Prusa i3, firmware, software and calibration

Hi everyone. I built my very first 3d printer but now Im not making process anymore. My board is arduino mega 2560 and after downloading arduino software and importing marlin firmware I feel lost.

So I downloaded

first this:
[github.com]
and then this update:
[github.com]

Now Im using repetier software but Im stuck. It doesnt work well so I turned around to basics.

Is marlin recommend firmware to prusa i3 arduino board? If not then what do you use and have you wizarded code?

About software, I read cura is rather popular but repetier has better quide.

And finaly calibration. When I make this far I will be very happy. I read couple of quides how to do it but do you recommend them:

[reprap.org]
[richrap.blogspot.fi]

Oh, and is any guestion too stupid here ?

A few basic questions:

1) What kind of board do you have between the mega and your printer? Ramps 1.4 is one possibility. There are many others.

2) What version / type of I3 do you have? They range from Maker Farm kits through piles of parts off of eBay.

3) Does the printer it's self work properly? Can you print a proper cube?

A very common toolchain for an I3 running Marlin is:

Pronteriface to control the printer it's self.

Slic3r to convert the cad files into g code.

That may not be the most fancy way to do it, but it should let you download files and print them. If you want to generate your own gizmos you will need a CAD program. That's way in the future if you are still trying to get the printer set up.

Hi.

1. Yes. I have ramps 1.4

2. I bought all parts separetly and I wasnt even aware of different types. What I did was looking this manual:

[78.47.92.212]

and buying parts that looked similar and were recommend.

3. I cannot print anything. When I press run job it doesnt do anything. Im thinking if I have made some errors when installing hardware (like I can move my motors to other direction but not to other).

Now must I ask what is Pronteriface? Is it a software or a word. I could not find proper translation for it.

Hi

Well it's a typo ... (sorry about that)

[github.com]

[replicatorwarehouse.com]

It's probably the most common thing to debug your situation with.

The Ramps electronics instructions here:

[www.makerfarm.com]

are pretty easy to follow. Downloading the instruction pdf for their closest version of your printer is the first step. Once you download it there are links to various videos and lots of pictures. Try using them to do a basic wiring checkout.

---------

That all assumes that the printer works ok mechanically. You should be able to slide the table back and forth by hand with no binding. The same is true for the X carriage. The z screws should turn with modest effort. If that's not all true you probably have a mismatched part. Without details of which part doesn't move properly there's not a lot of specific help that can be given.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/17/2013 07:30AM by uncle_bob.

Hi. I have again a problem and I dont know how exactly describe it.

When I try to install pyglet file in dos it just doesnt do that. It doesnt recognize command "python setup.py install" and command "setup.py install" opens .py file in notepad.

I have windows 7. Should I download another dos-program or something else?

Update:

problem seems to be how to run pyglet. first it was set to be run on notepad but then I set it to be run on python. however now it says "error: no commands supplied". what program should be used to install it?

update3:

never mind. my computer didnt recognize python command. now it is installed.

Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 10/20/2013 01:15PM by calad.

Hi again. I know it should not be this hard but I fail to make my prusa i3 work. Now I have unistalled everything and now Im back to zero.

I will try again in couple of days so I leave here couple questions:

which intructions do you recommend: nextdayreprap or makerfarms?

[www.nextdayreprap.co.uk]

[www.makerfarm.com]

Does arduino need to be reset or can I just overwrite old firmware?

and are there other forums where I can ask help? I feel I need every possible helping hand now.

Hi

I think you can use either set of instructions. They are pretty similar.

The Arduino is flash based. You simply blow away everything in there when you write in a new load of code. The key issue is making sure the "stuff" in your config.h files is correct before you do. If it's not right for your specific printer, you will have issues. Since you have a mix of parts, you will probably need to do some research on the settings for the pieces you have.

As far as I can see, this is about the only place with rational information ....

Sounds like lot of work. Where I should, or could start?

Start with the mechanical side of the printer. Make sure that all the stuff that moves does move. Make sure that the bed is level. Plan on spending a lot of quality time on calibration. Load the latest version (with stock headers) of the Marlin firmware into the Mega.

