I have just had two prints stop at the same layer, along with another that failed in a similar manner. In each case the print had simply stopped, but commnuncation seemed to be intact as I was able to disconnect and then reconnect - althogh without being able to resume the print. It was possible to home the printer, so motor control was O.K. Further details: Rostock printer with Arduino Mega 265by leadinglights - Repetier
Suppliers of filament used to tell you who or where their filament was made. I remeber that some suppliers on eBay even used to have a reference number for their ABS. This no longer seems to be the case and the sellers advertise that their filamen is from a new supplier - as if a new unknown will instill a sense of confidence. Picture below shows two examples of bulges in filament, the top stoppeby leadinglights - General
As tmorris9 says, it will be outdated before it is printed, but that doesn't mean that a printed manual isn't a good idea. Until user manuals and other referrence books can be presented directly to the retina, ear or even straight into the brain, and the reader is equipped with a full set of memes to enable them to use the information, paper books will be a good idea. A Wiki is a great idea, butby leadinglights - General
If it is wiped with acetone, and occasionally with ABS juice, there seems to be no difference between cheap Kapton and 3M Kapton (by whatever name). If it is fresh and washed only with the soapy water used to put the film on the glass, the cheap Kapton seems to need 5 to 10 degrees more temperature. The same can't be said for blue builders tape where 3M builders tape is vastly superior to the idby leadinglights - General
@thejollygrimreaper This launches many questions, some perhaps more suitable to other threads. Trying to address what we can one at a time, and stressing that this is purely my opinion. Earlier you said Quote......, aside from the temperature limit,what is wrong with having more than one hotend? There is presently no design of hotend that can be interchanged simply and without any adjustment. Iby leadinglights - General
Quotethejollygrimreaper why exactly the push to get away from ptfe?, aside from the temperature limit,what is wrong with having more than one hotend? we don't have 1 screw driver for 101 different types of screws do we? Because something else may be better. We don't know until we try. Mikeby leadinglights - General
Earlier in this thread I said that I was trying Tecapeek/PVX/Graphite loaded PEEK instead of PTFE. Although earlier trials were promising, I must tell you that it is yet another negative result. After about an hour of the first print the nozzle blocked - the ABS was firmly welded to the Tecapeek liner. A shame since in non printing conditions it had seemed free of any sticking and melted ABS or Pby leadinglights - General
3.6 Ohms was also what I calculated - for the 24V I allowed within 10% as being "on the nail". What do the 12V heaters typically measure up to. Where can I get some that are somewhere in the right ball park? Mikeby leadinglights - General
Thank you all for the suggestions. I think I will build something loosely based on the Cupcake, although I love Delta printers, I think Cartesian in this case, possibly with the table X and Y driven by a cable Corex mechanism. I will also try to build it as a printer and not just a test rig as anything that needs a bucketload of hotends would benefit from a moving table geometry. Mikeby leadinglights - Mechanics
A few months ago I purchased two 12v 40 W heater cartridges only to find when I measured up the resistance yesterday that one was 12 Ohms and the other 9 Ohms - both pretty much unusable. I also purchased two 24V 40 W cartridges from another supplier and they both measure up at 13.5 Ohms - pretty much on the nail of what I would expect. What is the normal resistance of the 12V 40W heater? Any recby leadinglights - General
Are there any designs which use an all moving table? I know that this seems a bit back to front as almost every endevour is to make the build stage stationary and move the nozzle, but if your hot end is going to be really really heavy then it would seem logical to move the build stage in X and Y (and possibly Z) The reason that I wish to do this is to connect a big Mecmesin force gauge and a litby leadinglights - Mechanics
A little while ago I started building an EDM machine based on discussions that I had a Model Engineering show in Warwickshire. Although the EDM machine is in abeyance until I have become tired of 3D printing, I did take lots of notes and waded through many web pages trying to get to the best simple control that I could. The logic for most of them seemed to be: 1) Advance until current flows 2) Bby leadinglights - General
Have you tried a different Arduino? Although rare, it is possible to get problems in the MCU such that a bit in one register is communicating with another bit. In this case it may be something like the counter for layer toggling the step output. That is, not a software or firmware problem but a hardware problem. Mikeby leadinglights - General
42 angels of course. But what do you mean by "side"? Upstream? Downstream? with reference to which direction? Do you mean left bank or right bank? again, with reference to which direction? But then, "side" is moot as it is only an artifact of the sectional view. Mikeby leadinglights - General
