, and creates the potential to damage trade relations with overseas companies.
We are optimistic that the strike will clear soon, and since we are currently in a slower period for shipping, that the impact will be limited. However, we would advise customers to expect a 2-3 week delay for new LongMill orders which require the LongBoard. In the meantime, we are working on alternative methods to get more control boards to continue shipping and production, and we will be pre-packing orders in advance as we wait for the boards to arrive.
The Vortex Rotary Axis is now being assembled and prepared with the parts that we currently have on hand and preparing everything in advance before our last few parts arrive. We continue to keep our set expected shipping date for late-July or early-August.
We will put another post out once this situation resolves and we are closely monitoring the situation. We will reach out to any customers with orders affected by the strike directly.
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Our inventory manager Kye taking stock of new end mills and bits
In general news, we’ve done a few things in the past few weeks:
A new batch of end mills have arrived from our manufacturer and are being packed. New bit packs should be restocked by the time this post comes out
We’ve officially signed all of the paperwork for our new office. This means we’ll start moving in August 2023 with partial access. Starting October 2023, we’ll have full access.
Office layout planning
Content Insight Survey
Hey guess what! We just passed our 7000th subscriber on Youtube! If you didn’t know, we make tons of how-to, assembly, and tutorial videos on our channel.
Our team wants to keep making amazing content. If you want to help us figure out what we’re doing next, make sure to take our Content Insight Survey, which will help us understand what content you like and what we should be focusing
The Vortex Rotary Axis was launched on June 1st! We now have about half of the batch accounted for, interested customers can still get on the pre-order. This launch was probably the smoothest product launch we’ve ever had. Although some customers weren’t able to make a purchase right at the time we opened up orders due to some website caching, after we had that cleared up, the rest of the day was pretty uneventful. I just want to thank and congratulate everyone who worked on this project as all of the prep work, testing, and resource development that went into this product made sure we had a smooth launch.
Production for the Vortex Rotary Axis has been ramping up, as we get things made up and printed for shipping in late July. We’ve now received most of the parts for the Rotary Axis, and the last remaining parts we are still waiting on are expected to be ready in the first week of July.
There has also been a substantial amount of resource development done for the Vortex, some of which is now being uploaded to the Vortex Resources. You won’t see everything on there yet much of it is in draft form, we are getting everything ready and set up for launch.
LongMill and Extension Kits
We continue to have fairly short lead times on LongMills, however, we are running low on control boards which may increase lead times for some customers. We expect to reach the end of Batch 8 in August, and have around 270 units left in stock. Pending delivery of new control boards, lead times are expected to be 1-2 weeks, but could extend later this month to +3 weeks. Once we receive the new control boards, we expect lead times to go down again.
Lead times are expected to be short for the time being, but lead times may vary a bit depending on how quicky we can get a few kinks resolved including:
We are running low on controller board parts, and we are expecting to restock in the first or second week of July
Some rails from production are twisted out of spec. We are currently shipping rails that are within spec, and are waiting on replacements to be made.
Some poor threading on T12 Delrin nuts means we are making replacements currently. We expect them to be completed in the next 1-2 weeks, but we don’t expect this to be a bottleneck since we still have quite a few in stock.
We are working hard to get ready for the busy season coming up this fall, which means doing lots of pre-packing, restocking and prep!
Rail twist measurement system
We have a few other things coming down the pipeline, but this is all for today. Make sure to stay tuned for the next update.
As we go into the summer season when things start to slow down in terms of orders, we’ve been catching up with the rest of the queue. We also increased staff to speed up our packing. We now have a turnaround time of just a few days. There are a few items we are running low on, such as the Delrin Anti-Backlash nuts and the v-wheels, but our new order should be arriving in the next week or two.
The past half year has been pretty busy, as this is the first time since August/September 2022, or almost 9 months that we’ve been able to get caught up. Even though it seems like a really long time for us to get caught up, during this time, we also experienced orders nearly double over the last few months, which means we’ve been playing catch up.
May has historically been the slowest time of the year for us as well, but we expect things to start to ramp up significantly in August. You can see the trends below.