Once you are confident of the basic stuff, hook up the end stops and the X, Y, Z steppers. Fire up Pronterface and see if you can connect to the mega via USB. If not follow the usual debug instructions. If you can, then tell it to do a +X motion. If it goes -X then reverse the X motor. Do the same for the Y and Z. Next tell it to home X, it should go to the X limit switch and stop. If it does not stop, check the limit switch wiring. Same thing for the Y. Z is a little more tricky since you can hit the bed. You need to get it to home Z a bit high and then walk it down to zero.

That should have you able to hit the home button and have it go to the right place.

Next tell it to do a +100 mm motion in X and measure how far it goes. Anything within 10% is fine at this point. If it's way off, check the stepper settings (>2:1 errors) or calibration numbers in the .h files. Same for Y and Z.

That should get you to roughly the right place for the mechanicals. You can fine tune it once you get a real printed cube.

Next up would be the heated bed (turn it on and see if it heats) and the hot end (same).

After that plug in the extruder stepper and see if it rotates the right way when you hit "extrude". If not reverse the motor plug. You can probably find settings for your extruder to put into the .h file by Googling the name of your extruder.

That's very rough and you are likely to hit some bumps. I'd get that all done before digging into the next steps.

Thanks! I will give a shot on it later.

Hi again. Im slowly starting to suspect my hardware is broken, damaged or wrong type. After checking all mechanics (there werent many of them) I still cant connect. When using cura I can connect but not print because MAXTEMP error, but lets not focus on that here.

Anyway error I keep getting makes no sense but I am 100% sure I installed all files correctly, there werent many of them and nextdayreprap has very clear instructions. Hell I cant even paste all message because servers things I am a spambot.

Connecting...
ánp|hn³Vba8fVH*FñJP.vëHJ-ˆJÎKNL]+mj-F‹HOJ-P|H^Ð^èŠ:&howL

Any ideas? Maybe my computer lacks some files but I am not a wizard.

Start with Pronterface. It's a nice simple program that does what you need to do. (It's also pretty easy to use).

1) Figure out what the correct serial port is (I believe you already know it, you uploaded the firmware to it).
2) Set the correct baud rate (likely 250000 baud).
3) Hit connect. The string that comes back is defined in the main .h file for your firmware. If it says "uncle bob's firmware" then that's what will come back as part of it. It'll also give you nice messages as it makes the connection and tells you what the Marlin firmware revision is.

If you are getting a "max temp" error, is it on your PC or on the LCD? As long as you have that specific error, nothing is going to happen. The firmware just plain stops with major errors. You need to reset, disconnect, and re-connect after the error is corrected for it to do anything useful.

Hi. Thanks for tipping correct baud rate for me.

3) Hit connect. The string that comes back is defined in the main .h file for your firmware. If it says "uncle bob's firmware" then that's what will come back as part of it. It'll also give you nice messages as it makes the connection and tells you what the Marlin firmware revision is.

About that I really did not understand.

But anyway now I dont get error M999 anymore. I was able to find lot of information about it but I really did not understood what original problem was. I simply downloaded following firmware and no more errors, I can even check temperature though graphs dont work:

[github.com]

what I understood that I should personally define type of sensor in Configuration.h to remove error M999 but after uploading new firmware I got no errors so I dont know if I really fixed problem or simply burried it:

[forums.reprap.org]

My motors work like shit, they make cranky noises, dont really understand their position (complain about endstops) and work only one direction.

But I feel finaly this is going somewhere. Thank you for support.

Get a hold of a voltmeter that will measure low voltages. Also get a hold of a spec sheet on your motors.

Look up the current rating on your motors, it should be something like 1 amp (anything from 0.4A to 1.5A is very possible).
Check the voltage rating, it should be less than 12 volts (anything from 3 to 9 volts is quite possible).
Measure the Vref on the driver boards, it's easy to do between the pot wiper and ground (they probably are set to low, but check it first).

