Has anyone come up with a solution on how to get a more accurate time estimate from Estl? Is it better to throw the Gcode into a preview software and see its time estimate?
I need to get a rough idea of how long I’m going to be in the shop so I can try and plan accordingly (time is short, lately but if I knew it’d actually take about a hour I might be able to go in more) the current ~15 minutes for a ~Hour cut is too much a difference.
I generally find the estimates OK, but one of the big sources of error was the assumed “rapid” movement rate. Estlcam assumes that when it issues a G0 move command that it will happen at the rapid rate, but Marlin just keeps the last feed rate used. You can tell Estlcam to always send the “F” parameter, which resolves this. The other was the feed rates exceeding the firmware maximum feed rate limits. If you have these correctly set, Estlcam’s estimates are reasonable.
On my machine, the firmware limited rates are pretty high, but Estlcam doesn’t factor in acceleration well, so still a little off. Having Estlcam send the “F” parameter on every move, means that rapids aren’t slow like cutting – or worse, plunging – feed rates. It helps keep the actual machine time down.
Besides the rapid movements, I’ve been bumping the plung rate up slowly and the times have come down quite a bit (at least while 3d carving). Still +/- 15 minutes is close enough for me. My rule of thumb is add 30 minutes to be safe, while i do other things in the shop.
I use Estlcam for the cutting on another machine with (as far as I know) identical settings. Especially carves are often waaaaaaay off. Normal cuts are fine.
This is where I’m thinking it’s coming from. That and tool changes. Things like This it said was around 15 minutes, but actually took 45 minutes and it’s 90% carves. I’m doing something similar to this and I’m guessing the result will be about the same.
I wonder if using a gcode viewer would aid in this?
I would agree. 30+ can be difficult though. My schedule is so sporadic lately I’m having to schedule down to the minute it feels like.
The accelerations can make a big difference. Especially if the pattern requires a lot of short movements. The max speed that was assumed to be at max feedrate might be at 25% average if it is spending a lot of time slowing down and speeding up.
I don’t know if there is a way to make estlcam use your acceleration settings in its estimate. You can bump up the machine settings. But you don’t want a rubber job for the sake of a better estimate. So I just try to guess at how wrong it will be.