I've been building my own 3d printer for about 3 months now and have been having serious issues with my stepper motor control. From the beginning it was hard to get the test code to work properly (just get them to move), and even with small successes along the way I was still barely making any real progress and was starting to get really frustrated.

Sometimes, after a long time of tweaking feedrates, accelerations, and steps per mm values (using different microstepping), I could get it to smoothly return to the start position of the axis, but it would hardly happen twice in a row...it still seemed to rely on luck, not to mention it choosing its own direction.

I've tried new drivers, different motors, and even brand new, high quality, multi-purpose machine ramp boards because I couldn't think of anything other than a faulty board.

If anyone is smart enough to find a solution for me, or even give me more things to try, I'd be grateful.

 

Not much info about the system!
Sounds like it might be in the code?

I just designed a 3axis board for NEMA17 .
Waiting for the,m to come from the PCB manuf.

 

There also exists the possibility that the problem is mechanical in nature. So one check would be to try driving the stepper without it being connected to the load it is driving.
What I have observed in another application was that a momentary excessive mechanical load can disrupt the programmed cycle quite a bit. So that might be a factor.

 

Could you try the simplest step by step mode avoiding microstepping for starters?

To be sincere, every time I started any design involving steppers, I tested them manually ensuring the sequence I had in mind was the right one. Programming was then simple and without hiccups.