Additional channels needed

I recently re-commissioned my printer (after being out of action for about 5 months) with a Speedy board - a South African Smoothie clone and am very happy with it. It has 4 high power MOSFET outputs and 2 low power ones - see www.black-box.co.za

I am also using a pellet extruder (which I made) using a normal hot-end heater cartridge on the nozzle, but also needs a heater on the barrel. This is controlled by a separate OMRON temperature controller at present, but since the Speedy has the capability, I would like to control the barrel heater via the Speedy, but Repetier does not allow this.

Can additional controls be added to Repetier? If so, I would like one for the extruder barrel heater and one for an infrared heating lamp.

Wally

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To get the right answer, you must ask the right question!

First, I wonder how you made Repeter-Firmware work on a smoothieboard. Did not know this was possible.

You could add a extra extruder for controling barrel temperature. Just don't use it as extruder. But using the temperature control capability should be no problem.

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I installed the Smoothie driver, setup the config.txt on the SD card, setup the COM port and it worked, no problem.
It seems to me to work better than the RAMPS board I had (it came with my Velleman K8200, but the USB port broke off) and Marlin firmware.
There are still a few problems, which I am working on, such as:

1 Getting the extruder retraction to work correctly
2 The estimated print time is about half of what the print takes
3 Another fan will be added on the extruder barrel fins, separately controlled from the nozzle fan - for now, this will be wired permanently on, via the Speedie board supply

Using a second extruder to control the barrel heater is not the ideal option, as a second extruder will be added later. On my next bigger printer, I hope to use two extruders which may be run simultaneously, doubling production.

Wally

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To get the right answer, you must ask the right question!

I installed the Smoothie driver, setup the config.txt on the SD card, setup the COM port and it worked, no problem.
It seems to me to work better than the RAMPS board I had (it came with my Velleman K8200, but the USB port broke off) and Marlin firmware.
There are still a few problems, which I am working on, such as:

1 Getting the extruder retraction to work correctly
2 The estimated print time is about half of what the print takes
3 Another fan will be added on the extruder barrel fins, separately controlled from the nozzle fan - for now, this will be wired permanently on, via the Speedie board supply

Using a second extruder to control the barrel heater is not the ideal option, as a second extruder will be added later. On my next bigger printer, I hope to use two extruders which may be run simultaneously, doubling production.

Wally

---

To get the right answer, you must ask the right question!

I installed the Smoothie driver, setup the config.txt on the SD card, setup the COM port and it worked, no problem.
It seems to me to work better than the RAMPS board I had (it came with my Velleman K8200, but the USB port broke off) and Marlin firmware.
There are still a few problems, which I am working on, such as:

1 Getting the extruder retraction to work correctly
2 The estimated print time is about half of what the print takes
3 Another fan will be added on the extruder barrel fins, separately controlled from the nozzle fan - for now, this will be wired permanently on, via the Speedie board supply

Using a second extruder to control the barrel heater is not the ideal option, as a second extruder will be added later. On my next bigger printer, I hope to use two extruders which may be run simultaneously, doubling production.

Wally

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To get the right answer, you must ask the right question!

Sorry for the repeated message, slow ADSL and a bit of fingertrouble!

Wally

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To get the right answer, you must ask the right question!

If you have a second extruder add a third for for heat control.

But as you explained, you are using Smoothieware not repetier-firmware so for firmware questions, this is the wrong place in your case. Controlling different heaters with one extruder must be implemented in firmware.

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Repetier-Software - the home of Repetier-Host (Windows, Linux and Mac OS X) and Repetier-Firmware.
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Thanks for your response.

What I really need is for the Repetier user interface to show 2 temperatures and control 2 heaters per extruder.

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To get the right answer, you must ask the right question!

Then we are back with 2 extruders per real extruder solution. There exist no firmware commands for what you want as far as I know and it would be to specific to write it from our side.

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Repetier-Software - the home of Repetier-Host (Windows, Linux and Mac OS X) and Repetier-Firmware.
Repetier-Server - the solution to control your printer from everywhere.
Visit us on Facebook and Twitter!