Finding ideal belt tension

I've been really surprised to find so little discussion of belt tensioning in the reprap wiki and other resources. It's a huge issue in automotive maintenance, with tools dedicated just to it.

My question is, what is the ideal belt tension? What are some ways that you check if your belt is tensioned correctly? What are the pitfalls of over (and more obviously, under) tensioning belts?

Thanks! I hope this can be a resource to future rep-rappers.

Whilst I can't offer a real technical answer here, I can say this - Belts need to be real tight to the point where there is an audible noise when plucked like a guitar string. I find a deep bass sounding D# is about right

Edit: Too add to that, undertighted belts will create huge backlash causing prints to be geometrically off and will create waviness on the perimeters. Severly overtightened belts will put too much strain on your motors causing them to skip and screw up your prints.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/07/2013 02:00AM by HaniC.

it really depends on the belt, and the path it has to run, you ideally want them tight to the point just before they start acting like guitar strings

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There are a few belt tensioner designs on thingiverse that I think will be useful for when I get there. I agree though, not enough talk about belt tensioning.

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Torsion springs will be your friend.
Like this one (shameless cheap marketing plug):

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Bye
Davide

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no toys here...sorry