Home Is Off

[Tim Bateson]

I lasered my 1st of a dozen jobs tonight only to find the Home on my laser is way off! I'm going to attempt to finish by jobs with the "New" Home, but I've got to get this fixed ASAP. I've powered Off & On, even tried to manually set Home - No luck. Picture Attached - Any Ideas?
Home_Is_Off.jpg

[Mohammed Issa]

hey,
i dont have an epilog myself, but i ran into this youtube video yesterday.
im not sure if it is the same machine as you have, but i hope it helps!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXFWwl5iJbU

[Frank Corker]

Tim, a couple of years ago my Epilog Helix did the same thing to me, the park position appeared to change, however it was only affected two jobs. It was the 0 zero 0 zero position inside Corel had changed after I had helped someone with a file. I reset the default position in Corel and it corrected the problem, but the park position remained 'out of position' on the laser itself. Never did get to the end of it or the cause but all I'm suggesting here is that you check Corel before messing with your laser machine settings.

[Tim Bateson]

...youtube video yesterday...

Thanks, I thought of that too, but if this were the issue the "current" Home would be absolute, I can still laser above the current position, but not quite to the proper HOME position.

... It was the 0 zero 0 zero position inside Corel had changed after I had helped someone with a file. I reset the default position in Corel and it corrected the problem, but the park position remained 'out of position' on the laser itself.....

Would this effect the laser even if it wasn't connected to a computer? I've since run other jobs from Corel files I had saved previously and it didn't change this behavior. Once last night it even set Home to 3 inches down. When I powered Off/On it again reset 1 inch down.

It took awhile to finish my work last night, but I got through it. I do have a ticket open with Epilog for this and a 2nd (long term) annoying issue that causes me to power Off/On every few jobs.

[Frank Corker]

Tim, to be honest, I don't know. All I know is that I save all my work spaces as the size of my laser bed. 18x24. Every file is saved so that I know exactly where on the laser any piece should be when the laser is working. When I used one of the saved files from someone else who didn't have the same working layout, the laser home position was out. It had also defaulted my corel settings to their settings. The laser was still finding exact locations, but only in direct response to their set out.

[Mike Chance in Iowa]

I'm sorry I can't give you a "this is what I did" answer ... I had this happen to me on my Epilog Mini probably 7-8 years ago. I was able to solve this on my own without calling tech support and I vaguely remember that I had to physically move something to get it to return to home. It may have been adjusting the belts or gears... Did the carriage hit something and knock itself out of alignment? I think that is what happened to me when mine shifted.

[Walt Langhans]

If Epilog hasn't fixed your issue yet you can try this.

Unplug your machine, press the power button to turn it on (this will discharge any capacitors that might still have a charge), plug it in and then turn it on again. If that doesn't do it, Unplug the machine again, then find the mother board for the controller, some where on it there will probably be a watch battery, remove the battery, press the power button to discharge the capacitors again, put the battery back in, plug the machine back in and turn it on again.

Here's the thought process behind this.

Either the machine itself is setting the position, or it's getting it's position from the computer that it's attached to, or like Mike said it's physically out of position and the machine is reading it at the 0,0 position.

From what you said it doesn't seem like it's corel is the issue. If it's the machine, by removing all the power and discharging the capacitors that will force it to reset to the factory presets which should solve the problem. If it doesn't I would try turning the machine off, physically moving the head to the correct location, and then powering it on.

[Tim Bateson]

No luck on all fronts. Support has yet to get past setting the X/Y to the default location. I've humored them and did so - no change. I've tried all of the suggested solutions - no change. What's odd is - 1st it happened suddenly from 1 job to the next - same session. #2. regardless of what I set X/Y to in the control panel - it'll go back to the same spot and start engraving at the same spot - the 2 locations are different.
At least it's consistent enough that I can get some work done. If I needed to use my whole bed, I'd be screwed.

[Walt Langhans]

Well that's really bizarre, I would have bet removing all power would have reset it and you'ed be good. The only other thing that I can think of is that you've got a bad sensor some where. Something has to be telling the machine that the position it's going to is the 0,0 spot even though it isn't. When ever you get it fix please post what it was, I'm very curious to hear the fix.

[Tim Bateson]

Well..... I'm being told it's likely the Mother board @ $1k to replace. Ouch! They are going to do a bit more research, but currently have no solid explanation.

[Walt Langhans]

I hate to say it, but if the other fixes don't work, that's kind of all that's left. If you do everything to reset it to factory specs, and that doesn't work, then you have to look at how the device is getting it's information (ie sensors) and if they are ok then the only thing left is the board itself.

Best of luck to you