LMCV4-FIBER-M

JCZ LMCV4-FIBER-M is a fiber galvo type laser controlled by Ezcad 2, the LMC boards are all controlled by Ezcad2. The board controls a galvo head laser through the standard XY-100 protocol on a DB25 connection. The board itself costs around $200 USD (Jan 2022). With the similar protocol Ezcad 3 board going for $800 USD (Jan 2022). The additional features of the Ezcad3 are likely not worth the value. The reason why people pay for them is so that they can use Ezcad3 rather than being stuck to using Ezcad2 which like a lot of laser software is disliked by users. In the case of Ezcad, it crashes often and the F1 let me see what my design is doing is right next to the F2 burn the project without the lining up the material buttons. There are some hacked versions of this software which provide dongle-less support and raises the ram limit which is baked into the ram starved program.

Reverse engineering

The reverse engineering of the product has been done (at least initially) https://www.bryce.pw/engraver.html and Jason Dorie (https://lightburn.fider.io/) the latter for inclusion in LightBurn, a highly regarded software program within the laser community.

Command codes are 2 bytes 16 bit little-endian numbers these starting either with high or low bit (0x00 or 0x80) depending on whether it is a commandList command or a single command. In the larger LMC Ezcad3 code set these can sometimes reach into the first byte when the code value exceeds 255 0xFF. The board communications are done through a simple USB connection with several endpoints connecting to:

idVendor=0x9588, idProduct=0x9899

• ep_hodi = 0x01 # endpoint for the "dog," i.e. dongle.
• ep_hido = 0x81 # fortunately it turns out that we can ignore it completely.
• ep_homi = 0x02 # endpoint for host out, machine in. (query status, send ops)
• ep_himo = 0x88 # endpoint for host in, machine out. (receive status reports)

Commands are sent and received in the clear without swizzling or additional control bits.

commandList codes:

0x800d is called in listJumpTo

0x8001 is called in listJumpTo

0x8005 is called in listMarkTo

0x8003 is called in listLaserOnPoint

0x8006 is called in listJumpSpeed

0x800c is called in listMarkSpeed

0x801b is called in listMarkFreq (if lasertype == 3)

0x800a is called in listMarkFreq (if lasertype == 4)

0x800b is called in listMarkFreq  (if lasertype == 4  and 0x800a returned 0).

0x8013 is called in listMarkFreq (if some_setting2 == 0)

0x800a is called in listMarkFreq (if some_setting3 != 0)

0x8012 is called in listMarkPowerRatio

0x800b is called in listMarkPowerRatio (if lasertype == 0 (CO2))

0x800b is called in listMarkPulseWidth

0x8026 is called in listIPGYLPMPulseWidth

0x8007 is called in listLaserOnDelay

0x8008 is called in listLaserOffDelay

0x800f is called in listPolygonDelay

0x8004 is called in listMarkEndDelay

0x8004 is called in listDelayTime

0x8004 is called in listDelayTimeUs

0x8002 is called in listEndofList

0x801a is called in listFlyEnable

0x801d is called in listFlyDelay

0x8011 is called in listWritrPort

0x8051 is called in ReadyMark

0x8002 is called in Run.

0x801c is called in listDirectLaserSwitch

0x801e is called in SetCo2FPK

0x8005 is called in listDirectMarkTo

0x801f is called in lsFlyWaitInput

0x8021 is called in listIPGOpenMO

0x8023 is called in listChangeMarkCount

0x8022 is called in listWaitForInput

0x8026 is called in listIPGSetConfigExtend

0x8028 is called in listFlyEncoderCount

0x8029 is called in listSetDaZWord (if this returns 0, listDelayTime is called)

0x8050 is called in listJptSetParam

0x8025 is called in listEnableWeldPowerWave

0x8024 is called in listSetWeldPowerWave

0x8006 is called in ScanBmpPtBuf (several times)

Single Commands:

Single commands are 12 bytes long in 6 int16le bytes. The first byte is the command code. Some commands in the DLC ezcad3 codeset move into higher byte. Nothing in the LMC board command set does. These commands are usually followed by GetState which reads 6 bytes of data. This provides response information and state information. These do not use all six int16le are used. The remaining ones are padded with zeros.

