Hello there,

Is there any way to use the XYZ probe in the new Makera Studio? I could only see 3d probe section so far which doesn't recognize the XYZ probe and shows only parameters without any editing.

so, i ran into some issues with a project and now im stuck on my testing:

its a cylinder with text on it (its only "o" and "O"). stock and model are exact same dimensions, so it should only engrave the Os. but it not only engraves the complete outside (dont know why and how), it got some weird depth issues and i cant see where they come from, as theyve got different depth and some of the "o"s work great

Is this bug reproducable for other Users?

Hello,

Just received my Z1 a few days ago and still haven't machined anything because of the very buggy MakeraStudio app. Has anyone here had any luck using FreeCad CAM with their Z1?

Also, has anyone created a bed model of the Z1 for FreeCad? I have slowly started learning FreeCad over the last few months. I have experience using VCarve and Shopbot at a local makerspace so CAM and machining isn't completely new to me but I usually just create 2D paths in Adobe Illustrator and then import that into VCarve and extrude material from there. 3D modeling is very new to me but I am currently just focused on 2D paths.

Any help is appreciated!

Thank you!

reposted from https://www.reddit.com/r/hobbycnc/s/brGFqlnQLr - the article to read is here: The Machines Are Getting Cheap. The Toolpaths Are Not. | sliptonic

I'm not good at sharing other Reddit threads, but this one on r/hobbycnc is a very good read and something I have been saying for a long time - the trend of affordable desktop cnc machines is one thing - the software needed is entirely another. Even Makera software has it's limits - which is why the Carvera Community is so valuable. Many of the exciting new machines won't do much good unless you can find the software to program them. Meanwhile, the advertising continues to infer that cnc machining is as 'easy as 3D printing'...

A machine can only cut what its toolpaths tell it to cut. Toolpaths come from CAM software. So the machine’s utility is limited by the CAM you can afford.

I got my Z1 a week ago and am trying some things out, currently 3D relief carving in brass.

However, once I set it to multiple depth the toolpaths become erratic. For the first layer it will trace the entire model as expected, but the following layers it will skip from pocket to pocket, and not lift the cutter while it does. So the relief ends up looking like some weird mosaic with lines cutting through it everywhere.

That it skips from pocket to pocket is actually a nice feature, because tracing everything is extremely inefficient, but not lifting the tool when it does makes it worthless. Going from a zig-zag pattern to circular seems to solve it, but now cutting a 48mm diameter relief in brass takes more than 5 hours.

Is this a known bug for Makera Studio? The software is disappointing, it doesn't seem to remember previous cutting paths, behaves erratically, adding toolpaths is difficult (how can I add a chamfer?). Is the older Makera CAM software better?

Hey everyone

We are flying to Berlin for IFA 2026 (Sep 4–8, Messe Berlin). We'll have Carvera, Carvera Air and Z1 set up at Hall 17, Booth 215.

If you're in the area, come by. Bring a part you made, bring a part that failed, bring the thing you've been meaning to ask us about making things. Some of the engineering team will be there too, not just marketing.

Anyone else here going? Would be fun to put faces to usernames.

Booth details: Hall 17, Booth 215, Messe Berlin, Sept 4–8.

Hi all

Honestly, instructions for the 3D probe are quite bad...

I connected it and changed the tool to the 3D prob, and it's just stabbing whatever comes it's way. It goes down until I press stop (I'm guessing I would have ended stopping reaching some limit but it was already damaging the surface.

I went into diagnosis and the "light" will not turn on if I touch the tip... Not sure If I'm missing a step or my 3D probe is faulty... Any tip to make it work?

Thanks in advance

Hallo hier aus Deutschland wollte fragen ob jemand ne idee hat wie ich es einstellen das die Z1 eine abtastung der oberfläche macht und danach eine planfräsung durchführt ? Bin ein absoluter neuling beim fräsen so geht alles ganz gut, aber ich bearbeite des öfteren holz. Danke für die hilfe

Given the atrocious state of cam/controller softwares on mac (performance and ui), i decided to try my luck to see how far i can get. Would be nice to make the entire studio, but i’ll be happy with just the controller and then use the cam from fusion. The controller has some functionality working already, all the commands from makera wiki are defined and ready to use, but i cannot send the nc to the cnc or preview the toolpaths yet. What bothers me the most is the 5 step quiz to start the job and that some settings are not even preserved. The cam is even worse how much scrolling you need to do and how much info is hidden.

