Smartrap evolution, improvements...

Printing them now... Thanks Mark

Sure thing, just hope they turn out alright.

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madmike8
Yup, with the quick connect.

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regpye
No, mine is 2.75" or 65mm from tip of nozzle to the end of the cold end, so it is not too different from the standard J-head.
Mine also has a few more parts than the J-head, those are to stop the heat travel.

Source files will be available when I get time to put them up on my website.

Save a bit of time is the least I could do...

Thanks Mark!

Thanks for that, I am flat out at present, no time to spit.

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[regpye.com.au]
"Experience is the mother of all knowledge." --Leonardo da Vinci

i'm wondering, has anyone already printed flexible PLAon the SmartRap?

And what about printing normal PLA and then soften it up chemically?

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BackEMF
i'm wondering, has anyone already printed flexible PLAon the SmartRap?

And what about printing normal PLA and then soften it up chemically?

I have some NinjaFlex sample, but I havent tested it yet, as far as I have only 3 or 4m of it.
I will probably try it in next week for some phone cover

Unfortunatelly is expensive as hell in Poland :< anny cheap alternatives for flexible materials?

I see their using carburetor cleaner to soften the PLA.

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verteez
Unfortunatelly is expensive as hell in Poland :< anny cheap alternatives for flexible materials?

There is a nice comparison here for flexible/elastic materials, including ninjaflex. After a short research online, ninjaflex seems the most expensive among them (in Europe at least).

In addition I found this, this and this flexible filaments. I also read that Colorfabb XT is somehow flexible, you find a review here.

If somebody has some experience with these filaments and smartrap I would be glad to hear their comments, since I am still waiting to receive mine.

hi,
here an italian product

Rubber [plastink.com]

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Enrico

[www.dapa3dservice.it] [www.studiodapa.it]
repstrap dApA, Ramps 1.4, MarlinKimbra / scanner 3D Cubify Sense / Formlabs Form 2

lot of development everywhere on the smartrap side lately. I have hard time to follow everything, i'm sorry for that !

On my side, i try to integrate what i read or see here and there. So there is a 0.4.9 coming out ( already on github and visualisation there : [sketchfab.com] ).

it's just evolution :

- separation of extruder : now base plate is naked and we have krisdaniels ( a little modified) direct drive as default. The main reason is to have a possible adjustment ( screw) to fit different gear drives and also the space to put a geared extruder without having to hack the base_plate. ( more options).

- GT2 integration complete ( with tensioners , i can't have nice printed gt2 holders integrated with the current model ).

- some plateX redesign to loos weight .

Next work : Z GT2 in place of the M5 thread : I'm tired of the noise of this threaded rod It's moving all the time with the auto level and get old very fast.

thank you all again for being so active with this project ! It's amazing

---

the Smartrap project

[smartfriendz.com]
[www.thingiverse.com]
[reprap.org]
[github.com]
doc assemblage: [reprap.org]
NEW: Forum smartfriendz: [smartraptalk.smartfriendz.com]

why have you removed x axis bearing career below motor?. i think it would improve xz axis rigidity alot.

some changes that i suggest:

-12 mm Z axis rods.
-mount for bigger 9g servo(its cheaper.)
-electronic board mounted from behind-its easier to adjust when printer working.
-for really better x axis stabillity make x rods fixed and carriage to drive with extruder
-

Quick thought: If the plateX could be "turned on its head", so that the Z rod bearings were to sit down beside the motor instead of partly above the carriage, wouldn't you be able to get a cm or two more print height with the same Z rods without stability suffering?

/Allan

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ZeAllan
Quick thought: If the plateX could be "turned on its head", so that the Z rod bearings were to sit down beside the motor instead of partly above the carriage, wouldn't you be able to get a cm or two more print height with the same Z rods without stability suffering?

/Allan

Do you mean turn the X plate around 180 degrees so the top is now the bottom?

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[regpye.com.au]
"Experience is the mother of all knowledge." --Leonardo da Vinci

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regpye

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ZeAllan
Quick thought: If the plateX could be "turned on its head",
/Allan

Do you mean turn the X plate around 180 degrees so the top is now the bottom?

More like a redesign that moves the holders for the Z bearings down below to top of the plate. Turning it 180 degrees might be the easiest way to do it in order to keep the plate easily printable, but it would probably require the "offset" of the plate to be higher in order to keep the head above the print bed, so that would defeat the purpose (and having the motor on top feels wrong somehow).

On the other hand, if it were possible to redesign the hotend holder to have the head a bit higher up, that might give the same effect...

/Allan

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/11/2014 04:19AM by ZeAllan.