Each 1/2 amp of current needed by the motor will add 0.3V to the Vref. A 1/2 amp motor wants 0.3V a 1A motor wants 0.6V. You can probably get away with running the motors at 1/2 the rated current. You need twice the current in Z since there are two motors on the Z axis. The chips are only rated for 1.5 amps or so. If you have two 1.5A motors on Z, do not set that axis for 3A. You will have to try something below 1.5A and see if it works.

Thanks. Adjusting motors werent a huge obstacle but I get this every time on any motors when I want to move motors to opposite direction:

echo:endstops hit: X/Z/Y:249.84

any ideas about this?

also what about extruder?

but now I need to order some new parts for so it will be quiet few weeks because some mechanical parts dont fit together.

Endstops hit means your end stop detectors are going off. If you are running optical end stops there's one set of things to look at. If you are running mechanical end stops the issues are a bit different. I'm guessing you are running mechaical endstops.

1) Check that the pull ups are enabled in your firmware.
2) Make sure that the wiring of your endstop switches and your firmware settings agree with each other
3) Check your wires and your solder connections.
4) Be sure the end stops are plugged in the correct place
5) Check the solder connections on your Ramps boad at the pins that go to the end stops

Once you have X,Y and Z running with reasonable performance set up the extruder. Read the the X or Y current setting. Set the same Vref on your extruder stepper driver. It may not be perfect set that way but it should be in the ballpark.

Hi again. I have made great process and I feel eternal graditude for you. However pronterface gives me this error: echoD init fail

I read that it has something to do with configuration.h file, and about that my motors dont move to minus direction without first pressing them to positive direction.

Any ideas what I should enable or disable?

If the rest of the line says "SD" (as in SD init fail) then it's not a problem. All it's telling you is that it went to find a properly formatted SD memory card and somewhere along the way it did not find it.

If your motors move backwards, flip the plugs on the motors 180 degrees where they plug into the Ramps. That should get them going the right way. You can also make firmware mods to correct the issues.

If they do not move at all until you go positive, check your end stop settings. You may have a setup that forbids motion if the end stops are triggered.

I just recently purchased an A8 Prusa i3, and assembled it just like the video and manual said, I have already gotten 4 prints out of it with no problem, until the 5th print where the Y axis would only move forward away from the end stop, when I try to home all the axis the Y axis does not move, I plugged the Y axis plug into the X axis on the board to see if the motor was bad , but there was no problem with the motor, the motor worked great. Can anybody help, I am not sure what to do from here, I am thinking maybe the Anet A8 board has gone bad, or the firmware is bad or not configured correctly or maybe a software issue, Can somebody please help, I am going crazy here cuz there is not much information on the web about configuring these boards. any kind of help is greatly appreciated. Thank you

Check your Y endstop.

using typedef-name 'fpos_t' after 'struct'
Arduino: 1.6.10 Hourly Build 2016/07/25 04:33 (Windows 7), Board: "Arduino/Genuino Mega or Mega 2560, ATmega2560 (Mega 2560)"

sketch\Marlin_main.cpp:2070:36: warning: invalid suffix on literal; C++11 requires a space between literal and string macro [-Wliteral-suffix]

LCD_MESSAGEPGM(MACHINE_NAME" "MSG_OFF".");

^

In file included from sketch\SdFile.h:27:0,

from sketch\cardreader.h:8,

from sketch\Marlin_main.cpp:44:

SdBaseFile.h:38: error: using typedef-name 'fpos_t' after 'struct'

struct fpos_t {

^

In file included from sketch\Marlin.h:10:0,

from sketch\Marlin_main.cpp:30:

c:\users\play\desktop\ramp 1.4\arduino-nightly-windows\arduino-nightly\hardware\tools\avr\avr\include\stdio.h:950 :33: note: 'fpos_t' has a previous declaration here

__extension__ typedef long long fpos_t;

^

exit status 1
using typedef-name 'fpos_t' after 'struct'

This report would have more information with
"Show verbose output during compilation"
option enabled in File -> Preferences.