Oh, and obviously the three stepper motor drivers, but I think that's it.by ahahn - Baltimore/Wash. DC (and environs) RUG
You only need 3 opto end stops- most of the designs currently only use the minimum stop and not the maximum. The reprap motherboard AFAIK is gen-3. You should just need 1) arduino or sanguino, 2) 3* opto endstops, 3) 1* dc motor driver (extruder motor) 4) 1* PWM driver (extruder heater) 5) 1* thermistor controller (forget the exact name, this is the temperature sensor for the extruder). I thinkby ahahn - Baltimore/Wash. DC (and environs) RUG
Hey Sy- Sorry, I haven't been in this forum in a long time. Were you able to see a machine up and running? The build at hacdc went on this weekend, the machine wasn't up by the time I left on Sunday afternoon but it was coming along nicely. They're in Columbia Heights DC, it sounds like there are folks there nights this week to get things finished up. I'm in Arlington, I have a working machinby ahahn - Baltimore/Wash. DC (and environs) RUG
Hey Insomniak- I haven't looked at what electronics are available right now so I don't know which ones are in which state- are there specific ones on the rrrf site that you have questions about? If you want to take this up in email I'm happy to dig around some. Also, where are you located? The hacdc machine (in Columbia Heights) has all the electronics in a good state, it seems like they're arby ahahn - Baltimore/Wash. DC (and environs) RUG
When I was fine-tuning my lasercut bfb extruder, I tested it by removing the nozzle and then running things as I thought they were supposed to go. This let me see if there was someplace else where things were getting held up. Once that was working fine (basically all the channels for filament were big enough and lined up), I made sure that the plastic was coming out completely melted at full wiby ahahn - Mechanics
Yay! I printed another mug, all the same settings except this time at 250c, and it seems to be holding together quite well. I can squeeze it as hard as I can by hand, and the layers don't come apart. Still have some ooze problems, that comes next.by ahahn - Plastic Extruder Working Group
Hey nophead- I read (I think in one of your posts here) that you're extruding ABS at 230c- is that right? Are you getting usable parts, or are they too brittle? I'm worried that I'm going to get parts which are no less brittle than the lasercut acrylic parts I'm trying to replace. Hmm, that's a tough one- the way HDPE fuses is nice but I keep getting objects messed up on the infill layers becby ahahn - Plastic Extruder Working Group
I just printed a minimug out of ABS after getting frustrated with dealing with the warping of HDPE as it cools. Came out mostly ok, still need to do some tuning, but for a first try it's pretty good. Unfortunately, when I squeezed it laterally to see how much it flexed it cracked between two layers. Not good! I'm wondering if anyone else has seen this, and what their solution was. I'm printinby ahahn - Plastic Extruder Working Group
I wasn't able to track this down. I tried with a different arduino and had the same problem. I switched to the gcode firmware and now using skeinforge to generate the code and send.py to send to the arduino all is working fine. I printed a minimug! Pics / details later, but I also have the pebbly surface problem.by ahahn - Mechanics
Ah, I associated feedrate with only the extruder feed, didn't realize that could apply to the movement of the extruder head as well. I guess I just need to tune this more, right now I have a choice between good edges and extremely sparse infill or tons of ooze/buildup on the edges and solid infill.by ahahn - RepRap Host
I've been using the gcode interpreter from the latest arduino firmware release on sourceforge, driving it via send.py after creating/exporting gts from AoI and processing via skeinforge latest zip from the forums. When I extrude it seems like the feedrate is doing the opposite of what it should with the oozebane-generated commands. For instance I have gcode for the beginning of a line segment liby ahahn - RepRap Host
Do you see any errors when starting the host software? Did you set the serial port in preferences?by ahahn - RepRap Host
Ah, sorry- I did that as well. That was my first attempt since I saw that mentioned in the forums here. It worked ok the first time I used it after sharpening, but then went back to the state where it would get stuck for an instant, which would cause the threads to score the filament just enough to make it start slipping in general.by ahahn - Mechanics
I've been able to extrude HDPE at 200 extruder motor speed/240c extruder temp with the bfb lasercut extruder, after making the following modifications: I sanded down the connection points where the drive gear subassembly joins with the main plate/top plate (step 3 in the Extruder Assembly pdf) so that there is an angle on all the connection points. Basically the main plate side is lower than thby ahahn - Mechanics
I haven't been able to move parts around except for using the Manipulate...Rotate option from the menu. I'm running under windows so not sure if you're supposed to be able to directly manipulate the parts on linux.by ahahn - RepRap Host
Thanks for the update, Demented. I don't think the problem I'm seeing is the same one you're seeing- when the printing stops, the motors are locked (not completely idle). Sorry to hear you aren't working on this project anymore- I hope you find something else fun to spend time onby ahahn - Controllers
DC- have you made any progress on this? I have a similar problem where printing starts fine, but then at some point (always the same on any given object, and always within a minute or so of starting the print) the stepper motors just stop and never start up again. The extruder motor and heater keep running, so I get a big pile of melted HDPE at whatever point it gives up. I'm running two powerby ahahn - Controllers
Hey Brian and everyone- I really wanted to make this meeting but it just didn't work out with my schedule. How was it? I finally got my bitsfrombytes reprap reliably extruding HDPE, now I'm having software problems of some variety where as soon as it gets to a part of the object where it needs to fill in an outline the motors all lock up except for the extruder motor, so it just starts dumping Hby ahahn - Baltimore/Wash. DC (and environs) RUG
Ah, turns out my thermistor was connected incorrectly- once I moved it from digital 0 to analog 0 the refreshTemperature() exception stopped showing up.by ahahn - RepRap Host
Did you find a solution to your last problem? I'm also getting that exception on startup, in windows: Exception in thread "GUI Poll" java.lang.NullPointerException at org.reprap.gui.botConsole.GenericExtruderTabPanel.refreshTemperature( Unknown Source) at org.reprap.gui.botConsole.GenericExtruderTabPanel.access$100(Unknown Source) at org.reprap.gui.botConsole.GenericExtruderTabPanel$1.run(Unknowby ahahn - RepRap Host