Category: General News

Hey everyone, here are the Oct 2023 production updates!

Ok so the marketing team asked me to do this in a video format, so enjoy.

Moving

A few months ago, we signed a lease on a new building a few minutes up the road on 120 Randall Drive. This space is not just double in square footage (around 8000sqft to 15,000sqft), we also get double high, 20ft ceilings, which will allow us to store a ton more materials as well as open up the possibility for new development space to help us build new products.

We now have full access to the building, and are starting some construction to outfit the space and get things moved over. Look out for an invite for housewarming in the next few months!

LongMill MK2 and Extension Kits

Production for LongMills and Extension Kits continues to move along smoothly. Shipments for these orders are generally shipping same day or within a few days.

We’ve recently made a small change to the laser-cutting process for the steel plates by switching to nitrogen from oxygen, which has shown to improve the quality of the cut edges on our parts. We expect the quality of the coatings and threading on tapped holes to improve because nitrogen reduces the impurities found on the edges of cut parts.

We don’t see a huge difference at this stage between the two different processes, but as we continue to work our way in processing all of the parts, we’ll be able to compare our QA reports to see if there is an improvement.

We’re also working on reducing our reliance on the 3D printing farm by experimenting with injection-molded feet. At the scale we are printing now, we believe that the cost of injection molding will save us money in just a few months.

We did run into a small issue where the manufacturer applied the finishing for inside the part rather than on the outside. As you can see in the photo, the outside of the foot is shiny, rather than a matt finish. The manufacturer is currently working on refinishing the molds so that they will look in our opinion, better for the next batch of samples.

In other news, we are also working on improving the quality of our lead screws. In the previous batch, we ran into a lot of issues of bent screws, so we started looking for some alternative suppliers.

This lead us down a pretty deep rabbit hole because we found that there are a lot of different types of threads and standards, some of which are country dependant. At this stage, we’re focusing on making the screws backwards compatible so that they are functionally the same as before.

Additionally, we believe that we can make the finish of the screws smoother, which may also lead to smoother motion and less wear and friction on the nut.

LaserBeam

LaserBeam orders are shipping out consistently and we have stock ready to ship. We are currently restocking some of our parts over the next few weeks.

Vortex Rotary Axis

We have now cleared the queue for the Vortex Rotary Axis for the pre-orders. We now have them in stock and can ship them within a few days. We only have around 70-80 units left, so make sure to grab one before we run out!

Production for the new batch is now underway, and we expect Batch 2 of the Vortex to be ready in about 3 months.

Sienci Router

Thank you for everyone for participating in our survey. If you haven’t participated and would like to, please check out the Sienci Router Survey which will help us learn more about what our users are looking for in a new router.

For the uninitiated, we’ve recently embarked on a new project exploring the possibility of building our own router or spindle system. Here are some reasons:

• The Makita RT0701 which is the most popular router used in hobby CNC machines have gone up in price, and may continue to increase in price.
• More people are reporting issues with the Makita RT0701, such as the bearings overheating, button breaking, and the speed dial losing its tension.
• There are no inputs to allow PWM speed control, unless you use a VFD and spindle combination
• Routers are loud

Our goal is to:

• Provide an alternative to the Makita RT0701 of a similar form factor so that it can be easily installed in place of it.
• Incorporate controls that allow on/off and speed control using gSender or in gcode directly, same as a spindle
• Improve the longevity and reduce noise
• Improve efficiency, power, and allow for a wide variety of bit sizes to be used

Additionally, we may incorporate features such as:

• Grounding through the bit, so that touch plates and bit setters can be used without needing to attach a probe to the bit or collet.
• Easier mechanism to change bits

There were a couple interesting things we found in the survey:

• While we assumed people would comment that they wanted more power from the Makita, we found that most people were satisfied with the power that it already provided
• We also assumed people would be more interested in using 1/2″ tooling, but it appeared it was not a feature a lot of people didn’t find useful
• Another very popular request that we didn’t include in the survey initially was an easier way to change tools, such as an auto tool changer.
• The majority of respondents told us that they would budget between $300 to $500 for a new router or spindle system, which is higher than we expected.

At this current time, we are in progress of researching some different motor options, as well as exploring different motor control options to validate that the basic functionality of the router can be produced. Once that is complete, we will be working on developing the mechanics and structure of the router. There is no set timeline yet, but I expect that we’ll likely have something ready to share by the end of the year.

