Where to get stepper driver motor PCBs

Hi I'm trying to build my first Reprap, a Prusa Mendel, and I was wondering if there is a place to buy the blank stepper driver motor PCBs. Makerbot doesn't have them on thier website anymore and I'm not sure I want to spend the money to get custom boards made. Any ideas?

Hey awyea

If you have not yet sourced any parts I would strongly suggest you take a look at the [url=http://reprap.org/wiki/Alternative_electronics#Recommended[recommended alternative electronics[/url] rather than following the standard G3 route.

For one thing, the G3 extruder controller is not built to run a stepper motor and is hacked to make it work with a stepper. This results in a constant nasty whine eminating from your extruder stepper that will quickely become rather tiring.

The alternative solutions are cheaper and simpler. You could implement the pololu solution yourself using through hole components rather than SMT which the G3 solution uses (and which building is sure to be *very* fiddly), and you get a decent extruder soution.

Alternatively there are other commercial solutions...

I would definitely recommend the Pololu stepper drivers. They are fairly inexpensive at only $15 or so a piece. Only down side is that the driver chips are so small that they need heat sinks to dissipate the heat.

Ok so after more research, I've decided to go with the pololu option. So if I'm reading this right, I need the Ardunio Mega board, 4 stepper drivers, and the homemade boards. I'm just making sure I get all the right parts. Thanks for the advice.

If you go with the RAMPS electronics from Ultimachine, you just need to get the complete set. It will include an Arduino mega, polulu drivers (with heat sinks, very important for these chips!), optical endstops, and a breakout board that connects it all together and provides heater/fan outputs. Other "monolithic" solutions exist, but this is the one I have been using. The only drawback I have experienced is that one microcontroler is pulling double duty as opposed to standard Gen3 hardware which uses one chip for motor control and another for extruder/heated bed control. In order to do this and maintain accurate temperatures, it should probably have a faster microcontroler than what the arduino mega provides. Even so, I do not foresee wanting to reinstall my gen3 electronics any time soon. This is a very clean and convenient package and doesn't suffer from the coms problems that have plagued many gen3 users. If you want to build your electronics rather than buying them pre-assembled, they do sell a DIY version which is a little cheaper too.

Otherwise, you can stick with the standard Gen3 (I think makerbot is actually selling Gen4 now) motherboard, extruder controler, and optical end stops . Get four polulu drivers instead of the gen3 stepper drivers. Send me a PM if you want to go this route because I have been working on some stuff. I can cut you a special deal if you would help me out.