stuck again!!!

Folks,

Have made a Wades extruder and wound heater coil, installed thermocouple sensor made 12V supply wired it all up - no smoke (yey!!) but have not got a clue what to do next.

i am guessing that I have to load firmwear but I must confess to total ignorance as i have ni idea what I am doing!!

I have tried to work out what programmes I need to download and so far have managed Skeinforge and RepRap programme but dont know how to make the extruder 'intelligent' and actually do something like heat up.

Can anyone give me an idiots guide in a step by step process to commission the extruder board and get things moving forward.

I intend to mount this on my CNC Z axis head - create G code via Skeinforge (if I can ever work it out!!) and then load as g code into Mach 3 which is my EMC controller.

have attached photo of work so far - shame it is now stalled out due to my lack of programming experience (NIL!!!)

just as a last query - the photo shows the thermocouple board with red/blue/blk leads ending in small black 3 pin plug can anyone confirm where this plug connects as I have some conflicting opinions regarding A7 and A6 pinouts

Thanx
Paul

Do you have a motherboard or just the extruder board?

If you check the schematics, the A6 and A7 headers are identical, so choose one and set up the firmware to suit.

As for installing the firmware, instructions are here:
[reprap.org]

I'm not sure if the official firmware supports thermocouples, last time I looked it didn't but had remnant code that suggested it did. If it still won't compile when set up for firmwares, use the alternate firmware from here:
[reprap.org]

Hi,
I just have the extruder board as Mach 3 runs my other 3 axis
Paul

You need another Arduino (Sanguino, etc) to run the extruder board.

Edit: unless you do some serious hacking of the extruder board firmware. Not sure how you would even go about it.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/16/2010 04:05PM by NewPerfection.