I am new to carving. I got an X-Carve over the summer for my classroom. I had some chatter on a carve, looked at my belts, and realized they needed to be tightened. Took me a while, but I got it done.
I carved two small projects with no issues. Third carve, broke a bit, and now, my belts are loose again.
Am I doing something wrong?
It’s not just the belts you need to look at, but also the eccentic nuts on the gantry (you should not be able to spin the v wheels with your fingers) but still be able to jog the machine - aim for 3lb of force on the belts once they are 1 inch stretched above the gantry (I use a fish scale to measure this).
Also look at speeds and feeds for the bit.
If the machine is over stressed it will put strain on the belts too and either stretch or break them.