Rotary Marking¶

Mark cylindrical parts — tumblers, rings, shafts, pens — by rotating the part between marking passes. The galvo can only mark a flat window at a time, so FocuZ wraps your artwork around the part in splits: it marks one strip, rotates the part, marks the next strip, and so on until the whole design is on the surface.

Rotary marking always runs through the 2D Rotary action in the Sequencer — the action carries the job's part and split values, so nothing has to be switched on or off app-wide. The rotary hardware itself (motor, mode, axis) is configured once under Device ▸ Rotary Setup.

Which controller drives the rotary

The rotary runs from your BJJCZ laser controller's expansion axis — no extra hardware. It has been tested on the Lite boards (LMCV4-FIBER-M, FBLI-B-LV4), which have a single expansion axis. The less common Standard boards (LMCV4-FIBER, without the -M), which have two expansion axes, are untested but should work; FocuZ uses only the first axis. A motorized Z for focus works through a FocuZ-compatible Z controller (FocuZ:grbl, coming soon), not through the standard laser board's own Z axis.

Rotary Setup¶

Rotary Setup keeps one settings profile per fixture — Chuck, Roller and Turntable — and each rotary action is tied to one of them: 2D Rotary (Chuck) runs the Chuck profile, 2D Rotary (Roller) the Roller profile. Set each fixture up once; switching fixtures is just picking the matching action. The Fixture selector at the top of the dialog chooses which profile the page edits, and its Enabled box decides whether that fixture's action is offered in the action list — untick the fixtures you don't own. (All three start enabled. A project that already contains a hidden fixture's action still runs.) Everything below is per profile.

Settings¶

Invert Direction — flip the rotation direction for both jogging and marking.
Return to 0 — rotate back to the zero position when the job finishes (on by default). If a run is interrupted — cancelled or stopped for any reason — FocuZ always returns the rotary to zero so the part is never left at an arbitrary angle.
Rotation axis — the axis the part rotates around. The artwork wraps around that axis: with X selected, the art's vertical (Y) direction wraps around the part; with Y selected, the art's horizontal (X) direction wraps. Match it to how the rotary sits under the laser.
Gear Ratio — the drive ratio between motor and part, as n : 1. At 1 : 1 the motor's Steps/Rot is the part's steps per rotation; a 2 : 1 reduction means the motor turns twice per part rotation.
Roller Ø — on the Roller profile, the drive rollers' diameter. Surface travel follows the roller, so both diameters matter: the part diameter for wrapping the artwork, the roller diameter for the motion math.

Import markcfg7 on this dialog imports the motor parameters (steps/rotation, direction, gear ratio, speeds, accel) into the profile currently shown. The Device Setup wizard's import seeds all three profiles at once — check each page's gear ratio afterwards.

Default Values¶

Diameter (default) — a default part diameter for new 2D Rotary actions. Leave it blank if every job is a different part — each action carries its own diameter either way.
Split (default) — entered exactly as in an action: pick # of Splits or Max Split Size from the dropdown and type the value. A new 2D Rotary action starts with the same dropdown choice and value. Smaller splits stay closer to the laser's focus and the field's sweet spot; larger splits mean fewer seams and faster jobs. Keep the strip shallow enough that its edges are still within your focus tolerance.
Overlap (default) — a default overlap between neighboring strips, in mm. A little overlap can hide seam lines in fills.

The three defaults only pre-fill a new 2D Rotary action's fields; a blank default leaves the action's field blank until you enter it there.

Rotary Behavior¶

Outlines at seams — how an outline or line that crosses a seam is divided between the two splits. Fills always share the full Overlap; this chooses the outline's window. Exact seam (the default) — divided exactly at the seam and marked once, nothing extended or doubled; a positioning error shows as a small break. Stitch — each split's outline runs a small fixed distance past the seam, the Stitch value (0.05 mm, about one spot), which covers positioning error without a visible doubled line. Overlap — outlines share the fill overlap too, so the segment inside it is marked by both splits (a doubled line the length of the overlap at every seam). Applies to layers and their sublayers.
Seam-aware splits (seams avoid geometry) — lets each seam shift a little (up to about a quarter of the split size) to land in the widest nearby gap in the artwork, so seams fall between letters and shapes instead of through them. The Gap field beside it sets the narrowest empty band that counts as a seam home (default 0.1 mm) — lower it to let seams use very fine gaps, such as the grid lines of a checkerboard pattern.
Arc compensation (correct curvature per split) — the laser projects each strip onto a flat plane, but the part surface curves away from it, so marks land slightly stretched near the strip edges. Arc compensation pre-corrects for the curvature so design distances land as true on-surface distances. The effect grows quickly with split size — it's what keeps geometry true when you use large splits, and it lets you size splits by focus alone. Fill lines are corrected the same way as outlines, and a fill pattern runs continuously from one split into the next. On by default — keep it on.
Backlash compensation (lash taken up before the first split) — off by default. When on, the rotary overshoots the first strip slightly and comes back onto the position from the marking direction, so the first strip is approached from the same side as every later advance and gear or chuck play can't land in the first seam. Turn it on for any rotary that shows lash, however small — it only adds a short move per revolution.
Settle between splits — the rest the laser takes between one mark and the next inside a rotary job: between splits, between layers and sublayers, and between revolutions. None (the default) starts the next mark as soon as the part is in position; Short adds a brief rest; Full rests as long as it does between separate marks. Step up if marks after a split start unevenly or the run pauses between splits. The job's very first mark always gets the full rest.

