UPDATE On 2/16/2012, I received a letter from US Bank that my VISA claim had been found in my favor, thus my charge for the Botmill Glider was reversed. In summary: It took me roughly 3 MONTHS to get my money back from these scam artists, and that is after hundreds of emails on my part. THEY NEVER REFUNDED MY MONEY. Rather, my own action taken with the bank resulted in a successful chargeback oby asifjahmed - General
Leaning against it?? Do some more research, you should be "running away from it, FAST"!! lol It would likely turn out to be one of the worst decisions you've ever made. I have a Rapman 3.2 and really enjoy it. While I have some experience with RepRaps too, and love the open-source aspect of it all, the Rapman is more advanced in its design - especially the electronics. Either one will requireby asifjahmed - General
Just wanted to thank the community members here for your support. You are much appreciated. For the record, Gil told me yesterday that my RMA was approved. I will let the community know when I receive my refund. Assuming it happens in the next couple of days, this entire ordeal tied up $1400 of my money for about 2 months.by asifjahmed - General
You have been claiming this for a long time. I myself, fell for this HOAX. THIS IS A COMPLETE JOKE. PEOPLE ALREADY KNOW BETTER. NOTE: If you came across this thread Googling for info about Botmill, just note that this is a lousy attempt to seed positive phrases into the search results. Please read real people's nightmares here: Anyone Have BotMill Feedback? BOTMILL is a NIGHTMARE Note to sby asifjahmed - General
Just wanted to bump this thread and say that I STILL HAVE NOT GOTTEN A REFUND!!! According to Gil, they have my machine in their hands, and are just waiting for an RMA to be processed. Well, this is well over a week ago. I will keep you apprised.by asifjahmed - General
BUMP - Added an update to the original post.by asifjahmed - General
Hi richrap - Thanks for your reply. The main reason I bought a Botmill is because I needed a printer quickly, and every other provider has a several week lead time. Botmill has "next day shipping" plastered everywhere. Thanks for your support.by asifjahmed - General
Dear Reprap community - I need your help. I am getting screwed so bad by Botmill that I need community support. In a nutshell: -Placed order for glider on Nov. 21. Note they advertise "Next Day Shipping" everywhere. -Despite numerous attempts to ask them and request expedited shipping since they were delayed, I didn't receive my printer until Nov. 30. -Printer arrived in poor condition, looseby asifjahmed - General
Hello - I'm hoping some people here are knowledgeable about rapman Just got my Rapman 3.2 assembled, tested all axes, leveled the bed, set the Z offset, and started printing rafts. While the rafts do print, I have pretty frequent clicking noises coming from the extruder drive/pressure bearings. Every time this click occurs, the print gets affected (inconsistent feed rate). I have tried all kby asifjahmed - General
Nothing at all on this?by asifjahmed - Mechanics
I want to have a discussion on various different layouts of cartesian gantry setups found in the various DIY 3d printers that are out there, and understand why each design decision was made. Traditional Mendel/Prusa: The y-axis is the moving build platform, the x-axis moves the entire extruder assembly, and the z axis moves the entire x-axis/extruder assembly Rapman (and some others): The x-axiby asifjahmed - Mechanics
Great ideas so far, guys! Forgot to add: -Soluable support material! 1-click generation in the printing tool and then the ability to simply soak my parts in water afterwards to rinse off the support material (PVA).by asifjahmed - General
Just wanted to start a utopian discussion of what the ideal reprap would have (aside from cost, that one is already a given ) My initial list: -Very fast prints -Very high quality, warp-free prints -Larger print area -Wireless printing capability (ideally wi-fi) -Queuing system (print multiple parts one after another, with a way to clear the print bed and begin the next print automatically) -Abby asifjahmed - General
I do not want to sacrifice quality, either. I do, however, want to try to push the envelope of speed. Especially with larger prints. I agree that PID tuning can be a mess when everyone has different configurations. However, if we can normalize the PID inputs by scaling factors such as extruder gear sizes, feed rates, etc. then maybe default PID gains could work for most people. That is a good pby asifjahmed - General
Can you PM me about the complete printer?by asifjahmed - General
Thanks, Andrew. That patent is difficult to follow. I have a hard time understanding how I would be violating a patent by enclosing my printer and heating it with some method. Not doubting you by any means, more just wondering if there is a legitimate way around that. I want to bring support material and larger, faster prints to the community. I know I am new here, but I am quite skilled when itby asifjahmed - General
Thanks a lot, nophead! Your work is great! What do you think about bowden extruders? I see the clear advantage of making the moving head smaller/lighter/faster, but keep hearing about problems with hysteresis. I was thinking having an idler wheel pressed on the moving filament right before entering the extruder nozzle, with an encoder mounted there. Then we can use a PID loop to compensate for tby asifjahmed - General
Even a small motor? i.e., I can of course suppress the RF noise with some caps. Just thinking that it would make the extruder MUCH lighter (and probably smaller as well), giving a mix of benefits between a wades and a bowden extruder.by asifjahmed - General
Thanks, Martin! I appreciate you taking the time to post all of that. I have gotten some good insight from everyone who responded - I appreciate it. Now I just have to decide whether or not to tackle such a project. I am thinking to use the ultimaker style gantry system and aluminum extrusions for the frame. Still pondering whether to go bowden extruder or not. Also - I really want soluable sby asifjahmed - General
That is very interesting about Stratasys holding such patents. Any link to the actual patent?by asifjahmed - General
Thanks for the replies. Didn't realize the steppers would care much about the higher temps. I was planning to figure out some sort of cooling solution for the filament. Andrew - can you elaborate on your last line? Getting a reasonable feed rate is a challenge - why? Also, what patents would I be violating? So I can't build my own machine that does these things?by asifjahmed - General
Well.. I seriously doubt I can afford to buy one of those.. Would rather figure out a solid DIY solution and share it with the community.. Thanks though.by asifjahmed - General
Has anyone tried using a torquey DC gearmotor with encoder feedback for the extruder rather than a stepper? The biggest advantage I see is that the gearmotor can be 50%+ lighter than a stepper, thus allowing for faster print speeds. Also, in the case of a bowden extruder, the encoder could be placed on some idler wheel at the print head itself to compensate for the hysteresis. Thoughts?by asifjahmed - General
Is there a noticable difference in accuracy/performance when using 0.9 deg/step motors vs 1.8 deg/step? Also, how much backlash exists in these belt-driven gantry setups? Would making a larger belt-driven gantry (say, a 48 inch belt per axis) introduce any more backlash? Thanks!by asifjahmed - Mechanics
How come I don't see any large-scale 3d printers? I have a couple of parts I'd like to make that are approx. 20"x6"x2" - and it doesn't seem like any existing design can handle such a part. I also want it to be made of ABS, so I know warping might be an issue with such a long part. Any theories, suggestions, criticisms? Thanks.by asifjahmed - General
Well the problem is I need a fully assembled machine so I can start printing ASAPby asifjahmed - General
Hello - I have a need to print some parts very quickly. I am building my own reprap right now, but won't have it ready fast enough. Is there anywhere I can buy a fully-assembled reprap and have it shipped overnight to me? Thanks, Asifby asifjahmed - General