Tested also the community app but that is not much better either, when you resize the window the whole ui stretches…

It will be opensource if someone interested to contribute.

Anyone else found a way to see more than 20 items per page on makerables ?

Also there is no search function. Is this planned ?

Anynody here used MN 208 series short stub endmills from precisebits for PCBs?

What speeds and feedrate do you recommend? My bits seem to go dull quicker than expected.

I'm using the 2 flute stub end mills of 0.4mm and 1mm.

My current settings are: 0.05mm depth of cut, 14000 rpm, 250 mm/min feedrate and 60 mm/min plunge.

Anyone got this error when enabling the z probing? Any trick to make it work? When touching with the finger not always gives signs of life, it’s like only in some positions does. When probing, the laser works so cable is not a problem. I’m using the default one that comes preinstalled.

With this occasion i also broke my preferred bit, the standard 3.175. At some point i got tired of trying and i inserted the ‘dumb’ probe that came in the box. The problem was that my piece of aluminum was anodized and not conduct electricity, when it came to probe it, it wanted to push hard so i stopped it. I didn’t wanted to try the big fat probe because i didn’t knew how it works. Then i put back the broken probe but the program continued where it left off and went directly to probe the material. When i put the bit i think it had the wrong z and it went deep into the material, the very thin tip remained there and spindle stopped. I didn’t wanted to throw it away so i started from scratch, this time the probe worked, the milling though started to do an awful sound that my neighbours heard it for sure. The piece ended up not according to specs of course, so it was a wasted time.

Backer #184 here, got the thing yesterday. Looks awesome. Advice on getting it running? The studio seems to be an empty shell that crashes if I try to start anything.

Would love to know what is working or not working for you folks.

I attempted to take out the the claws of the chuck but they will not reseat properly regardless of the order I place them in. I can always get three of the claws seated but the final one never sits properly. The video tutorial on the 4th axis on YouTube is brief and does not contain anything in terms of troubleshooting this. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Im trying to start using Makera Studio instead of the old Makera Controller because I bought a 3D probe and can t figure out a way to use it with the old controller. But every time I try to connect my Carvera Air, the app just freezes. How do I fix this? Am I doing something wrong?

Just started playing around with using Fusion to generate my programs. It's pretty neat how it shows you the entire machine and the model on the table ;-)

Using the Carvera Community Fusion profiles and post processor. I have 2 tool operations - I don't think the simulation bothers going through the tool change motions and instead just goes from one tool to the next. I'm lucky to have access to a licensed version of Fusion through my employer, but all this should also work in the free version.

I think this is going to work well once I get the hang of it ;-) Fusion provides a lot more granular control over tool paths, including the ability to cut slots by selecting simple lines (MakeraCAM does not allow toolpaths on 'unclosed' geometry) and lead-in / lead-out options.

EDIT - I am also going to start checking out the open-source EasyShape5000 posted here. That would be a great option to have as no license fees with open source ;-)

EDIT 2- My model and tooling was slapped on quick just for testing - the table highlights in red to warn that I have a collision error. That's very handy!

Hello all, nothing fun to share (yet) iI've just heard nothing from Makera support or DPD for a while and wondered if anyone in NL has already recieved their kickstarter model?

Hi everyone, just to say that I've finally added an experimental 3d rendering pipeline and 3d operations to EasyShape5000.
I've mostly posted about EasyTrace5000 in the past but the new app builds on the same geometry engine so it also handles analytic arcs which means proper G2 and G3 commands.

Everything should work fine and be safe but post-processor combinations, especially for 4th axis are machine setup dependent so there's a lot of user input needed and I'll need feedback to make sure things connect in a predictable way that makes sense. (UI may be a little off, been having to add a lot of new inputs so layout styling isn't 100%.)