Splits are always distributed evenly across the artwork, so the last strip is the same size as the rest — no thin leftover strip at the end.

Multi-pass rotary jobs: Per lap¶

A layer set to more than one pass shows a Per lap checkbox in its header, next to Repeat. It decides the order those passes run in — the number of marks is the same either way.

Per lap ticked (default) — one pass on every split, then back to zero and round again. Each strip gets a full revolution to cool before its next pass, and seam artifacts are spread across the job rather than concentrated. This is how most laser software sequences a rotary job, and it generally gives the better mark.
Per lap unticked — all of a split's passes run back to back before the rotary advances, so each strip is taken to depth in one go. Fewer rotary moves, so the job finishes sooner.

With 5 passes over 4 splits, ticked runs 5 laps of 4 splits; unticked marks split 1 five times, then split 2 five times, and so on. Backlash is taken up again at the start of every lap, so each lap's first strip is entered from the marking side just like the job's first strip.

Layers take turns around the part. When an action has more than one layer on the same part, each layer finishes all of its revolutions before the next layer starts — the rotary never switches between layers on the same split. That keeps consecutive splits on the same settings, which is what lets them follow one another without a rest (see Settle between splits above); switching settings on every split would cost a full rest each time. Group repeat repeats the whole sequence of a group's layers, each repeat a fresh set of revolutions.

The box is hidden at 1 pass, where there's nothing to order.

Repeating the whole rotation as a job step

Per lap repeats a layer. To repeat the entire 2D Rotary action, loop it with a Goto — each time round it re-plans and takes up backlash again, and whether it returns to zero between rounds is up to Return to 0 in Settings.

Motor¶

Steps/Rot — motor steps per motor rotation (combine with Gear Ratio for the part).
Ramp Min / Max Speed — each rotation ramps from Ramp Min up to Max Speed, in pulses/sec. Ramp Min is the starting speed, not a limit — a heavy chuck or part may need a lower one to start smoothly without losing steps; a light setup can start faster.
Accel — acceleration ramp time, in ms.
Return Spd — speed used when returning to zero.

Jogging the rotary¶

Live rotary motion lives on the Jog card's BJJCZ Rotary strip (available while the controller is connected): jog CCW / CW by the set angle, Set Zero to define the current position as zero, and Go to Zero to rotate back to it at the Return Spd — with a live position readout. See Jog, Homing & Terminal.

Import Rotary from markcfg7… pulls rotary parameters from an existing markcfg7 file, the same way as the main device import. The Device Setup window (first-run setup) offers the same import in its Rotary Setup section — including reusing the device's own markcfg7 — so a rotary can be configured during first run.

The 2D Rotary action¶

The 2D Rotary (Chuck) and 2D Rotary (Roller) actions (Sequencer › Marking › Rotary) are a 2D Import that marks through the rotary engine — the only way a job runs on the rotary. Pick the one for the fixture on the bench: each runs its own Rotary Setup profile (the chuck action uses chuck math, the roller action roller math), and only enabled fixtures are listed. Both carry the same Rotary section above their content:

Part Diameter / Max Split Size / Number of Splits / Overlap — the job's own values, saved with the project and set once for the whole action in the Rotary section that sits above the layers: one part per action, shared by everything the action marks. Values pre-fill from the Rotary Setup defaults when the action is created; fields with no default start blank. Diameter, a split, and overlap are required — the run and trace are blocked, with a message naming the missing field, until they're entered (an overlap of 0 counts as entered). Different actions (or different projects) can target different parts without touching the device setup.

Number of Splits is per revolution. The part is divided into exactly that many strips — 24 splits is 15° each on any diameter — with the grid starting at your artwork, so nudging the art moves the whole result round the part without re-cutting a single seam, and a full wrap closes on a seam. Strips that hold no artwork are simply skipped: a 90° logo on 24 splits marks 6 of them. Numbers that divide 360 (24, 36, 12…) give whole-degree strips.

