Where to learn about electronics/hardware development to date?

Afternoon All,

I'm currently using the Ormerod 2 as an experimental rig. It is likely that in the near future I will have to modify parts of the electronics or hardware to better suit my needs.

Are there any online resources that detail the deveopment of the hardware and electronics to this current point? I'd like to know why certain design choices were taken so that when I'm considering modifying aspects of the design I do not fall straight into traps that have already been avoided or found in the past.

I would be especially interested in making the electronics more modular so that I could mod it for propper e-stopping (at least following the flavour of the guides rather than full documentation for performance level ratings to EN/ISO 13849), higher current stepper drivers, etc. Can the duet firmware run on a Arduino Due with specifically made add on electronics or are some of the used pins on the firmware not available on the Due headers?

Regards,

Wesley.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/2014 08:58AM by WesBrooks.

Would there be a better choice of electronics hardware to go with if I am interested in changing aspects of it such as the stepper drivers?

Resources I've found so far:

Active RepRap Electronics:
[reprap.org]

Comparison of Electronics:
[reprap.org]

List of firmware:
[reprap.org]

Generation 7 Electronics:
[reprap-diy.com]

Not found much of an overview that is immediately obvious but presume I'd get some incling from reading through the above!

Regarding running the firmware on an Arduino Due, the Due lacks both the Ethernet interface and many of the I/O pins used by the Duet. There is a RAMPS-FD board available for the Arduino Due, but it still lacks the Ethernet interface.

---

Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Thanks dc42.

I've been reading around the duet since my post and think learning a little more about the extension header may cover what I need initially to break out stepper control signals. This will cover me for a while but I'm concious that I'll need to start getting my head around the Duet and other offerings sooner rather than later in order to lessen the learning curve when it's really needed.

While I appreciate the core of the Duet is extremely versatile have the seperate SPI controlled/interface stepper drives been investigated much?