need help quick RDWORKS 8.1.24 !!!

[Pieter Swart]

Hi Guys, I am stuck and not able to complete my project.

ROTARY SETTING FOR RDWORKS 8.1.24


I have turned off my machine,
Connected the rotary
turned the machine on
plugged the usb cable into my pc,

went to User settings,
enabled rotating
but when I test, it says enable rotating first.
then on output, it does not allow me to enable???
is there a fix and what is it?
setting on.JPG
rotate not on.JPG

[Pieter Swart]

never mind

i figured it out by myself....

[Pieter Swart]

FILE.JPGREAD.JPGSTEPLENGTH.JPG

Turn machine off,
unplug y axis, plug in rotary
turn machine on and plug into usb
Click file,
vendor settings

read the current settings
Save the current settings in a VERY safe place
go to the work space and draw a square.
burn the square onto a spare bottle or cup... preferably not in a permanent marking, or a spare glass bottle or glass.
measure the actual measurement
go back to vendor settings...
Select the Y-axis and go to where it says "step length"
select that... a new window should pop up for you.
input the measurement you drew on the work space
below that is another measurement
input the actual measurement you got after the burn...
(I used a vinyl sewing measuring tape )
Now the new step length will be shown.

Save this vendor setting ( as something else in the same safe location)

Now you are set up to run your rotary as you wish...

Remember to change the settings back to normal, by selecting "open" in the vendor settings and selecting the first file you saved, once you are done with the rotary.

Then repeat the first steps to unplug the rotary and plug the y-axis back in...

you should be all set...

[John Lifer]

Pieter, you SHOULD be able to use the rotary setup. WITHOUT going into Vendor Settings.....

IGNORE the Yellow section you have circled! in .24 version it is greyed out. (don't know why the Chinese programmer didn't remove it, it is redundant.
Cut off your machine, connect the rotary to proper Y axis. ( I have switch, makes it easy)
Turn on laser, if you have to push Y axis to zero (back) do it. I have to push back, pull back a mm and repush to zero to reset. When x axis moves, repostion the y to where it's over rotary.
Go into program and user section. Press Read, turn rotary to ON and Write back to machine.
At this point I reset machine again, just to make sure it zeroes but you don't have to. Rotary should work then.
To go back the other way, Read cut off rotary, and Write, CUT off machine and plug back the y axis.

[Rich Harman]

What I do is go into Vendor settings and change the Y axis step length to whatever number I had figured out before, then disable homing on the Y axis and "write" so that it is saved. Then shut off machine, disconnect Y axis (I put a Molex connector inside the cabinet) and connect rotary. Restart machine. Only the X axis does the homing so no need to manually move it.

I don't generally mess with the step length after that, if it is wrong I just stretch the artwork by whatever amount is required (after making a copy of it). Real easy to figure out how much to stretch in one test run. If there is more than one size of workpiece I will repeat the process of testing and stretching and just have multiple copies of the same artwork, each stretched appropriately. Changing step length will only be correct for one diameter of workpiece so I would rather change the artwork instead of changing step length - providing the step length is already in the ball park. Nothing wrong with altering the step length each time, just not the way I do it.

[John Lifer]

Please you guys tell me if YOUR machines absolutely won't work using the rotary setup! Going into vendor settings on a regular basis seems to be a potential disaster waiting to happen. At least an awful lot of folks seem to screw this up consistently.

[Jeff Body]

I'm with you John. You shouldn't need to go into vendor settings to use the rotary.

I go under the user tab and Click read
I check Yes for rotary
Write it to the machine
And I'm done.

Too many people don't know what they're doing in the vendor settings

[John Lifer]

It is WAY too Easy to corrupt the data. I just spend a day getting RDworks AND Corel Reinstalled after updating RDworks to latest version to work with a couple of the new features. And I told myself I wasn't going to do it, but did it anyways. In uninstalling and reinstalling RDworks, it corrupted the plugin and corel didn't like it one bit. Visual Basic error that I couldn't fix. And I had all my settings the way I wanted them... Oh, well.

[Rich Harman]

I've gone into vendor settings countless times and have never had an issue. You should know how to save your configuration and restore it if necessary. I have only had to do that when swapping controllers, but if the settings were to get corrupted, I would just restore them from the backup.

[John Lifer]

If you were smart enough to save a backup:-)

And it is called Vendor Settings for a reason! Same as the programmer putting a rotary settings under user.....

[Rich Harman]

If you were smart enough to save a backup:-)

And it is called Vendor Settings for a reason! Same as the programmer putting a rotary settings under user.....

My version of LaserWorks has no rotary settings under user, how else would you recommend I make the rotary work other than modifying the vendor settings?

The factory freely gives out the password for vendor settings, they also advise to make a backup (common sense). Common sense also dictates that you don't change settings if you don't know what you are doing. I really haven't heard of people screwing up their machines by using vendor settings - unless they didn't know what they were doing. If your data is getting corrupted there is probably a bigger problem. So from my point of view, there is zero potential for disaster. Worst case would be the minor inconvenience of restoring the backup - which hasn't happened in the six years that I have been using the vendor settings.

[Pieter Swart]

Hey John,
I have tried and tried... nothing seems to work... until I went into the vendor settings... I suppose it is one of those unexplained situations where certain things just don't work on certain machines...

I was careful though to save the original settings as Original home settings and then the new settings as Rotary settings... I put a procedure list on my screen on how to achieve the same results for the same materials and settings... I have become slightly OCD about this machine...

I also certainly understand why this should be a last resort and agree that certain people should not mess with it...

However, I had no REAL help at that point so I ventured into the dark reaches ( vendor settings)

It would be greatly appreciated, if one of the Veteran users would do a detailed write-up fr us Newbies on how to do it color by number... I know its a lot to ask, but it should/could/would cut down on people like me crying for help... and others who have messed up their vendor settings... without a back up... Maybe as a sticky?.

[Brian K Coughlin]

I know this is an old thread, but I found it when I also could not see any "rotary" settings under the "User" tab. Silly me.. after a while I realized that there are a few radio buttons on that tab and one if them is "other." That's where I found the rotary enable area.

Hope this helps someone.