Put on your laser safety glasses for this section!
The purpose of this section is to set your XY origin (aka zeroing) so that the workpiece is positioned correctly for your laser project. Remember we will set our zeros on the bottom left corner of the workpiece, which corresponds to how we set up our LightBurn projects.
The following instructions assume you have already focused your laser. If you have not done this yet, please see this page here.
Use a scrap block of wood the same height as your workpiece. We will use its square corner to zero your CNC machine. On gSender, jog the machine to where you would like the workpiece to sit. Put the block underneath the laser diode, then turn ON your laser driver. On gSender, make sure the laser power is at 1%, then press “Laser On” on gSender. Position the block or slowly jog the machine, until the block corner is underneath the beam.
Beam positioned at corner of scrap material
Press “Laser Off” to disable the laser. Then press “Zero X” and “Zero Y” to set our zeros for the X and Y axis. Use a pencil or tape to mark the zero position at the block corner, so that you can easily swap out the scrap for your actual workpiece.
Marking the corner of the scrap block
You are now ready to load up a project and start burning!