Daniel, I’m sorry to hear your Maslow has been giving you this much trouble. It took awhile for me to get my machine set up as well. The first 6 months were calibrating the machine, testing various improvements for it, cutting sleds, and re-calibrating. I eventually got it to the point were it’s been able to make signs and cabinetry for me. Until it broke, that is.
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Sounds to me like a possible software bug. Are you running the most recent firmware and Ground Control? If you are, someone else should test those conditions on their (working) machine and see if they can replicate the issue.
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This has been a super common issue with the stock router base. It’s most likely due to the backlash in the router base. There are a few fixes for that issue if you search the forums. What worked for me was strapping a bungee across the top to pre-load the router towards the workpiece. This is an (older) picture of my setup.
Now, it’s also possible that your router and base are binding on themselves. If you haven’t already, you should adjust the clamp on the router base so that the router can slide in it. Too much and it will have a lot of slop, causing the router to jam in the base. Too tight, and the z-axis motor won’t be able to move the router.
As another note, the Meticulous Z-axis was designed specifically address this issue. If we can get you cutting well enough to cut out the parts for the new system, then that should solve this problem for you.
- Is tricky issue and unfortunately this design doesn’t address it. The short answer is that the frame geometry has a massive affect on your accuracy across a 4’ x 8’ sheet. For example, I built my frame short (112" top beam) to fit in the only space I had for the machine at the time. As a result, I really only had a 3’ (vertical) x 4’ (horizontal) area where the machine would cut within 1/16".
This is really obvious if you just look at my spoilboard:
These threads are good reads if you want to get into the weeds:
The second one includes me doing testing to figure out the usable area of my machine, rather meticulously 