skFrontend, a Skeinforge Frontend for 3D Printing

Common Skeinforge use only leads to modify a few parameters, I wrote skFrontend to modify them. Details & download: http://reprapide.fr/skfrontend-a-skeinforge-frontend



skFrontend is written with Python & Tkinter. User interface can be set to french, english or german. I am happy to see that acc & me had nearly the same idea!

---

François

Hi François,
can I use Your script and modify it for use and integration with SFACT?

---

Manufacturer of low tolerance Filaments PLA, ABS, ASA, PETG, TPU, PA, PVA,
[www.miafilament.com]
[github.com]

Hi ahmetcemturan,

of course you can (it's GPL) & I would be happy…! for me it will be the occasion to discover SFACT that I don't know!

Let me know your developments…!

---

François

glad to inspire you to publish your idea I also see new SFACT is published as well!

Beside much less settings in your frontend I see you use different flow and feed rate - is it a must for PLA? I never had different values for these settings, always the same.

acc Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Beside much less settings in your frontend

yes, I wanted something very simple for the reprap to be used by non-experts…!

> I see you use different flow and feed rate - is it a
> must for PLA? I never had different values for
> these settings, always the same.

For me, yes with PLA but plastic type is not important, feed & flow rates are the sames for only one layer height (0.4mm): I calibrated my extruder (firmware E steps by meter into Teacup) to get feed & flow rates equal for this layer height. When layer height changes, feed & flow rates becomes different, 10 & 8.3 with 0.3 layers for example.

Before the Mendel I used a RapMan: feed & flow rates are very differents there, 16 & 420 for example…

---

François

Well, a bit offtopic, but how do you calibrate it? I calibrate my extruder by extruding a few cm and checking how much filament was in fact extruded.

Is it all "just" experimenting and checking the printed object?

I calibrated the extruder by checking the lenght of filament coming into it, process based on Josef Prusa webpage. And I tested the width of perimeters (which must be Carve/Layer Height x Carve/Edge Width over Height), and made some of the tests of wiki calibration page. I can't tell you more precisely because I did'nt take notes…

But now I must recalibrate because I had a crazy value for Carve/Extra Decimal Places (0.8, defaults to 2.0, why this value?…) which change very much the results (more plastic extruded with default value). I'll be then more accurate why my calibration process…

Checking length of extruded filament was good until Skeinforge 39 it seems…

Yes, a very bit offtopic as you said…

---

François

@acc, I am going deeper into Skeinforge 50 (volumetric setting) & extruder calibration: you are right, Flow and Feed rates are the same for all layers height, I experimented that… it was not the case until Skeinforge 39…

---

François

Uff ;-)

Just to tell you that skFrontend is version 1.4 now. More Skeinforge parameters can be set, several profiles can be managed. Happy use & new year!

---

François

Francois,
This is an excellent tool - thank you. Having the key parameters on display such as infill value will help prevent a lot of mistakes. Now all I have to do is try and get to grips with the other settings in Skeinforge 50 for my printer.
Alan