I see the same thing, regardless of what type of machine I'm on ( MAC or XP ), or what browser ( Firefox, IE, Opera, Safari, etc. ). It seems to be a recurring issue for most, as it's been mentioned before. Perhaps a Phorum bug that could be fixed through an update? (5.2.14 is now available)by jhoff - Administration, Announcements, Policy
So I was at my Mother-in-laws this weekend and noticed something that she was using for some baking. It was very similar to this, except it was larger and smooth: What about using something like this as a bed material? Has anyone tried something like this? It's heat resistant up to 360C... I wonder if the extruded plastic would stick to it...by jhoff - General
I seem to recall ( a long time ago ) that using a marker ( like a sharpie ) resulted in pretty poor traces. Granted, I was still in High school the last time I actually last etched my own board, so I probably was doing something wrong, but I seem to remember having to basically coat the thing in solder afterwords because there were so many breaks in the traces. Is there something else that couldby jhoff - General
Heh. Thats quite a response in just under an hour from my original post. I'm impressed. I'm just hoping to just stir up some conversation around this. I've been following these forums like a crack fiend over the past few months, and I haven't seen a whole lot of discussion over this topic in particular. QuoteCorrect. There's no preliminary advantage. Adrian et. al. have focused on trying to innby jhoff - General
I've been thinking a bit about the recent movement to make repraps print PCBs on their own. Why exactly are they going for a plastic / solder method? It seems like that is not a solution that would scale down very well. Is there a particular advantage of using extruded plastic and solder over say, drawing or printing the circuit in ink, on a bare copper PCB and then using chemical to etch itby jhoff - General
From what I understand, when scaled, you start to see alot more warping in the object. When the plastic cools, it tends to shrink and over long stretches, this causes it to pickup the object at the edges. There are currently steps being taken to attempt to resolve this ( better rafts, heated beds, etc ), however I think that's one of the reasons why the size is kept to a minimum. In regards to thby jhoff - General
I've seen this before, but I never realized they could get such high quality scans with it. I wonder how hard it would be to make a laser scanning head for a rep(st)rap? You could take any object, scan it, model it and reprint it. By using a reprap to control the head, you could get pretty accurate scans too. JHoffby jhoff - 3D Scanners, Book Scanners, and Optics
Want a free stepper or two? How about a free arduino with shield? On Jan 7th, place an order on SparkFun.com and get up to $100 for free ( you still have to pay for shipping ). Once they hit $100,000, the offer ends though. Just thought I'd pass the word to my fellow makers... So much cool stuff, it's almost too hard to choose! JHoffby jhoff - General
I believe quantities can be found in the "Mendel-m4-assembly-data-sheet.ods" file found here: ( You need Open Office to view: ) --JHoffby jhoff - Reprappers
Does a stepper motor have any greater torque potential when microstepping versus full stepping? Also, should there be any change in potential "top speed" by changing to a half, quarter or eighth step? The tests that I've done so far seem to suggest no for both of these questions, so I'm wondering if the only difference in microstepping is just greater resolution and higher power consumption. Tby jhoff - Mechanics
For my repstrap, I've decided to go with a microswitch like this: When mounted in a way that allows travel past the "zero" or "max" locations, I can zero at the moment of switch, but also allow a little extra travel to slow down.by jhoff - General
Thanks for the great reference. That site has several CNC machines that use that same method for track. Should definitely help when it comes to getting everything setup. I found my inspiration here: --Jby jhoff - General
Hey, If anyone is interested, I've started documenting my recent attempt at a RepStrap project. Thanks, JHoffby jhoff - General