Last month in May, we mentioned our extrusion die being damaged unexpectedly. The silver lining to this however is that with the fresh die, we are getting better tolerances across the length of the rail. For those not familiar, extrusion dies have to be replaced over time once the die wears and the profile changes shape to enough of a degree that the extrusion it produces is not of the correct dimensions. This means that the quality of the new Y rails should be slightly better than before.
A recent batch of T12 lead screws has arrived, with half of them being out of spec. Due to bends in the screw, we’ve been working on a way to straighten them out. Although in the long run, our priority is to make sure that they are straightened by the manufacturer, due to the large number of bent screws, we wanted to figure out a way to fix them if possible. We expect to receive the full batch of lead screws in the coming weeks, so we’ll have stock available.
While we have some QA issues to tackle, since we have parts stocked up, we expect to be able to go through our existing parts for the time being.
This lull period will allow us to divert energy into the production and assembly of the Rotary Axis, as we expect to see parts start to arrive this month.
Parts for Batch 8 continue to trickle in, with a significant number of parts slated to arrive over the next two months.
We are at the last third of machines in Batch 7, and we expect to go into Batch 8 around August 2023.
LaserBeam Orders
New LaserBeam orders are shipping generally within 2 weeks, but usually faster.
Vortex Rotary Axis
Preorders for the Vortex Rotary Axis will be available for pre-order on June 1, 2023 at 1PM Eastern Standard Time and is expected to ship in August 2023. All important details can be found in this article.
We are expecting parts to start arriving in the coming weeks, and we are prepping assembly and QA for the Rotary units. We’ve started receiving production, and we are expecting the last batch of parts to complete production around mid-July.
Price increase on Makita RT0701 Router
Due to price increases from our supplier earlier this year, we’ve increased the price for the Makita RT0701 from $150CAD to $165CAD.
Shipping Holdups from UPS from Canada to the US
We have now obtained our US EIN number and set up an entity in the US to help facilitate shipments from Canada to the US. Over the last few months, we’ve generally seen fewer holdups, but they are still occurring. Once we get everything set up, we hope that number will drop to zero.
We just set up US bank accounts so that we can also start setting up payment processors in the US. Although for most customers this probably won’t make any impact, this means that we can save on some banking and cross-border fees that happen due to the fact we are doing everything through our Canadian banking network.
There continues to be a bit of friction setting this up, since there are a few extra steps, such as setting up a physical mailing address that can forward mail to us to Canada, learning about the US tax system, and fixing some technical issues with our payment processor as we switch over.
Customers have been calling and messaging in about missing nylon washers used for assembling their machines. Those who are watching the video instead of the assembly manual will encounter this issue.
NYLON WASHERS ARE NOT REQUIRED FOR THE ASSEMBLY OF YOUR MACHINE.
For the most up-to-date instructions on assembling your machine, please always follow the online instruction manual.
Early in the production of the LongMill MK2, we ran into some resonance issues. The patch fix was to use nylon washers between the motor spacers and gantry to help mitigate the transfer of vibrations into the machine. However, soon after, we found a better process for tuning the motors so that they can run faster with less vibration, eliminating the need for nylon washers completely.
In fact, improperly assembled nylon washers could introduce other minor issues, such as the chance of misalignment and skewing of the motor, due to the uneven compression of the nylon. However, if you already have nylon washers on your machine and it is working fine, please keep them on as usual as they shouldn’t cause any further issues.
I’m excited to share that we’ve recently hired two new technical writers and resource developers and a second videographer to help continue to bring awesome instructions, troubleshooting, projects, and content to the community and our users! Some of the things our new team members will be working on include:
Additional involvement in the online community, through our social media and forums
Helping create documentation for new products
Sharing more news about our company and the amazing things we’re working on
We hope that by continuing to share our information, knowledge, and wisdom of hobby CNCing, we’ll continue to make CNCing more accessible for everyone. For more info about why resource development is important to us, please check out this article.
