I reached out to Lunyee’s customer service team, and they exceeded my expectations in every way. They promptly acknowledged the problems and shipped the correct parts quickly, arriving in just about one week.
The professionalism, responsiveness, and dedication to resolving the problems left a strong, positive impression.
When I first unboxed the Lunyee 4040 Pro CNC Router, I encountered several challenges that made initial assembly impossible. However, thanks to Lunyee’s outstanding customer service, every issue was swiftly and professionally resolved, leaving me very pleased with the product and the support team. I reached out to Lunyee Technical Support, using their email link provided on their enclosed sheet, After-sales Service, email address: support@lunyee.com
They responded to me within 24 hours after I provided them with photos demonstrating the issues that were encountered.
I have purchased several of their products, so I am pleased that they are still responsive, as they were two years ago, with my purchase of their 3018 model.
Prior to surfacing the wasteboard, I just had the itch to make some sawdust.
I have plenty of wood scraps lying about and I happen to be in need of a pocketed storage board to store my accumulation of different-sized and spare collets. So, I chose a relatively nicely-squared scrap of 19mm thick poplar, of sufficient size to accomodate the number of collets that I have on hand for both my machines, with room for another 50%. My first g-code for this task was for the simple task of marking origins for the pockets, to be equally-spaced across the board. This was sketched out using CMS IntelliCAD and with the use of one of the included V-bits, made a quick set of marks, 2mm deep in the board, which at this point, now resembled a bit of cribbage board. I manually write my own g-code, in case anyone is wondering. I design my own toolpaths in IntelliCAD and write the code to follow them.
I use gsender to transmit my code to the 4040. For the initial testing of my coding and processes, I use a laptop attached to the 4040 via a USB cable. Once I have the repetitious code developed, I copy it to an offline controller, stored on a microSD card.
The "cribbage board" holes were spot-on in terms of measured locations versus my CADD design, confirming my steps calibration and the accuracy of this machine.
The pockets were drawn in IntelliCAD next, complete with chamfered corners to ensure a snug fit of the collet cases. I generated several code snippets for testing a variety of cutting depths, spindle speeds and feed speeds. I utilized an 1/8th inch upcut end mill for the pockets, using one set of toolpaths for the perimeter cut and a second set for the pocket clearing. The full depth of the pockets was designed to be 15mm.
I am quite lazy, so the tedious part of the code assembly was accomplished by using Python. Using Python, I developed a script to concatenate multiple G-code modules — each representing a different depth of cut, speeds and feeds, into a set of slightly different NC files. This approach enables efficient testing of repetitious toolpath cuts to fine-tune my catalog entries of my bits with materials and other particulars that I need to keep in mind for my g-code development planning. It will prove interesting once I have more data, how my catalogue varies between my lead screw drive 3018 and this belt drive 4040.
I then performed the pocket cutting, using a variety of depth plunges, feeds and speeds and I came up with some helpful data, but the short cutting paths did limit the usefulness of my results for this.
My next tests will be a couple weeks away on a long weekend, as I plan on utilizing this 4040 for building the components for an apothecary-styled cabinet for my model railroad parts and supplies. Desktop CNC is very handy with apartment living, as my neighbors would be rightfully irritated if I were to be running full-size routers and a tablesaw here and it is relatively easy to enclose a desktop CNC for maintaining a reasonable sound level and dust collection; my immediate neighbor only knows that I am using the CNC machine because of the frequent running of my vacuum.
I use a Lunyee enclosure for my 3018 with audiophile turntable isolation pads under the corners of the machine to keep the noise and vibration down. I plan on obtaining a 4040 model enclosure, if they ever develop one.
Next came the fun part of the process, tweaking some g-code to continuously exercise the machine to establish the limits and to see how closely I could repeatedly approach the limit switches with the spindle running at its maximum design speed of 9,000 RPM and movements of 2,000 mm/minute. With the belt drive being very responsive in terms of speed, I am not sure if the movements actually were able to achieve 2,000mm/min.
Once I established and marked the wasteboards with the achievable limits, I wrote some g-code to continuously traverse the limits with a variety of motions, ranging from concentric circles and squares to the limits to running corner to corner repeatedly (linear and diagonally), to running in various diameter circles throughout the limits for several hours. These were run both with and without the spindle running with various types of bit to note the spindle eccentricity.
Once I received the initial customer support replacement parts package, I was able to complete the assembly process and square-up the machine with minimal effort.
The next hurdle encountered was that the X-axis module had some of it components over-torqued during their factory assembly, which resulted in X-axis movements effectively wearing flat spots on the rubber rollers and the axis was not able to move to the left-most position on the module during the testing of the machine's movements. Easing the over-torqued screws was accomplished, but the flat spots on several of the distorted rollers hindered smooth operation.
Again, I reached out to Lunyee’s customer service team, and again, they promptly had the replacement parts at my doorstep.
I was able to swap out the problem parts and then continue with configuring the steps per mm and then running a number of sets of g-code operations, both with and without the spindle running.
Out of the box, I discovered a few critical build issues that prevented the machine from being assembled:
Rails #4 and #5 (X-axis and Y-axis) were drilled and tapped incorrectly. Severity: Critical – replacement rails, properly drilled and tapped were received from Lunyee Customer Service.
A missing M3x6 screw (#13). Severity: Moderate – a replacement set of screws was received from Customer Service, which allowed me to properly attach the LED light strip.
An incorrect power cord (#24). Severity: Minor - I was able to very easily source the proper cord.
These issues were frustrating at first, as they prevented me from testing the machine.