query for deposition head

hi,

I am new to this group. I have my fab at home assembled and working. I would like to add a new deposition head so that i can use more materials. I want something like a worm driven extruder or a thermoplastic extruder. can some one help me if something like this is available ready to go with fab at home ? if yes, then if you can also help me were it is available for purchase.

I hope this group will help me in all my doubts from now. Thanks a lot in advance.

Regards

Vivek Anand

If I am not mistaken, you can purchase a thermoplastic extruder from Bits from Bytes (www.bitsfrombytes.com) with some assembly required. Not exactly a "bolt on" piece. Meaning you would most likely need to modifiy the bracket to fit up with your Fab@Home kit. Or if you are feeling really industrious, you could attempt building your own from the plans at the RepRap home site (www.reprap.org/bin/view/Main/RepRapOneDarwinThermoplastExtruder). If your kit can already print parts you shouldn't have too much trouble as the STLs are readily available. If I am in error, I'm sure one of the vets will soon chime in.

-Rick

Fab@home already has a thermoplastic extruder which uses hot glue as its material:
[eposition_Assembled_Solid_Edge_Drawing.jpg" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">fabathome.org]
If that (understandably) doesn't appeal the fab@ printhead carriage is relatively simple and modular and you should be able to hack a Bits from Bytes extruder on there with no problem (it's even acrylic, so everything matches). The problem you will face is that f@h uses a very simple stop/go print command with no feedback from the printhead, whereas RepRap uses a more conversational method in which the printhead tells the carriage when it is ready to print and uses feedback to maintain its' temperature. The printhead can also receive commands to reverse or perform other operations such as closing a valve. In short you will probably need to integrate the RepRap extruder control electronics (available from the RepRap Research Foundation); these will expect to communicate with your Cartesian controller in ways which it may not understand, so... Happy coding!
Keep us posted on your progress.

[www.fabathome.org]

(The "colon D" got converted to a laughing smiley. Changed the colon to "percent 3A")

Thanks to all - Rick, BDolge and John wasser ( to getting me to that page)

Before asking this question i already had done lot of research about this head and quite know abt the rep rap's and the worm driven extruder by a university in australia. i am not that professional in assembling stuff, so the rep rap version could be a tough one if i had to do that alone. but if it has proper backups, and is proved to work with fab at home and if people here are ready to support me, i can take the risk of getting it. my main concern is i want to be sure shot of its working/ compatibility with fab at home.

next, the worm extruder developed by australian uni, i would like to know if it can be purchased straight of from them. or if its available in market already were can i find it. or if its not at all available, out of the 2 - the rep rap one and the aus uni worm extruder one, which one is more promising and guaranteed to work with fab at home.

what i understand from my findings so far is that the reprap one is quite generic, it has to be quite molded and panel beated to fit into fab at home, but the worm extruder one is a special project exclusive to fab at home and is more assured to run with it. i may be wrong, but i need to find out which is best and which one is ready for purchase. i agree that i may not able to find a plug and play one, but if there is a good one with better probabality of working and little bit working it would be fair enough.

please do guide me with this.

Thanks

Vivek Anand