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ZeAllan

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regpye

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ZeAllan
Quick thought: If the plateX could be "turned on its head",
/Allan

Do you mean turn the X plate around 180 degrees so the top is now the bottom?

More like a redesign that moves the holders for the Z bearings down below to top of the plate. Turning it 180 degrees might be the easiest way to do it in order to keep the plate easily printable, but it would probably require the "offset" of the plate to be higher in order to keep the head above the plate, so that would defeat the purpose (and having the motor on top feels wrong somehow).

On the other hand, if it were possible to redesign the hotend holder to have the head a bit higher up, that might give the same effect...

/Allan

Redesigning the hotend holder would be very easy. Also adding a different Z nut bracket. one that was separate from the main print would be easy too.
I haven't looked at the space between the bearings to see if the motor will fit or not, but I can't really see much of a problem with redesigning it anyway.
I have gone another way and turned the X assembly only 90 degrees and that way the X axis rods are one above the other. It makes it so much stronger that way.

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[regpye.com.au]
"Experience is the mother of all knowledge." --Leonardo da Vinci

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verteez
Unfortunatelly is expensive as hell in Poland :< anny cheap alternatives for flexible materials?

that's one of the reasons why i'm looking into chemically softening. We already have PLA, and why buy (and store) different types od PLA and in different colours.
So IF chemically softening gives good results then this will, at least for me, be the preferred option.

And i have a few doubts of flexible PLA in the bowden tube, i've seen people do this, but with lubrication in the tube.

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markstephen
I see their using carburetor cleaner to soften the PLA.

Ah yes, thats what i've seen, carburetor cleaner ... is that actually safe to use? I will look into it.. Need to figure out what the actual chemical is that does the trick.

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enricodare
Rubber [plastink.com]

Thats actually nice, clear PLA rubber.

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smartfriendz
I have hard time to follow everything, 0.4.9 coming out, Z GT2 in place of the M5 thread : I'm tired of the noise of this threaded rod

Much respect for keeping up this good, i also find it hard to keep up. Z GT2 sounds VERY interesting. Z-whining is also getting on my nerves (I can't print at night because of it).

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BackEMF

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smartfriendz
I have hard time to follow everything, 0.4.9 coming out, Z GT2 in place of the M5 thread : I'm tired of the noise of this threaded rod

Much respect for keeping up this good, i also find it hard to keep up. Z GT2 sounds VERY interesting. Z-whining is also getting on my nerves (I can't print at night because of it).

What? What noise / "Z-whining"? My threaded rod is quiet as a mouse and the stepper does not make any more noise than the others. No objection to a belt driven Z, just wondering where all this noise is coming from.

Mark

Hmm, for some reason the Z axis is screeming especially during bedleveling. The small adjustments during a print are quiet.

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markstephen

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BackEMF

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smartfriendz
I have hard time to follow everything, 0.4.9 coming out, Z GT2 in place of the M5 thread : I'm tired of the noise of this threaded rod

Much respect for keeping up this good, i also find it hard to keep up. Z GT2 sounds VERY interesting. Z-whining is also getting on my nerves (I can't print at night because of it).

What? What noise / "Z-whining"? My threaded rod is quiet as a mouse and the stepper does not make any more noise than the others. No objection to a belt driven Z, just wondering where all this noise is coming from.

Mark

Mine too, I can't say it is loud at all.
If you want to hear noise, have about 12 machines all going at once, then you will get some noise, but it sounds more like music to me ha..ha..

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[regpye.com.au]
"Experience is the mother of all knowledge." --Leonardo da Vinci

Maybe someone can make a musical slicer algorithm? :-)

I think my neihgbour is a good reference.. when my doorbell rang at 1:00 in the night and i got the question if i'm building a robocop, then i thought smartrap is a it too loud for "home use".
I placed the machine on a soft foam board though that still wasn't enough to be able to print at this hour. (and it is mainly during the bedleveling)
In my case the base board wokrs as a soundboard and then the table top is another soundboard...
I will try if spikes work as decoupling.

And in fact my question about chemically softening PLA was also about this. (then i can print gaskets in normal PLA and then soften them) Then we would have a printable noise decoupling. And with multiple Smartraps i wonder how hard they would whisper their songs. hehe

Grease the rod? Mine's pretty quiet...

The rod is already greased and far as i can tell running smooth enough, so that leaves the motor itself, i'll try to slow down the Z moves during probing and see if that makes a difference, but first i'll compare the Marlin configs with those from Mark and maybe i'll find a difference in the Z settings

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smartfriendz
lot of development everywhere on the smartrap side lately. I have hard time to follow everything, i'm sorry for that !