Working on Rotary Axis documentation
LongMill and Extension Kit Orders
In April, last month, we ran into some part shortages for the Y-axis rails due the extrusion die getting damaged unexpectedly. This pushed back production by about 2 weeks while the broken die was remade. We have received the rails and have been able to ship a large number of machines. We also ran out of the front and back steel feet for a few days, but we have also received a new batch last week as well. We believe that we should be able to ship most of the units with a turnaround of 4 weeks, better than the 5-6 weeks we promised, but we expect to run out of T12 lead screws in the next coming weeks, so we will continue to have a 5-6 week lead time listed on our product page in case there are delays in receiving our next batch.
Otherwise, although we have had to pause shipping at times, we have been continuing to deliver within the promised times for our customers. Additionally, we have recently brought on a few new staff to help continue to bring lead times down.
I should note that due to the high volume of orders we are processing, we are finding that on some days, due to space constraints of the truck picking up orders, some items may need to wait for the next truck to ship. Since we are trying to clear the backlog, it’s a bit slower than usual, but we expect things to ship out without delays once we get caught up.
Our engineers have been working on a few new projects to help improve the productivity of production in a couple of different areas. One notable update is with our tapping setup. We do hole tapping in several different areas, including with the ends of the rails and several of the gantries and feet that make up the LongMill. With our original setup, we used a tool to tap each hole individually. However, our engineers are trying a few new ways to tap several holes simultaneously with a special jig by essentially driving multiple tapping heads at the same time. With each batch needing tens of thousands of holes tapped, we expect these new tools to greatly speed up the tapping process.
Our engineers excited to get their multi-material rapid prototyping Bambu printer
LaserBeam Orders
A new batch of laser drivers recently arrived at the shop and we are currently processing our queue. We expect to have the rest of the pending orders cleared by this week. We expect to have a fairly short lead time of around 2 weeks going forward based on part availability.
SuperLongBoard
We’ve had an overwhelming response to the SuperLongBoard, with over 400 survey respondents. If you didn’t read the full article, you can check it out here. Thank you, everyone, for your support!
Based on the results, it’s very clear to see that our users are very excited about this massive upgrade to the LongMill and for the future of the hobby CNC industry.
Our team and team and Expatria continue to work on the development of the board. We don’t have any major updates yet, but a few things we’re working on include:
Enclosure design
Compute module integration
Testing and QA jigs
Rotary Axis
We are reaching the final stages of rotary axis development. We have now placed orders for just about all of the parts and are waiting for things to ship. Our gSender development team has now implemented rotary axis functionality in the Edge version (our beta, experimental public version of gSender for internal and external testing). You can learn more about the release here: https://forum.sienci.com/t/gsender-hal-rotary-support-early-alpha/8462.
Additionally, are currently fine-tuning the homing sequence for the rotary axis which will allow the machine to self-home, zero, and align the rotary axis, which is unique to any rotary axis system in the hobby market.
Our team, primarily Daniel and Johann have been vigorously testing and fine-tuning the Rotary Axis over the last few weeks with some amazing projects and results.
We expect to have launch dates, interviews, pricing, and new content to come out soon in the next 2 weeks so make sure to stay tuned!
Hey everyone, I’m excited to share with everyone a project that Chris and the rest of the Sienci Labs team have been working on in collaboration with Andrew and his team Expatria Technologies to develop a new CNC control board and firmware system. The SuperLongBoard (SLB for short) represents a huge step in hobby CNC technology, as it’s advanced electronics and software bring not just new features and functionality to the LongMill, but at a price point that we believe will be affordable for hobbyists.
LongMill running at 10,000mm/min and 750mm/s^2The SuperLongBoard taking its first baby steps
What is the SuperLongBoard?
The SuperLongBoard is a next-generation control board for the LongMill CNC. This development gives access to a whole new set of features, functionality, and integrations more commonly found in industrial applications to the hobby CNC market. Some features and functionality include:
Full integration of gSender within the control board, removing the need for a separate computer to run the CNC
Advanced, programmable stepper drivers that run motors faster, quieter, and with more torque
Faster, more accurate motion control processing for smoother movements
Ability to control more than 3 axis, for full 4th and 5th axis motion control
Networking and file transfer with wifi and ethernet, USB port and SD card for removable storage, HDMI output for display outputs, and more
Standard PWM control for laser and spindle, with compatibility with industry-standard RS485 protocols for industrial-level spindle control
Rapid tests using the SuperLongBoard
Additionally, this design will have many input-output connections and ports to allow for new features and accessories to be used with the new board, effectively future-proofing your machine for years to come. Some of these features include:
Automatic tool changing support
Skew, cutter, and joint compensation
External wired and wireless pendant control
Camera and machine vision for features like failure and crash detection, auto zeroing, auto-tracing, and more
Please note that although these features are something we want to work on down the line, we currently do not have specific timelines on these features and they will not be available during launch.