One box, two ways to fill it. The dropdown beside the box chooses whether you are entering a Max Split Size or a # of Splits; switching it just shows the other value. Type a Max Split Size and FocuZ works out the fewest splits per revolution whose band (strip plus overlap) fits inside it; type a # of Splits and the size becomes the width that number gives. Changing the diameter or the overlap never changes a number you've chosen — the size follows it. Projects made before the count existed carry only a size and keep marking exactly as they did; enter a number (or retype the size) to move them onto the per-revolution grid.

Below the fields, a readout shows what those values actually produce:
```
C 40.527 mm · 1 step 2.53 µm · art wraps 337.6°
15° per split · 23 of 24 marked · 666–667 steps (±1)
```
C is the part's circumference, and 1 step is how far the surface moves per motor step — the finest seam placement the rotary can manage on this part. art wraps is how far your artwork reaches around the part: 360.0° ✓ means it closes exactly, and anything past a full turn is flagged. The second line is the split itself — how many degrees of the part each split covers, how many of the splits actually mark, and how many motor steps the part turns between them (a range marked seam-aware means seams have shifted into gaps in the artwork). The count and size themselves sit in the split row above, so they are not repeated here. A band wider than the lens field, or wider than your Max Split Size, is flagged here too — the job is held until the field limit is met. - Start Offset — optional, in part degrees: rotates the whole job's starting orientation on the part without changing the rotary's Set Zero position. Handy for marking at a specific clock position, or spacing repeat jobs around the same part. 0 (or blank) = none; Return to 0 still returns to the true zero. - Sublayers on the rotary — a Mark or Groove sublayer runs on every split, right after its parent's pass on that split. A Jog or Terminal sublayer runs once per wrap, after the pass it is attached to has completed all the way round the part — with Per lap on, that is the end of that lap; otherwise the end of the job. A sublayer's Repeat is how many times it runs each time it fires, exactly as on a flat layer, and never adds wraps.

Rotation axis, mode, motor settings, and the split-quality options still come from Rotary Setup — the action carries only the job values. Because rotary is per-action, nothing is left switched on afterward — other actions and later jobs are unaffected.

The 2D Grid action¶

2D Grid (Chuck) (Sequencer › Marking › Rotary) is 2D Rotary with every split divided into a grid of cells shared between two layers — for checkerboard textures, comparing two settings side by side around a part, or simply spreading heat by marking a split cell by cell instead of all at once. It always has one group with two layers, and the same Rotary section and readout as 2D Rotary.

Content is shared. The Content section sits at the top of the group: import, size, location and transform apply to both layers. Below it, Link Layers (on by default) keeps Layer 2 collapsed and gives it every setting of Layer 1. Turn it off to open Layer 2 and give its cells their own power, speed, fill and so on; turn it back on and Layer 2 follows Layer 1 again.
X # of Cells / Y # of Cells divide each split. Along the wrap the cells are equal in degrees, so the grid is even around the part; along the rotation axis they are equal in mm, with the cell size to 5 decimals and the last row taking the remainder up to the edge of the art. Beside each box the cell's size on that axis is shown — mm around the part for the wrap axis, mm of distance for the other — to three decimals, with a ~ when the true value has more. The readout adds a line with the cell size in degrees, and Show splits on canvas draws the cells inside the seams.
Cell padding leaves an unmarked gap between cells — for melt pools or any breathing room you want. Every cell edge pulls in by half the padding, seams and the outer edges of the art included, so the gap is the same everywhere around the part, including where the wrap closes at 360°. With a padding set, the seam Overlap and Stitch options do not apply to that grid (the padding is the gap); the Overlap box grays to say so. The canvas draws each padded cell as its own rectangle, and the cell-size labels add how much of each cell is marked.
Cells alternate between the layers in both directions — the upper-left cell of the first split is Layer 1 — and the pattern carries on across the seams, so an odd cell count still checkerboards. If the count around a fully wrapped part is odd the pattern cannot meet itself; the readout says so.
Marking order is per split and always starts at the split's upper-left cell. X First marks left to right, then the next row down; Y First marks down the column, then the next column; X Checker and Y Checker mark every Layer 1 cell first in that sweep, then every Layer 2 cell. Each cell is finished before the next begins, and a whole split streams as one pass, so the split timing matches 2D Rotary.
Layer 1's Repeat and Per lap drive the grid; clearing a layer's Mark checkbox drops its cells. Sublayers and Variation are not offered on the grid layers. Importing a file with several layers asks which of them to bring in — all by default — and puts the chosen ones together into Layer 1.
Each layer's eye shows its own cells. With both eyes on the canvas shows the whole art as imported; hide one layer and only the other layer's cells of the art remain, so you can see the checkerboard each layer will mark. Each layer's fill preview is clipped to its own cells the same way. In the layer tree the shared art is listed after the two layers rather than under Layer 1, since both layers mark it.

