ScottW514
d3bab940b3
Two pages aimed at someone who owns the machine rather than works on it, written for the documentation site. Nothing here is new behavior - it is the behavior the machine already has, explained where an owner can find it instead of spread across a kernel contract, a services contract and three driver headers. MOTION.md follows one thread: everything physical comes out of a single fixed-tick byte stream, so the page starts there - the byte layout, speed as step density rather than clock, the ring and the two ways to fill it, and the hardware's own stop, halt and resume-with-waypoint. The laser is presented as part of that stream rather than beside it, which is what makes the three contract rules (power before fire, no consecutive power bytes, end dark) and the persisting duty legible instead of arbitrary. Then geometry and limits, device ownership and the liveness check the operator sees, and the two modes in full: GRBL from connection through the arming sequence, the stop/pause/fault table and homing-or-not; cloud from the preloaded pulse file through the pause backtrack, the park that ignores the lid, and the ring's cap on job length. A comparison table and the motion-related settings close it. COOLING.md explains the engine as what it is - one owner of the thermal hardware answering a single question for whichever controller runs - and gives the reasons behind the numbers rather than just the numbers: why the flow check heats and measures the downstream rise, why 40 percent is the duty (below it, convection mimics flow), why the settle gate uses a split-half mean instead of peak-to-peak, and why one bad reading is a suspicion rather than a fault. Over-temperature, the two diagnostics tools and when to run them, the settings, and a situation-to-response table. The fire watch is described honestly: the lid IR channels are first of all a photometer for the lid lamp, the gate ships watch-only, and it is not a fire alarm. Both pages state what is not implemented - low-temperature gates, TEC control, a fire watch that acts, limit-switch homing - so nobody plans around them. Constants come from the sources that own them (the feeder contract, cool.h, the board header, the services contract), not from prose. README links both. Documentation only, no behavior change and no catalog consequence: docs/ is outside every layer and .md is excluded from the layer content hash.
OpenGlow/ForgeFIRM Firmware for Glowforge
Open-source firmware for Glowforge brand CNC lasers. ForgeFIRM replaces the cloud-dependent factory software on the stock control board — no hardware modification — and gives the machine a local controller, a local web control panel, and a standard Grbl interface.
- Latest Release
- Installation Instructions
- Build Instructions
- Connecting LightBurn
- How motion and the laser are driven
- How cooling and airflow work
- How the laser safing works
- How a release is accepted
- Community Support
What it does
Two controller modes, selected in the web panel and switchable while the machine is idle:
- GRBL mode — grblHAL runs on the machine and speaks Grbl 1.1 over TCP port 23, so LightBurn, UGS, and cncjs drive the laser directly. Motion runs on the board's own hardware step engine (SDMA + EPIT), fed live by the planner. M3/M4 dynamic laser power, coolant-flow verification, over-temp holds, and an operator button press to arm the laser for each job.
- Cloud mode — the machine presents itself as a stock Glowforge to the Glowforge web service, so the phone and web apps work as they always did. Optional, and off by default. GRBL mode jogs and cuts without it; the one GRBL-mode function that still reaches the Glowforge service is camera-referenced homing (below), until limit-switch homing lands.
Around both modes:
- A web control panel on port 8080: machine status and position, coolant and fan telemetry, safety-switch states, camera view, machine settings, hardware diagnostics, firmware updates, and boot-slot management.
- Camera-referenced homing:
$Hfrom any sender runs the factory-style camera homing cycle through the Glowforge service (a Glowforge account and a live service session are required for$H; everything else in GRBL mode runs without them), and the machine records where it is.
Hardware
The control board is common to Glowforge Basic, Plus, and Pro. The 5 MP (OV5648) camera modules are fully supported; the 8 MP (OV8856) modules found in "HD" units bind but do not capture yet — see the camera note in kas/README.md.
Safety
These machines contain a CO₂ laser: it burns, blinds, and starts fires. Never defeat the lid switches or interlock. Never leave a running job unattended — keep a fire extinguisher within reach. Read Before you cut — safety before your first job, and the Regulatory and legal section before installing. How the laser safing works describes the hardware safety chain and the software gates ForgeFIRM stacks on it.
A very important warning: this is experimental software. Use of this software could seriously maim or kill you or others, and voids your warranty. It is not affiliated with or endorsed by Glowforge. Use it at your own risk.