You can even set up the SuperLongBoard to send messages through Slack!
The SLB is a system of two different parts working together. The first is the board itself, which contains all of the core functionality. This includes motor control, sensor inputs and outputs, and lower-level processing of g-code. Users will be able to tether this part of the controller directly to the computer using a USB cable in the same way as the original LongBoard currently used in all LongMills to control their CNC machines.
SLB takes things to the next step with the addition of an onboard compute module. The SLB has a small connection interface at the bottom of the board that allows for a compute module to be attached and replaces the computer or laptop. Users can connect a keyboard, mouse, and monitor to control all functions of the machine directly through the SLB.
The SLB can operate with and without the compute module. I expect that given the considerably low price of the compute module over a computer, around $40-80 dollars plus the cost of the monitor, keyboard, and mouse, as well as the extra speed, user experience, and reliability of an onboard system. But we are planning to allow for the board to be used in either configuration.
This control board will be backward compatible with ALL LONGMILL CNC MACHINES OF ALL GENERATIONS, which means that users can upgrade their machine’s capabilities by simply replacing the controller. All of the hardware and software will come ready to go, plug and play for all LongMill CNCs, and will have a similar form factor to the current LongBoard so that it can be integrated easily into your existing machine.
Why the SuperLongBoard?
The creation of the SLB comes with a series of motivations. The first and main motivation is our belief that at this current stage, the integration of smarter, more reliable, and more capable CNC control electronics will make the biggest improvement to the CNC user experience.
This new design will aim to eliminate many common issues universal to hobby CNC at this time, including:
Electromagnetic interference issues
Computer, compatibility, and connection-related issues
Resonance and driving issues restricting motor performance
With the integration of an onboard computer and far more sophisticated electronic systems, the SLB will not only be able to eliminate these issues, but it will also allow us to have better control of the hardware and software to optimize every aspect of the board and iron out bugs more easily.
As some readers know, we’re also in active development of the rotary axis. The SLB will also open up more possibilities for integrating new add-ons and improving already existing add-ons such as the AutoZero touchplate and LaserBeam. Some other potential add-ons include:
Plug-and-play router or spindle with programmable speed control
Bitsetter
Toolchanger
Plasma cutter
There are no specific development timelines for these items, but the SLB will allow for better compatibility for add-ons such as the ones listed above.
Development of the SuperLongBoard
The SuperLongBoard has been in development since the Fall of 2022. We’ve received our first batch of prototype boards and have been working with Andrew to develop the firmware and software for the control boards, finalize the PCB design, and prepare them for long-term beta testing.
The development of the SLB actually comes with many different individual developments that all work hand in hand. First is the integration of grblHAL, a rewrite of GRBL that was originally designed to work on Arduino-based controllers. One of the limitations of GRBL was that since it was designed to work on low-performance microcontrollers, it has limitations on what features that could be added. Additionally, there are limitations on things like how many processes could happen at any given point and the raw speed of the processing of g-code and motor signals.
grblHAL essentially uses something called a hardware abstraction layer (HAL). The HAL is essentially like a switchboard that the GRBL core knows how to use the microcontroller to communicate with different aspects of the board, such as the spindle control, motor drivers, and networking. This means that the development of core firmware that includes all of the functionality can be developed and only the HAL needs to be adapted to each model of the microprocessor. This means that the development of grblHAL benefits the whole community since features that are developed for one controller can be implemented on other controllers almost immediately with basically no modification. grblHAL, although still fairly new, already has a fair number of plugins that can be used to add functionalities.
