I second the vote for Smoothieboard. Updating firmware and changing machine configuration doesn't get much easier. It's also easy to make connections to external motor drivers, etc.by the_digital_dentist - General
My machine moves the bed in the Y axis. I am using a SmoothieBoard for the controller. X, Y, and Z axis motors are all NEMA-23. X and Y axis motors have their own 32V power supplies and DSP driver modules. The Z axis has a single motor driving two screws to lift the X axis. There are a lot of factors to consider when selecting the electronics, including cost, ease of making connections to thby the_digital_dentist - General
You need to power four motors at about 1A each, the controller board- maybe about 1A, the bed heater (?)- about 10-20A depending on the machine, and the hot-end about 3-4A. That all adds up to 18-28A, mostly depending on the bed heater current. A 1A supply isn't going to do the job.by the_digital_dentist - Controllers
Be careful about hanging big caps on the output of a power supply. The cap will look like a short circuit initially and could kill your power supply. Big caps have to be charged slowly unless they are connected to a battery, like in a car. Have you considered using a car battery to power the machine? It may not be adequate for really big prints, but is probably OK for most.by the_digital_dentist - General New Machines Topics
Auto bed leveling/zeroing measures the location and tilt of the bed, then the firmware compensates for the tilt by running the Z axis screws continuously as the machine prints. It essentially tilts the print in software to match the tilt of the bed.by the_digital_dentist - General
My printer is just what you describe- 300x300 with bed moving in the Y axis. I have had to take some extreme measures to get the bed motion under control. I started with 1/2" round guide rails, brass bushings, belt drive, and a medium sized NEMA-23 motor and ended up with linear guides, ball screw drive, and a big NEMA-23 motor with a DSP driver and 32V power supply. It works beautifully, butby the_digital_dentist - General
I'd stay away from anything built out of threaded rods.by the_digital_dentist - General
Yeah, that's good too, but the real flakyness comes in when you adjust the screw to trip the zero switch. There is mechanical hysteresis built into the switch so you're never exactly sure what spacing you're going to get until you try printing.by the_digital_dentist - General
Make sure both the hot-end and bed are at print temperature when you set the zero point for the Z axis. The extruder nozzle always has a little plastic in it and if it isn't soft you won't set the zero point right. Many print beds tend to warp a little at print temperature so you want to make sure it's in print state when you zero. In general, clean the bed at room temperature prior to printinby the_digital_dentist - General
Parts: 450W 24V kapton heater w thermistor (from Trinity Labs, no longer in business, ~$40 IIRC) 500W 24VAC buck/boost transformer (from ebay, $50 shipped) D1225 SSR (Crydom) - from the junk at the makerspace I have a 10A circuit breaker acting as a power switch for the entire printer. Each of the power supplies, except the transformer, has its own fuse. I let the high current MOSFET on the sby the_digital_dentist - Look what I made!
As a point of reference, the Stratasys FDM1600 at the makerspace prints ABS inside a closed chamber at 70C.by the_digital_dentist - Printing
BullDog XL is 5.18:1, not 1:1 (direct drive). The RRD site has a page of info that says to use 495 steps/mm for the extruder. I'd say that's a good value from which to start calibrating.by the_digital_dentist - General
You'll get best calibration results if you have the printer lay down a square that goes almost to the edges of your print bed. If you have a 250 x250 bed and you print a 200x200 square and measure it and calibrate with it, if the error in your measurement is 0.5mm, when you print a 20x20 square/cube, the 0.5 mm error divide down to 0.05mm.by the_digital_dentist - General
You can check for parallel guide rails by taking the belt off and pushing the print bed/extruder carriage back and forth down the length of the rails. If they are parallel there won't be any binding. If they bind they may cause the motor to slip and skip steps and that will cause the sort of weird behavior you're seeing. While you're at it, check the belt tension and the grub screw on the motoby the_digital_dentist - Printing
The calibration should not matter where on the bed you print the part. Think about how it works- the motor steps/rev doesn't change, the belt pitch doesn't change, and the number of teeth on the pulley doesn't change with XY coordinates. If you calibrate with a very small part then print a big part, the error in the small part calibration will multiply in the dimensions of the larger part. Itby the_digital_dentist - Printing