Placing more than one piece of art¶

Position along the wrap direction is absolute: where art sits on the canvas is where it lands on the part, measured around the circumference from the rotary's zero position. Moving a piece of art along the wrap axis moves it around the part; moving it along the other axis moves it along the part's length. That means two pieces of art always land in the same places on the part no matter how you organize them — but how they mark differs:

	Same layer	Two layers, one action	Two 2D Rotary actions
Revolutions	One	One — all of an action's layers share the same part values, so they share the revolution	Two — each action runs all of its splits before the next begins
Splits & seams	One split plan across the combined artwork	Same combined plan — seams line up for both pieces	Each action plans around its own artwork — seams fall in different places
Position on the part	Absolute — identical in all three arrangements	Same	Same
Where filled shapes overlap	Overlapping areas cancel to unfilled (with the default Even / Odd fill grouping)	Each layer fills independently — the overlap is marked twice	Marked twice
Where outlines overlap	Both mark, on top of each other	Same	Same
Marking settings	One set shared by everything in the layer	Independent per layer	Independent per layer
Marking order	All content together, split by split	Layer order within each split, then the part rotates	The first action completes entirely, then the second runs
Fit circumference	Fits the combined width of all the layer's art	Fits each layer's own art	Fits each layer's own art

Which arrangement to use

Use the same layer when the pieces share settings and you want one revolution. Use separate layers for per-piece settings while keeping one revolution and aligned seams. Use separate actions only when the jobs must be sequenced independently — for example with a jog or an operator prompt between them — at the cost of a second revolution and seams that don't line up between the two.

Nothing warns about overlap: overlapping art simply marks as the table describes. Artwork that reaches more than a full circumference is flagged in the Rotary readout (art wraps 395.9° ⚠ over 360°) and still marks — everything past a full turn wraps onto whatever already occupies that angle. The preview shows the true result either way.

Previewing splits¶

In the Preview of a 2D Rotary action, a vertical split slider appears beside the playback slider, with one stop per split:

By default the preview shows one split at a time, centered in the canvas — exactly the strip the galvo will see. Move the slider to step through the splits.
The horizontal playback slider and the split slider follow each other: scrubbing playback advances the split; picking a split jumps playback to that split's beginning.
The All button shows every split at once at its true position instead.

Seam-aware splits and arc compensation show up in the preview exactly as they will mark.

Sublayers in rotary jobs¶

Sublayers fire at the same points as in flat marking — after the parent pass that Run every names — but on the rotary each firing is a whole trip around the part rather than something that happens on every split:

A Mark or Groove sublayer takes its own revolution: once the parent's pass has gone all the way round, the sublayer goes all the way round, marking its Repeat passes back to back on each split. Tick Per split in the sublayer's header to weave it into the parent's revolution instead — on each split, right after the parent pass that fired it, while that strip is still under the lens (for a groove or cleanup pass that should follow the parent immediately). Groove (the rotary name for the Cut mode) marks its offset band clipped to each split — it is for grooving and deep engraving around the part, sectioned by splits like all rotary content, and is not a tube through-cutting mode.
A Jog or Terminal sublayer fires once per wrap, between revolutions — a Z step is a whole-part event, so it never repeats on every split.

A layer without Per lap runs all of its passes in one revolution, so its sublayers follow that revolution in pass order — the same number of firings Run every would give pass by pass.

Variation in rotary jobs¶

Variation is worked out on the whole design, not per split: a Layer or Fill ramp runs once across the entire wrap, a Segment or Chord ramp continues through a seam on the far side exactly where it left off, and Quadrant tiles are the design's tiles regardless of where the seams fall. Nothing restarts at a split.

Chuck vs. Roller¶

Each is a fixture profile in Rotary Setup with its own action:

Chuck — the part is gripped and rotated directly. One motor rotation (through the gear ratio) is one part rotation, regardless of part size. Backlash compensation lives here.
Roller — the part rests on powered rollers. The rollers move the surface, so surface travel depends on the roller diameter, and how far the part turns depends on both diameters. Enter the part diameter and the roller diameter and FocuZ handles the conversion.
Turntable — a profile for a part that spins about the beam axis; its motor settings drive the Rotary Jog action today, and its marking action is on the roadmap.

Rotary Jog¶

Rotary Jog (BJJCZ) (Sequencer › Motion) turns the part as a step inside a sequence — between marks, or to present the next face. Choose the fixture (its profile's motor settings apply), Rotation (degrees) or Distance (mm) of part surface, the direction, and the amount. A distance needs the part's diameter — enter it on the action, or leave it blank to use the profile's Part Ø default. The live jog buttons on the Jog card have the same fixture choice.