The next part of the development is with the gSender integration into the SLB and to use grblHAL. Since the plan is to integrate gSender directly on the compute module, we are working on optimizing it for the hardware, such as improving the general performance and UI, adding new features and functionality, and testing the speed and reliability of gSender as a whole. We’re already working on the new gSender, and you can find an early access version here.
And lastly comes the design and production of the PCBs themselves. At this stage, we’ve mostly finalized the design of the board and are making the last few touches to the design and layout. The new control board uses a larger number of components, adding to the challenge and complexity in manufacturing, but we’ve been able to work closely with PCB manufacturers for the first batch of prototypes and expect this area to come along relatively smoothly.
We are expecting to work on testing the boards in-house for the next few weeks and start beta testing in the next coming months.
Pricing
At this time, we’re expecting the manufacturing and production cost of the SLB and case to cost around $100 (prices here in CAD). The compute module is expected to cost between $40 to $80 depending on the model and spec, bringing the total cost of production to around $150.
Chris and I have been talking about the pricing and how we want to figure this out, but we do have a few goals:
To offer it with new LongMill machine kits with minor changes to the current price
To have a simple and inexpensive upgrade path from the original LongBoard to the SBL
Reduce buyers remorse for currently existing customers
Here is our tentative pricing. Please note that pricing may change and is not set in stone.
SuperLongBoard, onboard computer, and enclosure: $280CAD/$210USD
This would be the full package with everything you need to plug and play with any LongMill. This also includes the onboard computer. Users who wish to use the onboard computer will need to provide their own monitor, keyboard, and mouse.
If you want to mix and match parts, you can use the pricing estimates below:
SuperLongBoard only: $180CAD/$140USD
For users that only want to upgrade the controller, but do not have the onboard computer. This would mean that you would still need to connect a laptop or computer to your controller. This also doesn’t include the price of an enclosure, so users can either make their own or integrate it with an existing enclosure. The case for this version of the controller is not backward compatible with the original LongBoard currently used in the MK1 and MK2 LongMills.
Onboard computer: $80CAD/$60USD
The onboard compute module is essentially a Raspberry Pi CM4 or another compute module of the same form factor. There are many different versions of CM4 form factor modules, all of which have different price ranges and specs. The price points of these modules vary greatly, which means the specific cost of this will be tied to which module we decide to choose. This would be available to users who choose to start with the SuperLongBoard and decide to add the onboard computer later in the future.
Enclosure: $30CAD/$23USD
The enclosure serves to protect the controller from dust and damage, as well as provide some mounting options onto the LongMill.
What’s next?
With regard to the LongMill
Once we get the SuperLongBoard into production, customers will be able to order them from our store to upgrade their machine electronics or as the controller that ships with new LongMills.
Here is our current general plan:
Once the SuperLongBoard is launched, to offer the original LongBoard and SuperLongBoard as separate options. The option for the original LongBoard would be the same, and the SuperLongBoard option would be a little more expensive.
Once we run out of or decide to phase out the original LongBoard, all new LongMills will ship with the SuperLongBoard.
For existing LongMill customers, we may provide a coupon so that users who wish to upgrade to the new controller can do so at a lower cost.
Based on where we are in current development, we expect SLB available sometime in the late fall or winter of 2023.
The exact details and pricing will come later.
With regards to other CNC machines
Given how powerful and integrated the SuperLongBoard is, we expect other CNC users to want to integrate the board with their own machines. While the board itself isn’t expected to cost a lot, given the complexity of support, resources, and documentation, we expect that a significant consideration in terms of support and price point will come down to many different factors.
We do plan on releasing the board designs open source as we have done for all of our hardware and software, which means that even if we don’t provide any official support, users who want to tinker should be able to figure out how to integrate things.
Here is our current general plan:
Users who want to use this board for other machines will be able to purchase it from our store, but they will not receive any technical or setup support. We will provide resources that we feel will be adequate for an experienced user to use for setup. At some point, we may also set up an online community where people can help each other.
In the future, there may be a certain tipping point in terms of scale for us to offer specific machine support, or if a third party decides to provide support themselves.
SuperLongBoard Survey
If you want to help contribute to our development for the SLB, please feel free to do our survey!
