Quote Originally Posted by CraftyGeek View Post
After reading around, it seems that the general consensus is that less microsteps are better ie, either use full steps or at most, half steps.
My understanding is that the accuracy of the stepper motor gets lower when the number of microsteps is increased...I think this also has an effect on the torque?


Am I missing something here?
Erm. . . !! You've been the wrong places then.? First you'll struggle to find drives that allow Full step and most start at half.

This is for a good reason. Don't think of MS in terms of increasing resolution but more in-terms of smoothing the motors action.
Full step gives rough action in comparison it's also common for resonance to be a issue if run at full step.
Main reason why you'll see folks run at full step is because they are chasing speed and have slow parallel port so struggle with pulse's needed for higher MS and higher speeds. They are often running low voltage has well.!!

Your PC parallel port will most likely be bottle neck for higher speeds with higher MS. So again you'll probably select the best MS to suit your PP motor/drive combo.! . . . . . If your using Mach3 and you want very Smooth motors and Higher speeds the invest in a Motion control card Like the SS it's well worth the money.

Personally I wouldn't run under 1/4 (800ms) and prefer to run nearer 2000MS which gives much smoother motor performance.
Often your PC and drives coupled with how much machine resonates will mostly determine the best MS to suit for machine.
Every machine tends to have it's own resonance which can affect how the motors/drives perform so you'll probably end up playing with differant settings that suit your machine best.? . . . BUT. . . I can tell you with great confidence you won't run them at Full step or very likely 1/2 has the motor performance will be rough in comparison to higher MS with possible resonance issues to boot with 1/4 or 1/8 being more likely your best option.

Regards the ratio then 2:1 will double torque and resolution of 10mm pitch screw so you won't have any issues here if you do this. It will half the speed thou.!!
If your mainly cutting woods.plastics etc then I suggest running 1:1 for the speed. If your cutting mainly Ali then I'd suggest 5mm pitch and 1:1.

If you want a balance of both then 2:1 would be ok but really not required with 10mm pitch screws if using 3Nm motors with enough voltage (60-70Vdc).