When you look at electronics companies who have successfully managed to radically lower prices on consumer electronics which work well, at least initially and provide a straightforward user experience, and perform an ultimately useful function, you start to see the same names over and over again. Some more familiar than others, all decades old. Look at document printers, for example, HP sold oneby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
Robots are used for repetitive tasks because they can be optimized for those tasks. A humanoid robot cannot replace a CNC machine, because if he was stiff enough he could not move effectively. Honda has well over 20 million bucks into the Asimo, and it is still learning to walk. Humanoid robots will one day do the things you speak of, and on the following day, which I believe James Cameron refersby Maxx Mayhem - Robots!
I looked at this. It sounds good on paper, Probably doable if you have a SLS available, but you'd have operational issues.by Maxx Mayhem - Let's design something! (I've got an idea ...)
Carbon nanotubes can be woven into a "yarn" which expands and contracts depending on the presence of an electrical charge. So it would seem by extension that if you bind them into groups, the rest is fairly straightforward.by Maxx Mayhem - Let's design something! (I've got an idea ...)
Today, I installed the PID controller for the heated bed. Tomorrow, I'll be soldering up the control circuit for the cold end lights, and running power and cold end signals, and a few other odds and ends.by Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
I managed to get a few days over the holiday weekend (thanks to my wood supplier whose ability to take an order is, not shockingly, absent) anyway, I got the upper assembly, brackets, cooling components and FINALLY cold end mounted....by Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
Hi all, I've been doing customer work for the past several weeks, but I am going to try and finish up a couple of items in the next couple of weeks... Mount the cold end assy. and liquid cooling system on the top of the printer; finish fabrication on the power supply covers, get some tempered glass and laminate up the bed, and finish design on the filament rack. This will leave only the (most impby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
I'm guessing you are using Win7? A lot of devices seem to go south when you just yank them, you likely do need to somehow end whatever process is using the device to avoid the problem. I have like 12 things plugged in, and they seem to die at odd times...by Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
I am mounting the tubes at the center of the machine, above the top. More important than length is to minimize the angles of your bends, as it is the cusps and apexes of the bends that have the greatest amount of friction.by Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
If you went with a Bowden setup, you could move the heads a lot closer together, and save on carriage weight. As long as you are able to keep your hotends cool enough, you can have them quite close together, particularly with J-heads.by Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
It would be a stiff challenge to build a printer for $150, without a great deal of expertise. The available electronics / motors are about the most cost effective point of entry. You might consider trying to spend a bit of time researching what the community is doing, and see if you can't deepen your war chest in the interim. There are places to cut corners, but there comes a point where it endsby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
Is all of your software up to date?by Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
It is helpful to consider things like how much time, money, access to tools you have. What you want to print is also a biggie. There are some very good kits if you are comfortable assembling and not so much scratch building parts. A lot goes into making a printer work. Whether you start with a kit, or from scratch, or perhaps buying a kit of electronics, and one of mechanical parts, allow yourselby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
The heater arrived today from MEI. It was made to my specs, for a pretty reasonable price. Next I'll need to get the glass and the silicone foam insulation, I will use RTV for assembly. This heater has a thermocouple that will be used for control, via an Auber Instruments PID, and a solid state relay. I will glue in a thermistor to report temps to the Ramps board. The controller is fully programmby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
Also, never take measurements with your fingers on both contacts... You are a conductor, and you will get inaccurate readings. You also have voltage, which will throw off those readings as well.by Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
You can do tempered (plate) glass, but the cost for getting a proper cut and buffed round piece by the time it is tempered may be getting close to the cost of finding a B.S.piece ready made - if you can. Tempered glass will withstand around 700f. It is about 20% the price of stove glass in the US, and since the cost for tempering seems to be the same, regardless of size, the bigger the area, theby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