DisableLaser 0x0002 -- all zero

EnableLaser 0x0004 --  all zero

ExecuteList 0x0005 --  all zero

GetVersion 0x0007 -- 1, 0 0 0

GetSerialNo 0x0009 -- all zero

GetListStatus 0x000a -- all zero

GetPositionXY 0x000c -- all zero

GotoXY 0x000d --  variable, stack value, 0 0

LaserSignalOff 0x000e -- all zero

LaserSignalOn 0x000f -- all zero

SetAxisMotionParam 0x0026 --  variable, stack value, 0 0

MoveAxisTo 0x0029  -- lower 8 bits, 16-24th bits specified by single variable, 0, 0

AxisGoOrigin 0x0028 -- variable, 0, 0, 0

GetAxisPos 0x002a -- stack value, 0, 0, 0

SetAxisOriginParam 0x0027 --  variable, stack value, 0 0

WriteCorTable 0x0015 -- boolean, 0, 0, 0

ResetList 0x0012 -- all zero

RestartList 0x0013 -- all zero

SetControlMode 0x0016 -- stack value, 0, 0, 0

SetDelayMode 0x0017 -- stack value, 0, 0, 0

SetMaxPolyDelay 0x0018 -- stack value, 0, 0, 0

SetEndOfList 0x0019 -- all zero

SetFirstPulseKiller 0x001a -- stack value, 0, 0, 0

SetTiming 0x001c -- stack value, 0, 0, 0

SetPwmHalfPeriod 0x001e -- stack value, 0, 0, 0

SetPwmPulseWidth 0x0006 -- stack value, 0, 0, 0

SetLaserMode 0x001b -- stack value, 0, 0, 0

SetStandby 0x001d -- variable, variable, stack value, 0

StopExecute 0x001f -- all zero

StopList 0x0020 -- all zero

ReadPort 0x0025 -- all zero

WritePort 0x0021 - variable, stack value, 0, 0

WriteAnalogPort1 0x0022 -- stack value, 0, 0, 0

WriteAnalogPort2 0x0023 -- 0, stack value, 0, 0 (stack value is 2nd)

WriteAnalogPortX 0x0024 -- variable, stack value, 0

SetFpkParam 0x0062 -- variable, variable, variable, stack_value

SetFpkParam2 0x002e -- variable, variable, variable, stack_value

IPG_OpemMO 0x0033 -- stack value, 0, 0, 0

IPG_GETStMO_AP 0x0034 -- all zero

ENABLEZ 0x003a or 0x0039 (if a value is zero) -- all zero

SETZDATA 0x003b variable, stack value, 0 0

SetSPISimmerCurrent 0x003c -- variable, stack_value

GetFlyWaitCount 0x002b -- boolean, 0, 0, 0

GetMarkCount 0x002d -- boolean, 0, 0, 0

IOCLT control codes

And additionally there are calls to a couple different IO events:

See winsdk-7 header file https://github.com/tpn/winsdk-7/blob/master/v7.1A/Include/WinIoCtl.h

MIO_Cmd uses the dwIoControlCode 0x99982014

MIO_GetState uses: 0x99982010

MIO_NewCmd uses: 0x99982024

MIO_Reset uses: 0x99982008

MIO_WriteCmdBuf uses: 0x99982018

MIO_TransferDataZ uses: 0x99982020

MIO_ReadEpprom uses: 0x99982080

MIO_ReadAllEpprom uses: 0x99982090

MIO_ModifyEpprom uses: 0x99982088

MIO_EarseEpprom(sic) uses: 0x9998208c

MIO_WriteEpprom uses: 0x99982084

MIO_EppromSetMark uses: 0x99982094

MIO_EppromGetMark uses: 0x99982098

MIO_EppromSetTimeStamp uses: 0x9998209c

MIO_Verify uses: 0x99982028

MIO_WriteNxp uses: 0x999820c0

MIO_ReadNxp uses: 0x999820c4

External Links

• https://www.bryce.pw/engraver.html - Bryce Schroeder's work on reverse engineering the board
• https://charliex2.wordpress.com/2020/01/31/fibre-laser-arrives-let-the-games-begin/ -- Fantastic blog post on setting up a dummy dll