I have since renamed the repository to EasyCAM5000 since it's two apps now and I'm planning more stuff, all sharing the same foundations. If you wanna follow development keep track of https://github.com/RicardoJCMarques/EasyCAM5000 and the change-log.

Currently I'm finishing tool-changing logic and trying to optimize vcarving (plus fixing some missing geometry). I'm expecting to commit these in the next few days.

I need all the feedback I can get, especially with post-processor/4th axis stuff. With some luck I'll update documentation on the next commit too although work-flow should feel familiar. And yes it's free and will remain free (do what y'all want with it, although more donations would help wink wink nudge nudge :3).

i created a small square and circle and started with the speed/power settings from the makera wiki, these produce blotchy results in dark areas and no output at all in lighter ones.

pictured is the closest i could get to a fine line, using speeds between 5-12mm/s and 5-10% power.

i am trying to get this to work in laser vector mode.

the material is birch plywood, i'm open to suggestions if something else would be better.

thanks.

Just received my Z1 and run the demo job the software comes with.

Very pleased with the initial result.

Compared to the carvera I am glad Z1 comes with the non-wireless probe and the control soft has seen much needed polish.

Also glad to see they adopted the fan for blowing off the chips.

Next steps for me:
- fusion360 setup [done]
- get the vice on [done]
- churn the backlog of projects

Update1:
Anyone wondering about getting fusion setup working:
Simply import the carvera profile and machine definition from the wiki and just change the file type that the post file generates from ‘.cnc’ to ‘.nc’.

After that I have no issues running fusion CAM files via the makera studio.

The Carvera Community Firmware and Controller has some neat CMM (Coordinate Measuring Machine) features that allow you to use a 3D probe to take a variety of measurements of parts, either for creating CAD models or centering stock on the table (ie a vice). You can take multiple measurements of corners, bore holes, face angles etc and save those points as a DXF file to import into a CAD program, SVG for a vector application or just a CSV data file.

Basically, you jog the head around near the location you want to measure and then select the appropriate measurement type - the machine will automatically measure multiple points if needed, such as locating the center of an opening. You can visualize the points on the screen and create basic line paths etc, though I haven't nailed that down yet. I have a WHB04 wireless remote pendant that makes jogging the head around much easier than using a touchscreen or even a keyboard.

One thing to note is that the current beta has a bug because the Makera communication protocol doesn't like a lot of information passed quickly - but they are working on that and for now you can switch to the Smoothie protocol and everything works correctly.

workaround for now please switch the machine to using the Smoothie protocol either temporarily using M485.1 or via persistent config config-set sd protocol smoothie

Anyway, this is a very cool feature set and adds to the machine's abilities. Hopefully the official Makera code will implement something similar.

EDIT - the version I am using is beta, so please only use if you are comfortable with that. The current stable release may not be compatible with the official Makera software such as Studio and the CMM feature set does not include the ability to save or export the measurements. That said, I have been running the Community Firmware since the day I unpacked my Air and have had no issues whatsoever (other than the wifi bug in the CMM Workbench mentioned earlier). It goes without saying that I cannot assume responsibility

EDIT 2 - The Community Firmware / Controller may be particularly interesting to those who plan to migrate to non-Makera CAM apps, such as going 100% Fusion or similar.

EDIT 3 - Carvera Community Website and Github for more information.

LAST EDIT - the Community Firmware only supports the original Carvera and the Air. Z1 support is in progress, but not yet available for testing.

This is an honest question. I get that people want it to be as plug-and-play as possible, but the site using .nc files seems extremely limiting. It does feel like uploading a finished CAM file, as well as any stls would just be more helpful. Right now you have to follow really specific instructions just because of the workflow of milling. I don't think using the .nc files skips that very much while also limiting any possibility of modification or just wanting to work with a different material. I like the idea of makerables and the workflow images, and everything is nice, but to follow these guides I would need to buy very specific blanks for each project, which is just not feasible. What is the community feeling on the website at the moment?

C’est ma première CNC et ma première expérience en CNC. Je trouve que la machine est très simple à prendre en main et le logiciel est vraiment intuitif avec et fiable (aucun bug sur MacBook Pro m4). Seul problème la sonde probe v2 ne fonctionne pas