Side-to-side clearance

Folks - I am very curious about the lowrider2, but as I look over the design I see nothing that adjusts the side-to-side clearance of the carriage. Am I missing something?

Theory is having a motor on each side working in sync, as long as you’re level/plumb/square, the gantry should track straight. The clearance is established when you build it. Just slide the parts on the xaxis tubes and then tighten your screws.

Yeah, I get the twin motors making the thing track straight down the length of the table. I am talking about
the fact that there appears to be nothing to adjust side play. Seems to me that along with the skate wheels on the side of the table, there ought to be a couple on each side.

Oops - I mean along with the 4 on the top, there should be two on each side.

Yeah. That is a common concern. Most people don’t have an issue with it. I had trouble with mine, so I added some tracks on the side to keep the wheels moving straight. Just some 3/4"x3/4" material nailed straight.

Give it a shot, let us know if it works better. It’ll add another level complication in the setup being that you’ll have to true up the flatness and parallelness of the 2x4 sides. Flush trim router bit aught to come in handy here.

As designed, what keeps the carriage running straight?

I have a question for you: Why wouldn’t it run straight?

I understand the lateral forces caused by the router really aren’t much at all. Everything is designed for minimal weight, the motors are little nema 17s and cant really throw things around too hard, so inertia shouldn’t be an issue. As long as those skate wheels have friction on the table top nothing should push it off line… Given that your table is level and y-plates are parallel.

As Jeff mentioned most people don’t have an issue with it. For those that due it’s an easy fix to put a groove for the skate wheels to ride in or a strip of wood down to keep them in line.

I saw mentioned the other day that someone was having an issue and their solution was simply to minimize the clearance between the z rails and the tables side, they said less than a mm. Meaning its physically impossible for their x to get off track more than a mm over the length of their table.

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Teams of tiny unicorns… :unicorn:

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I have a few mm(1/8"-ish) clearance between my rails and the Z tubes. If it does move, it’s only moving that much. So far I’ve not had it slide sideways on me.