Yes,i looked at the ramps set up,and i probably will change to that before too long.But I wanted to make it do some work first.
I was going to get this lot:
[www.hobbyking.com]
It would save a bit on postage to get the whole shebang at once,and i don't think the price is too bad.
After doing a bit more surfing,I realize the Migbot software I've got is a bit lacking in options.
Once my bank balance settles a bit,I'm going to get a mini-lathe to make some of my own parts.(I sold my big lathe to get the 3d printer,amongst other things)
The basics of my printer are ok,but as they say,the devil's in the detail.
Still,i got it cheap enough,so i can afford to spend a bit on upgrades over time.
That's half the fun,isn't it?

seems a nice price whats it come to with shipping? and you will want to get some heat sinks for the steppers.
when I got my ramps, stepper boards and arduino through aliexpress, it came to US$72.17 all free shipping, thats without an LCD screen though.

as the Melzi board has most of this stuff already built in, once you flash the board with Marlin would you have the same features?
you can get an Uno clone from Aliexpress for 4 or 5 US$, just take a month or so to land it here.

Well,whaddya know,I cleaned out the nozzle once again,and gave the blue tape a light sanding with 400 wet n dry.
2 perfect prints,the 3rd one a miserable failure.It seems i can get a maximum of 2 prints before having to clean out the nozzle.
Not that it's a big job with a small lpg torch,but a bit of a nuisance.
I have also realized why the x and y axes overrun their travel when starting.They must be reversed in the firmware,
because what migbot's bed leveller calls the left,is in fact right,and front=rear,at least to my untrained eyes.
That may be the reason the endstops don't come into play at all.
Once i fix that,i might actually have a reasonably working printer.
My nozzle cooling fan has also died,but i ve got a spare 40mm job somewhere.just have to print out a bracket for it.
Hello thingyverse

I tried to look what firmware is on the melzi,but can't seem to get access.I swapped the reset jumper to the correct pins,but no dice.
I have the mini USB port connected to my laptop.
Do i need a separate dongle to get to the firmware settings?
I have one like this:
[www.ebay.com]

firmware setting, if your lucky m503 will tell you most of them. if not there is no way to retrieve them, unless you have the source

search that cd of yours for configuration.h if they have been nice its the marlin and that is all the settings


Also on connecting first few lines printed should be what its running and version. should be displayed on a console type window somewhere

You normally only use a usbisp like that to put the boot loader on the chip. normal firmware is uploaded via this boot loader over usb.
You can also use this to dump the firmware to a file as a backup.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/29/2014 05:19AM by Dust.

Goshdurnit,now the laptop i was using for the printer has packed a sad.I will have to use my other one which has win7 on it.
And of course,Migbot flatly refuses to run on it.I have downloaded Pronterface,so with a bit of luck,that will get me back on the road.
Co-incidentally,the last thing i printed(a 40mm fan holder) stopped at 97% completed,but the printed time was at 00.00.Weird.
Maybe that was due to the dodgy laptop,who knows.

I've got Pronterface and sli3cr installed on my win 7 laptop now,and noticed that Pronterface mentioned the firmware as being Marlin 1.0.1.
Is that a fairly recent version?I tried reversing the x and y axes by putting in -200mm movements,but this didn't work.
There must be another setting to be changed.
That said,the new setup printed 2 key rings without any trouble.I'm going to try something bigger soon.

in pronterface at the bottom, right hand side there will be a text box for entering Gcode, type M119 and hit send, the Console in the upper right should send back some info.
can you post here what comes back?

Also when you move X Y and Z in positive increments, do they move away or towards your endstops?

Can,t win.Got x and y axes to move in the right direction at last,by reversing 1 phase on the steppers.Don't know why i didn't think of this before.
Did a couple of good prints.
But now the hot end now refuses to warm up.The thermistor seems ok,as it shows 120K ohms.The heater resistor shows none.
Yet it heated up very fast when connected to a 12v battery,suggesting there's nothing wrong with it.
Both measured at the end of the wire,so no break in there.No magic smoke anywhere,so i'm at a loss where to look next.
Actually,after cleaning the nozzle again,i broke it off at the thread,so i'm not printing until i get another nozzle anyway.
Maybe time to look at a ramps setup,and possibly a better extruder.and hot end.
Not heard too much about the budaschnozzle,yet people that have one rave about it.
Any thoughts or suggestions appreciated.

the hot end refusing to warm up could be a few things.
if you can get it to come up to a good heat with a battery, I'd be looking to either the board or the power supply or the thermistor.
if the thermistor is not detecting the temperature correctly then you wouldn't know if it was reaching temp or not.

the resistor is going to need a certain amount of Amperage reaching it in order to reach temp, if the amperage is low then the heat will be low.

check the amperage coming out of the PSU to the board and out of the board?

as for Nozzle, is the nozzle holder broken or just the nozzle itself? nozzle itself would be a cheap replacement from the seller ( have you contacted them about it to see if they can replace the hotend or its failed parts?)

if your looking for a new hotend and want hassle free printing and only want to use PLA and ABS, the most recommended hotend for this is the Jhead available from www.hotends.com (DONT BUY A CLONE, its just as much hassle as you have already had)
the guy that makes the official Jheads is a great guy and is even replacing a thermistor that I broke, didn't even ask me to pay for the shipping form the states.

there are other designs available but I know nothing about them, or atleast not enough to recommend them, others may be able to weigh in and offer their input.

the Jhead is not the cheapest by the way, if costs are a concern.

Zerker

I've had a look at the board,and it's possible it's done for.There's 12v going in,but none of the 12 v outputs show any sign of life.
Since i can't do any printing for a while anyway,i've ordered a ramps set from Hobbyking.
By the time that gets here,i should have my lathe,so i'll be able to run up my own nozzle.
I'm looking around for a better extruder setup anyway,so i'll probably order a new hot end from hotend.com once my credit card recovers a bit.
But i need a functioning printer to print a new extruder body.
Having to unbolt the extruder motor to get at the grub screw to release the filament tube is getting old real quick.
Besides,half the reason I broke the nozzle was that it had been leaking,causing the nozzle to be glued into it's thread in the hot end block.
Zerker,you,re right that the cheapest option is very seldom the best.I probably should have gone your route,sourcing parts independently,but was too impatient
I got my new y- bearing blocks today,and fitted 2 to the right side of the bed rails,where i previously had 1 double length one.
This has improved the rigidity of the bed quite a bit,but i'm still not totally happy with it.I think the acrylic bearing pad should have been 4 or 5mm aluminium.
I may yet replace that as well.