OH. gen3 electronics, and you're driving the extruder stepper off of the h-bridges. See the page in the wiki about PCB changes for mendel. Have you done the required changes? Probably, if you're seeing flashing lights. Your problem probably isn't with skienforge at all, but rather with configuring your electronics properly to run with the 5D firmware. (again, see the wiki page) Telling point:by jgilmore - General
Another option would be to get a different power supply, preferably something a little higher than 12V. I think 19V or 20V laptop supplies are becoming common.by jgilmore - Reprappers
One of the most common "errors" is the firmware trying to turn the Z axis too quickly. This can easily happen because the previous move was at 1200mm/m and the Z move has to be under 40mm/m. But the firmware (with it's fairly stupid logic) decides that it needs to deaccelerate from 1200mm/m to 40mm/m. Trying to move the Z axis at 1200mm/m doesn't work at all, of course. So, either insert a dummyby jgilmore - General
spaztik Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Triffid_Hunter Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > sure, #define DEBUG in your config, and read > the > > M250+ commands in the bottom of > gcode_process.c, > > also shell scripts in func.sh that go with > them. > > No can do, I am using the 168 cby jgilmore - Firmware - experimental, borrowed, and future
Markus Amsler Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Currently there's no working homing code, > correct? Mostly, yes. I wrote something that mostly worked, which you can find here, I'm not at all satisfied with it and am working on something much better. Current progress (and lack thereof, USB port on my laptop died, currently no way to test stuff) is on the "masby jgilmore - Firmware - experimental, borrowed, and future
I don't have a mendel of my very own (yet) so the all of this post is gleaned from reading. Also it's possible that I'm solving problems which aren't problems because of my lack of direct experience in this area. The bed hangs over it's frame on both sides in the Y direction when printing. Nophead's box had to be made bigger than the actual mendel because of this. The Z axis can't go all the waby jgilmore - General Mendel Topics
Double-check your endstop's connections and settings. Every time there's an uneven movement like that it's been the endstops. However, this is the first I've heard of it moving even a little - usually if the endstops bad (broken, misconfigured, not hooked up, whatever) it will refuse to move that direction at all. Perhaps you have a combination of that with a unreliable endstop or electrical coby jgilmore - Firmware - mainstream and related support
What kind of plastic are you using? What surface are you trying to print onto?by jgilmore - General
I think one of the problems with a heated chamber is the extruder motor overheating. I've not heard of the extruder itself having problems, but it makes sense that it would. It should be possible to compensate with a thicker insulator though, a longer piece of PTFE or something.by jgilmore - General
I though the geared part of facing the motor was the right way? Look at step four. The adrian mendel drive pulley doesn't have a rim, so you must not mean that one?by jgilmore - General Mendel Topics
makeme Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Can I just use mechanical end stops instead of > optos? Does it matter? Yes you can. No it doesn't. You might want to double-check if you should have a resistor in series with the switch though. It's been long enough that I don't remember. Do you want it pulled UP or pulled DOWN? If you deviate from "standard behaviorby jgilmore - RAMPS Electronics
Maybe just ask enrique to update it instead? He's usually good about bug fixes, and this is a clearly defined problem with an easy (and known) fix.by jgilmore - Skeinforge
Motors plug directly into the pololu stepper driver boards. These boards come with .1" headers that you solder in. So you cut out four and solder them in sticking up instead of down. I think the endstops are the same way, just a .1" (2.54mm) header. OTOH, I still haven't figured out how to make a good connector on the ends of the wires to plug into those... which part do I order?by jgilmore - RAMPS Electronics
Someone did plastic nuts recently. The prusa mendel uses many, many fewer parts in general. I keep thinking that using plastic screws (self-threading type) is the way it's done in industry, why aren't we doing it that way? We could design most of the parts to clamp on (as opposed to being held in place with nuts & washers on both sides) and hold the clamp closed with a couple of screws. Plasby jgilmore - General
You might be able to use the 5V rail. On PC PSUs the 5V rail usually has more power, but you'd have to use smaller resistors, and probably hook them up in parallel too. And use heavy wire of course. What's the PSU rated for on the 5V rail?by jgilmore - Reprappers
Questions about the fived_on_arduino firmware are usually on the "firmware - experimental, borrowed, and future" but luckily, most people read all over the place. I suppose the 5DON firmware is a bit on the experimental side, though people have been using it, it is less common. This firmware is just for the main board. The gen3 electronics are a bit unique in having a separate controller that wby jgilmore - General Mendel Topics