Not so much the lazy man's way out as the cheap printer maker's way out. It is far cheaper to add an inductive sensor (about $5 at retail) than to build a solid printer. One thing it would allow, and I expect to see it in a printer kit soon, is to eliminate bed level adjustment hardware altogether. If you have a working autolevel system, why bother including hardware to mechanically level theby the_digital_dentist - Reprappers
The problem with super low speeds is that the very hot extruder nozzle will remelt the layer(s) of plastic below the one it is printing and wreck the beautiful precision with which they were deposited. The result may look pretty bad. The good news is that you can try it and if it sucks, convert to higher speed drive.by the_digital_dentist - General
The only improvement autoleveling offers is eliminating the need for you to manually level the print bed before starting a print. If your printer is solidly built and doesn't need frequent releveling, autoleveling is sort of pointless.by the_digital_dentist - Reprappers
Dead wrong. There is no better way to bring the filament to the extruder. It is almost a straight line path wherever the extruder is on the X axis and the only friction being where the spool turns on the pipe. You are doing fine. Don't change it.by the_digital_dentist - Reprappers
What are the first and second layer thicknesses? Does the hot-end temperature remain steady?by the_digital_dentist - Printing
I used a kapton heater from the no longer operating Trinity Labs. It is a 450W heater that runs on 24V. I use a 24V transformer to power it with an SSR switching 117VAC into the primary of the transformer under PID control from the SmoothieBoard. I turned the PID frequency down to 8Hz in the SmoothieBoard so it wouldn't blow circuit breakers- Smoothie runs at about 20Hz by default, I think. Tby the_digital_dentist - Look what I made!
I think you'd need more air than an aquarium pump can provide. A blower like the things used in CPAP machines would probably do the job since they are designed to blow air through a hose.by the_digital_dentist - General
Aluminum is more thermally conductive than most other metals, cheap, relatively light weight, and easy to cut/mill. You could use copper, but it is a lot heavier, more expensive, and harder to machine.by the_digital_dentist - Printing
We have a Stratasys machine at the makerspace that has a couple flexible hoses attached to the hot-end for bringing cool air in from outside the box to keep the hot-end cool. I don't know what sort of blower they have attached to it to force the air through the hose. Quotesungod3k I like the idea and even calming down the airflow would be positive, however my main concern would be hotend coolinby the_digital_dentist - General
The bed temp is a little high, extruder temp is fine. I don't know about the speeds- my printer runs slower. You might try slowing down a bit- maybe 50mm/sec. I solved the delam problem by building an enclosure around my printer using PIR foam insulation board. The 450W bed heater was raising the enclosure temperature to about 45C during prints (with the door propped open a little to preventby the_digital_dentist - Printing
MegaMax was a great printer but there were a lot of things I wanted to change. First, he was a little too large- barely fit through doorways and required a huge enclosure. Next, I wanted to separate the electronics from the print chamber so the chamber could be allowed to get very warm. Finally, I wanted it all self contained- no more power supplies in a separate enclosure. For the newby the_digital_dentist - Look what I made!
Quotegadittri Ayouden, Your problem looks a lot like mine. I believe mine was solved by switching to a solid state relay for the heated bed. The relay that I was using was causing huge temp swings. The type of relay shouldn't affect the temperature swings, but turning on PID temperature control will. With PID control you definitely don't want to use a mechanical relay to switch power to tby the_digital_dentist - Printing
There really shouldn't be any appreciable lateral motion in the screw. If there is, either the screw axis isn't accurately aligned with the motor axis or the screw is bent. If one end of the screw is flopping around in space it is hard to know exactly where the screw's axis is as it changes depending on the rotation angle (and maybe with the position of the nut on the Z axis). Bearings at bothby the_digital_dentist - Printing
I added the stuff you posted to the config file and it works fine. I seems that the board can't read files a couple folders deep- probably due to path length getting too long. I have disconnected from the computer until i need to update the firmware/config file again...by the_digital_dentist - Controllers
I'll take a look at it. Thanks. You should be able to select "play" from the LCD panel and not use pronterface at all...by the_digital_dentist - Controllers