On my side, i try to integrate what i read or see here and there. So there is a 0.4.9 coming out ( already on github and visualisation there : [sketchfab.com] ).

it's just evolution :

- separation of extruder : now base plate is naked and we have krisdaniels ( a little modified) direct drive as default. The main reason is to have a possible adjustment ( screw) to fit different gear drives and also the space to put a geared extruder without having to hack the base_plate. ( more options).

- GT2 integration complete ( with tensioners , i can't have nice printed gt2 holders integrated with the current model ).

- some plateX redesign to loos weight .

Next work : Z GT2 in place of the M5 thread : I'm tired of the noise of this threaded rod It's moving all the time with the auto level and get old very fast.

thank you all again for being so active with this project ! It's amazing

I looked at the sketch and see that the extruder has been moved a little, but not the best way.
I feel it would be much better if the extruder had the filament exiting directly from the rear so that a smooth curve towards the hotend could be achieved. With it coming out at the side there is too much twisting and turning and that causes friction.
I have tried the rear exit on my last build and it does work much better and gives a cleaner movement.

---

[regpye.com.au]
"Experience is the mother of all knowledge." --Leonardo da Vinci

Hi regpye,

Yes, maybe you're right, i will try this one . For now , I just wanted to integrate separated extruder , so we cn choose between a direct drive and a geared one.

I just turned it a little, so the out won't go right in the Z rod Actually, it's even less bended than before.

didn't think about going out from rear.. thank you .

---

the Smartrap project

[smartfriendz.com]
[www.thingiverse.com]
[reprap.org]
[github.com]
doc assemblage: [reprap.org]
NEW: Forum smartfriendz: [smartraptalk.smartfriendz.com]

Quote
smartfriendz
lot of development everywhere on the smartrap side lately. I have hard time to follow everything, i'm sorry for that !

On my side, i try to integrate what i read or see here and there. So there is a 0.4.9 coming out ( already on github and visualisation there : [sketchfab.com] ).

it's just evolution :

- separation of extruder : now base plate is naked and we have krisdaniels ( a little modified) direct drive as default. The main reason is to have a possible adjustment ( screw) to fit different gear drives and also the space to put a geared extruder without having to hack the base_plate. ( more options).

- GT2 integration complete ( with tensioners , i can't have nice printed gt2 holders integrated with the current model ).

- some plateX redesign to loos weight .

Next work : Z GT2 in place of the M5 thread : I'm tired of the noise of this threaded rod It's moving all the time with the auto level and get old very fast.

thank you all again for being so active with this project ! It's amazing

Have you already tried GT2 belt for the Z? I will make one to try, but I think there will be not enough resolution for the Z axis. I will use /1/32 stepping because I am sure that 1/16 will be too course. Even with 1/32, the steps will be 160 compared to 4000 using M5 threaded rod, and only 80 steps using 1/16

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[regpye.com.au]
"Experience is the mother of all knowledge." --Leonardo da Vinci

1/16 step should be fine. That's 0.0125 mm per step, or 16 Esteps to make a 0.2 mm (20 micron) layer height. That's not bad. Sure, 1/32 steps would give you more resolution, but is it really needed?

Mark

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markstephen
1/16 step should be fine. That's 0.0125 mm per step, or 16 Esteps to make a 0.2 mm (20 micron) layer height. That's not bad. Sure, 1/32 steps would give you more resolution, but is it really needed?

Mark

Easy to try it both ways, just a matter of unplugging a driver and replacing with another.
I have already designed and printed out the new Z assembly to test this out, I am assembling it all now.

I needed to build another printer anyway, because the last printer that I built I lent to an electronics store to take to a convention. When I went to pick it up on Thursday, they said they wanted to keep it longer, so I guess they will be having some fun with it.

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[regpye.com.au]
"Experience is the mother of all knowledge." --Leonardo da Vinci

Shiny, please post back with your findings after your testing.

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markstephen

What? What noise / "Z-whining"? My threaded rod is quiet as a mouse and the stepper does not make any more noise than the others. No objection to a belt driven Z, just wondering where all this noise is coming from.

Mark

The high speed Z-axis moves are really loud here. Though the X and Y axis are also starting to sing a bit . and i have the feeling that the LM8UU's bearings are part of the problem.

Came across this yesterday - [www.thingiverse.com] - and it looks very interesting. Anyone want to try a Dual Extruder Smartrap?

Looks cool... So when you going to try it? You probably have a dual holder for the Smartrap already designed up and your head and your fingers are twitching over your mouse waiting to put those ideas in to FreeCAD... I'll mail you a spare Jhead-Lite thanks to Regpye. Come on... You know you want too... I think I have some spare PTFE tube too...