Today I finished up and installed the transition that holds up the upper assembly, which will include the extruders and the cooling system. Here's a shot of the printer so far...by Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
I ran into a possible issue with the length of the linear rods, concerning the possibility of flexing and drooping. Fortunately, the frame of my machine is constructed heavy enough to allow a stressed configuration, with the rods on the long axis bolted to the endcaps and held in tension. This will prevent any tendency for the 12mm rod not to hold its linearity. The main, 25 mm rod is of less conby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
My idea is to have some sort of symmetrically sprung pair of tensioners to hold the belt in a 270 deg contact with the gear. After doing a couple of tests yesterday, I started thinking about fit vs. wear, and late fit (after wear) and came to the conclusion that CNCD, you are correct, I'd ultimately find a reliability issue with my previous design. The differences in hardness between thew belt aby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
The next consideration would be the initial tension on the belt. I don't want to stress the drive pulleys and clearly don't want to have any slop. I'm thinking to spring the idlers...by Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
Well, CNCD, you've given me another idea, something that you had showed me about a month ago, with a looped belt and then I'd use a pair of idlers at either side of the pulley. Then I'd just need to get some open lmm25s and do it that way, because I'm seeing the issue with the contact. It would seem that it will run my way, but it would take a lot more torque wrapping the belt. Then, I could useby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
So basically, I have this, and a 12 mm rod which will be slotted to make a rack and pinion drive for the x, y axis'. From what I have read in some tech data online, the benefit to post hardening milling is that it tends not to warp, once you cut a slot in a round and harden it, it will usually deform. I had come up with a way to slip this part across my mill way, using just a piece of angle, theby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
I've been on the phone ALL day to try to find a machine shop to slot my linear rods. There are a few specific issues such as capacity (length ) of their machinery, cutter availability, and how stiff the machine is. A bridgeport won't do the trick, you need a big, heavy machining center. So the harbor freight mill is out of the question. Rockwell 61 surfaces tend to chip carbide tooling, so thereby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
400 on a side is not that big. That is unless of course you intend on using your ramps board as the power supply. I'm 18 x 26 in or so, and taking power responsibilities completely off the control board. You're looking at six or seven hundred bucks to do this properly. Long story short, more than a square foot, mains power is the only way to go. The larger you are looking to build , costs will, lby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
Make sure you have the correct port for the device. You may need to poke around in device manager to get things set up. I can tell you that the devices are not always where you left them, because , especially if you have a ton of crap hooked up, windows has a way of assigning ports almost at random, every time you restart it. I have a nano for example that likes 3 just as much as it likes 4, andby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
Silvos, I believe that the print software should already take care of that. You want a home position and end stops, the software should not allow a condition where the nozzle dips below the current layer. So, once your printer is properly set up, there should be no problem. If you are writing software from scratch, keep in mind that the arduino has limits to the software it can handle. If you couby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
Quickly, this weekend, I have been working on a couple of parts for the printer. One is the top frame which will hold the extruders, the cooling system and roughly half of the electronics...It is made from wood, being the easiest way to get the shape I wanted, and is halfway thru finishing right now. I know I said at the outset I was staying away from wood for this build, but it is not a piece whby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
You could make a set of simple corner braces with some flat stock which would lessen flex, and cost little to nothing...by Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
I would have to go ahead and agree with CNCD. It seems that nowadays, folks are none too shy about selling printers on kickstarter they've no idea how to build, and interviewing for jobs they've no idea how to perform. So if the boss knows absolutely nothing, and you toss around a couple of buzzwords, then mazel tov, you have a job. So now what are you going to do? You need to first have a passioby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers
Parts are coming in... I got my PID controller with the ramp and soak feature to run the heated bed. Ramp and soak is basically a means to manually pre program the heat curve on the bed. It offloads the work from the ramps board, while I'll still be able to report the bed temp to ramps. This is another thing to have to calibrate, but you do get more temp control of the bed than you will ever getby Maxx Mayhem - Reprappers