@A2 Far be it from me to keep back mankind. I sympathise with the PhD professor as I am perplexed by Information theorists and thermodynamasists both using the word Entropy for different things; annoyed by surveillance operatives stealing and miss-using the word Metadata and maddened by the perversion of the old computer-geek word Hacker by journalists. So I humbly suggest the following terminoby leadinglights - General
Somewhere in the depths of time I had come across the word Die for something like the hot end. Most of the other words you used also echo from the depths of time whe I used to read tomes like "Machinery's Handbook" or "Metals Handbook Volume 5 Part B Melting and Casting". I further agree that we should be able to talk in the same language with people from similar fields. Perhaps there ought (maybby leadinglights - General
Hmm, so we are still in the area of terminology: While I may define the extruder as "The bit with the gears or whatnot that pushes the filament along", another may use the term for that and the hot end, or just the hot end - from which that which is extruded comes. So still, what to call the feature that I previously knew as Land? Face may work, but I particularly like the word Podex.by leadinglights - General
O.K., the word land is not appropriate to the feature marked "Land" in the drawing repeated below. So what should it be called? Mikeby leadinglights - General
For a seal between the glass tube and the heater block a ring of very soft pure aluminium would work very well if you can keep under pressure. I came across this on old Kratos mass spectrometers where they used very pure very soft gold sealing rings - possibly a bit of overkill here though Mikeby leadinglights - General
Really good looking hotend. The PLA/ABS adhesion problem may or may not exist as the area of contact where the plastic is both hot enough to adhere and cool enough to be fairly rigid is likely to be quite small. Have you thought about seepage of plastic through the joint between the hot end and the borosilicate tube? Mikeby leadinglights - General
The method that I mentioned above works - and doesn't take too long. I will try out the one that I made, but need to find a way of comparing the back pressure from different geometries -any thoughts on quick and easy strain gauges? Mikeby leadinglights - General
@gsport Two thoughts from things that I have seen done in the past: To put a small calibrated orifice in the end of the glass tube, put a bit of copper wire of a known size in the tube, heat and shrink with an oxy acetylene torch, break/cut to length and use acid to disolve the copper. The trick is to flux the wire with a coating of borax to form a crude version of a "Houskeeper seal" To make aby leadinglights - General
@Beekeper The cost of stainless steel is not a significant factor as the amount used in a hot end is very small, mine use a bar 6mm diameter by 50mm long. The thermal conductivity of stainless steel at 16 W/(m.K) is one third of steel at 43 W/(m.K) This allows a short region between the incoming filament softening against the wall and the actual melted plastic. While other steels could be used toby leadinglights - General
@A2 A project that I put on hold when I started building 3D printers is an EDM machine. For the moment though, I will keep to my old lathe. I think I have come up with a way to do the holes: 1) Drill the inner holes, allowing the deep holes to go where they will. Include the inner profile but not the orifice. 2) Make up a plug in the lathe which accurately fits the inside of the workpiecby leadinglights - General
@A2 Looking again at the text of the patent, I think I have to agree with Robin2 that "Land" is the flat area at the exit of the orifice. I have put together a drawing to show my present thoughts on terminology. My present view of my own results to date and my best judgement of what I am being told is The Orifice Entry diameter should be at least 3 times the Orifice diameter. The angle of thby leadinglights - General
@Robin2 I decided to give your suggestion of the 2nd drill bit shaped for the lead up to the small hole. I was able to modify a drill - including cutting the web between the flutes to almost nothing. It doesn't drill very well, but it only has to finish off the hole and looks O.K. when used on a bit of mild steel. @A2 My best guess is the word "land" applies to how long the orifice hole is. Theby leadinglights - General
Nope, toolbar has gone again And back again 4 minutes later A+++ Mikeby leadinglights - Administration, Announcements, Policy
Thanks DeuxVisby leadinglights - Administration, Announcements, Policy
Not just the toolbar, all embeded links, pictures etc. have disapeared Mikeby leadinglights - Administration, Announcements, Policy
Is there any data available on the optimum internal geometry for a nozzle? I am particularly interested in getting a small nozzle size at the moment, although any other effects of geometry would also be interesting. Further info. I have found that my own nozzles are erratic, sometimes giving really good results, sometimes unacceptably bad, so I am trying to tease out the problems with my basic dby leadinglights - General