Some interesting things we found:

First is a comparison of running the Makita without a fan, which means basically ripping out the one in there already. We found that there is a decent change in volume at higher speeds. In practice, it sounds quieter as well because the frequencies coming from the fan is more perceptible (lower pitched) than the other parts of the motor.

Johann also mentioned that he found NSK bearings in some routers and CW in some of the new Makitas we were taking apart. The hypothesis is that during the pandemic, there may have been supply chain issues with getting NSK, so Makita used CW in production instead, which coincides with a larger number of bearing failures or overheating issues that we’ve seen happen in the past year.

SuperLongBoard

SuperLongBoard beta testing continues.

We recently received the newest version of the prototypes, which we expect to be put into production after validation. We now have 25 boards we are working with to complete phase 2 of beta testing.

Here’s a video of us testing the macro buttons, which allow the user to program a specific code or function into the buttons themselves, rather than just start, pause, and stop, which is hardwired into the current control board. In this case, it’s being used to move the machine to a specific position to assist with getting the machine out of the way for changing tools and materials.

We have received the version 2 of the SLB early last week and have been doing our internal testing before we prepare them for use. Here’s a bit of an update (this is the email I sent to the beta testers earlier).

– V2 has a couple of components that had issues and we are manually replacing parts and updating the design. This is minor surgery but a bit tedious working with small parts. We were hoping to start sending out the V2 version at the end of last week, but we are shooting for end of this week and the start of next to have the first 3 boards ready.

– The development team are working on testing and implementing features, listed in the attachment below. This is an excerpt from the main development notes we have. Thought I would share so you guys know what to look forward to them. Some have already been implemented but not tested.

– We also have a newly designed case that we are 3D printing and assembling, which allow you to install the case to the rail of the machine, or on the table or in another place. We are starting production of it now, which will be made from aluminum and acrylic. We should be getting them in Nov-Dec.

Chargeback/Fraud Instance

We recently ran into an issue with someone having placed a few orders for LongMills on our site using different aliases and charging the orders back after they had shipped. It appears to be done using stolen credit cards, but we are looking into this further.

Although this happens very rarely, it is a part of business that we can’t avoid. I just wanted to mention this to warn people to be cautious if they run across any LongMills for sale, still in the box, that seems suspicious, especially in the Montreal area…

Hi everyone. It’s September, and we’re going into my favorite time of the year, the autumn. We have quite a few updates for this month.

Want to get news like this directly in your email inbox? Make sure to sign up for our mailing list.

LongMill and Extension Kit Orders

Production for LongMill and Extension Kit orders have continued to move smoothly. We have very short lead times at the moment and most orders should ship within a few days, if not on the same business day.

We have received the controllers that we were waiting on last month and we expect them to last until the end of the year. Other parts are in stock and we hope to have shorter lead times over the next few months.

We also recently launched the Beginners Kit, which was designed to help package everything we believe someone getting started with CNCing should get. The idea was to be able to:

1) Package everything so that it offers a one-stop package for CNCing

2) Allow us to pre-pack a number of kits and ship them out within the same day or next day

3) Improve our efficiency in packing and shipping kits

This is an experiment to some extent for us, since our production team wanted to see if we can streamline our process. As a way to pass along some of the savings, we have been offering $100 for each kit as an incentive.

Interestingly enough, at this moment, we still have about a 50/50 split on Beginners Kit orders and regular machine orders. We’ll continue to see if we see any new trends here.

LaserBeam Orders

LaserBeam orders continue to move out slowly, and most are shipping within a few days.

Vortex Rotary Orders

We have continued to ship around 40 to 50 units per week and are expecting to complete the queue in the next 2 weeks. We are advising customers that the wait time is expected to be around 3-4 weeks, but I expect that after a couple of weeks, we expect the lead times to reduce.

We are nearing the end of the first batch of the Vortex Rotary Axis, with around 100 units left in stock at the time of writing. We are currently working on wrapping up this batch and have started manufacturing parts for the next batch.

We have started to see people using the Vortex in the wild! We are thrilled to see these new results.

Additionally, the gSender team has continued to improve the experience of using the Rotary mode on gSender. We are expecting a new version of Edge to come out in the next week or so. You should continue to see new resources and projects available for the Vortex on our Resources, and we are currently working putting out a few project videos and tutorials on Youtube soon, so make sure to subscribe to stay on top of that!

T8 Spring Loaded Anti-Backlash Nuts

Another recent launch was our T8 Spring Loaded Anti-Backlash Nuts. We saw a common issue with the LongMill was getting the correct tension on the original nuts, and some beginner users were making the mistake for overtightening their nuts and causing them to bind.