Measuring with calipers will be inaccurate - small differences in amount of plastic deposited etc can (will) result in being a bit off. You'd have to measure from center of extrusion to center of extrusion with hand-written g-code (so offsets don't mess it up) and without other interfering plastic deposits. And even then backlash may cause problems. I think it's generally agreed that calculatingby jgilmore - General Mendel Topics
Is it the *size* that's the problem, or the *complexity*? I doubt that shear size is really the problem. There may be a limit on the total number of layers, but layer thickness on a large machine may be 2mm (or more) and so. There may be a limit on the total number of g-code moves that can be generated. That's a complexity issue that can also be fixed by reducing the total number of layers. Havby jgilmore - General
Along the lines of openscad, there's POVRAY. POVRAY has been around for ages (since the early eighties at least) and is a quite well-developed language. Of course, it's got lots of cruft, and isn't supported outside of it's tiny little ray-tracing world. It is used as a ray-tracing engine by blender and others, (so obviously blender generates POVRAY language) and there are other front ends designby jgilmore - General
Why do they not work? Wrong voltages would be the only insurmountable obstacle I can imagine, and even that could probably be worked around with a couple resistors. If the output is inverted (i.e. 5V when it should be 0V and 0V when it should be 5V) that's (as NewPerfection mentioned) easily fixed by a #define in the firmware configuration file.by jgilmore - RAMPS Electronics
Yes, and so did 3D printers, a few short years ago. Some 3D printers still do. Of course, they get lots better results than our sub-$1K machines. Looking at his speed of extrusion, and the inaccuracies caused by inconsistent extrusion pressure, I'd bet you could get better results with a sub-$5K machine. Probably a lot less than that, really. Probably enough less that you could build such a machiby jgilmore - General
I don't think the type of file format you're talking about could be saved into from a high-level CAD package without additional information. In order to have a small (say, less than a couple hundred) number of variables, you'd have to have the designer choose which the end-user can modify. With even fifty or so variables, the formulas for the locations of the individual points (which in turn defiby jgilmore - General
Saw a video of one guy printing chairs. He was using a granule extruder (which had pulsing problems, causing a rough surface finish) mounted on a huge robot arm. About a 2cm wide extrusion. Yes, that's 2cm. I'd estimate that his extrusion head weighed about one or two hundred pounds. Not something any reprap I've seen is prepared to do yet. But something we could do. You'd really have to redesigby jgilmore - General
No motor that has five wires will work with the mendel electronics. Well, not without taking it apart and re-wiring it's insides See this wiki page. It should not only make clear what kind of motor you have (even if I've counted the wires wrong) but give you all the info you need to figure out how to hook it up. Look at this wiki page for more information about required spec for mendel's steppeby jgilmore - Mechanics
OH! Right. You're correct, I recalled the number for 16 bit ints and applied it to 32 bit ints. Everything I've said in this thread is wrong, and no firmware will have a problem with steps sizes even with 1/16 stepping on 1/4-20 threaded rod and sizes MUCH bigger than a meter. my bad.by jgilmore - General
Do the math before giving it up. The key is "how many steps per mm?" Standard mendel, toothed belt 5 mm per tooth, 10 toothed pulley. full step is 4 steps/mm = 8191mm max 1/16 step is 64 steps/mm = 511mm max somewhere between those settings is the optimal for your machine. It looks like you could do a 1 meter machine with 1/8 microstepping without running into the 32767 limit. 1/16 microsteppinby jgilmore - General
Threaded rod may be a bad idea. If the size of the bed, in steps, is over a certain amount (varies by firmware) it will overflow, causing problems. Threaded rod often means many, many more steps per mm, thus a smaller maximum supported-by-the-firmware build size. The fived_on_arduino firmware uses a signed 32-bit int for position (in steps) so the max bed size is 32766 steps. The reprap.org 5Dby jgilmore - General
stabbs Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Thanks for the fast reply! I am a real amateur > when it comes to the electronics so forgive my > slowness. So I would need to buy another > controller board to run the heating elements and > the end stops, but the Xylotex board would run the > steppers and provide the power? Uh, let me look over the specby jgilmore - General
*if* that spec sheet is correct, Safety off black and white. They are the common wires and you don't need them, but don't let them touch anything (including eachother) either. coil A is Brown/Orange Coil B is Red/Yellow So on the connector to the stepper driver, it goes brown, orange, red, yellow. If the motor goes backwards, turn it off, unplug it, and plug it in backwards. (See the wiki pagby jgilmore - Reprappers