The idea for spring loading them was to make them self-adjusting, so that the user doesn’t need to touch them after they are installed. You can read the full article for more information.

We have continued to test our production nuts, which have overall worked well. However, we have noticed that to improve their long-term ability to reduce backlash, we can increase the force holding the arms together to further reduce backlash and allow for more variability of wear over time.

Currently, we are working on some new ideas using spring steel clips and circlips, as the size constraints of the nut create some limitations on the size and shape of the nut we can make.

Additionally, we’ve gotten a lot of feedback where people are also interested in a T12 version, and we are currently working on a design for this as well.

In the next few weeks, we’ll be sending our surveys to our users to gather feedback.

SuperLongBoard Beta Testing

We have installed two SLBs with beta testers last week. One with Ian, who has a Onefinity, and Ed, who has a MK2 LongMill. The objective for the beta testing is to look for issues that we might have missed in the use or design, do real-life comparisons between the old and new board, and do real-life durability and performance testing.

We had really great results with testing on Ian’s Onefinity, which was our first installation. His former setup used the original LongBoard. Once we installed the new controller we noticed a couple of new improvements.

• – We were able to increase the max feedrate from around 8000mm/min to 16,000mm/min
• – The noise and hissing on the motors were significantly reduced

There are currently two issues that we are expecting to resolve in the second version of the prototype expected to arrive in the next 1-2 weeks.

• – Wiring is not good for the homing switches, causing them to disconnect. The new plugs on the new version should eliminate this
• – Powering on the 24V side before the computer signal can cause an error with the way that the MCU communicates with the drivers. We are expecting this issue to be resolved in the new board as well.

Since this is our first-hand experience with working with our electronics on a different machine, we’re excited about the possibility of offering the SLB on other hobby CNC machines.

For Ed’s testing, we also noted these improvements:

• – The responsiveness and sensitivity of the touch probe has improved, which we believe is because the processing speed of the MCU is much faster, and so it takes less time for the touch to be detected.
• – While inconclusive if this makes a difference, but we noticed that the inductive sensors with the original board were flickering at times, whereas the new controller showed the lights to be on bright. We suspect that because the power coming to activate those sensors are coming from the power supply instead of the computer, we should expect the reliability of the homing switches to improve. We tested the homing sequence and they both work
• – We were able to increase the feedrate from 4000mm/min to 6000mm/min
• – We were told that on the original board, turning on the vacuum and running the board on the same circuit would cause a disconnection. We tested the new board while sharing a circuit, and found that it did not have a disconnect.

We are also working through an issue where a skew in the y-axis causes binding at rapids (about 4mm of skew). We think that this may be caused by a few things:

• – The skew itself causes more stress on the machine, so the motors are over-torqued.
• – Since Ed is using the old version of the power supply which is rated for 10A, rather than 12.5A, the board needs more power.

Based on the motor tuning done by Andrew and his team, we are running the motors at around 3.5A peak, which is about 20-30% higher than the default setting on the TB6600 on the original boards. This means that if all motors draw power at peak simultaneously, the board could be drawing around 14A.

We have replaced Ed’s power supply with a higher-powered one and are continuing the testing.

After the testing, we found several different things that we can improve on, and Chris and the rest of the technical development team are making changes and updates to the gSender and firmware to add more features and improve the performance and settings on the board.

Assuming all goes well, we hope to have the new boards available near the end of the year.

Hamilton Woodworking Show

After a long hiatus due to COVID, we are coming back to the Hamilton Woodworking Show! Make sure to come join us, where we’ll be showcasing the LongMill, LaserBeam, and the Vortex! The event is on Oct 20 to the 22nd.

We’ll also have a few Beginners Kits available for sale so you can come check out our stuff and go home with a machine.

Sienci Router

Another new project we’ve started working on is our own router/spindle! The idea is to build something to replace the very common Makita RT0701 router with something similarly compatible. Although the Makita RT0701 is a very good option, we felt like there were a couple of areas that we could improve such as:

• – Control over the speed with connecting with gSender
• – Durability
• – Precision
• – Noise

We’re still in the early stages of development, so we’re still trying to decide on what sort of features and functionality we want to see in this new product.

We don’t have a specific timeline yet for this product, but we aim to have something available at the start of next year.

Want to provide us with feedback on what you want to see in our development? Please fill out the survey below, or use the link (https://forms.gle/LwLu7ydBKBnNcmDt5)!