Quoteredhatman Quoteasbo It looks like some sort of counterweight to me, perhaps to offset the weight of the bed? Ding ding ding! I have modified it already since posting that picture, however the idea remains the same. Hopefully this will eliminate the z-wobble condition. I am curious where you plan to install that, will you change to using belts instead of screws? Or will you remove one ofby LarsK - CoreXY Machines
It is unclear to me if you know for sure that the parts were touching? How did it go with taking the motor apart? Did it go smooth? Have you tried to reassemble it after taking it apart and testing again? As VDX says it might just have been some foreign particle and now it could even be fine. Can you post photos of the stator and rotor?by LarsK - General
Almost end of the line. As Tadawson is saying, it looks like your card have some problem. I would like to return to investigating when your stepper have holding torque. Do the exact following things and report about the holding torque - Please note in the first two you should not be asking it to move, we only want to see if the circuitry makes holding torque. 1) En= Gnd , DIR = 5V :by LarsK - General
Quotejoshuafkon Hey LarsK, I just doubled checked everything, and I do NOT have any holding torque when its not moving clockwise. I tested all the pins from the RAMPs and GND is 0V, VCC is 5V, DIR switches between 0 and 5V, Step showed as roughly constant 4V on my mulitmeter, and En was 5V. Ok, I think this means that EN is floating because it pulls low when going in one direction. Try to cby LarsK - General
Tadawson is correct that if you have swapped the DIR pin and En (Enable) then this would be the exact behavior. Test this by seing if the stepper is enabled when sending the not working signal the following: When you are sending the signal that does not work, do the stepper still have holding torque - That is, is it significant harder to turn then it is when the system is not powered? Ifby LarsK - General
Hello, First - You are not clear if your stepper is ALWAYS moving to the left regardless of what signal you send, or if it just "ignores" the moves to the right and only executes the left ones. Try to swap the connecting wires to the stepper. So that, from left to right: Red - Blue -----------------GAP--------------------------- Green - Black Doing this should reverse the direction of yourby LarsK - General
Quotesdyuvi54 Assembling is delayed due to some reasons but some amount of rust has started developing on rods. How to avoid this ?? Shall i apply any available rust prevention liquid or is there any specific grade of this ? Please help Surface rust can be easily cleaned. Often it will be enough spraying with some WD40 and passing a cloth with a firm hand. The WD40 that will be left on the rod sby LarsK - Reprappers
Hello gmh, I have had a similar problem with a PSU (assuming you are using a PC PSU). I turns out a PC PSU, especially the cheaper ones, are designed to mainly regulate on the 5V line. Not the 12V. So if you are only loading the 12V and have nothing on the 5V the voltage can go too low and it cuts on undervoltage. So - Are you using a PC PSU?by LarsK - RAMPS Electronics
Quotemisan The advantage of using a closed-loop system is to compensate for potential errors, that means no more missed steps. Cost reduction is not a goal, but we are trying to get this working within a similar cost range as steppers. This solution space has been explored, tested and discarded in the past for RepRap mostly because of its high cost. That is why I am so conscious about its potenby LarsK - Stepper Motors, Servo Motors, DC Motors
Hello Misan, What is the advantage of using a brushless DC motor instead of a stepper? Is it a cost reduction aim that you are looking for? Or is it size? I have some time ago ordered a number of various hall chips to try and do what you do, so I am really interested in your work. My aim is size reduction and absolute position. I would like to make a printer (coreXY type) but with only the hby LarsK - Stepper Motors, Servo Motors, DC Motors
Hello Andrew, Read the original thread (it got side tracked a little down). This is very much a continuation of that. The answer to my question have a great deal of influence on how many microsteps it is attractive to use. Simply, as I see it, if it is option nr 2 then you should not chose a microstep number which will give less torque then what you need to actually move the printer. At 128 mby LarsK - Stepper Motors, Servo Motors, DC Motors
I read the page but I am not entirely sure that I understand. Is the reduced torque only a problem for holding the given position (microstep) and for reverse moves? I mean if the sum of the micro steps is still the same (and better) as a normal step? For example; With 16 microsteps, then each of my microsteps will have 9.8% of the normal full step incremental torque. Let's say I apply a higby LarsK - Stepper Motors, Servo Motors, DC Motors
Also for all the general small parts like belt, pulley, smooth rods check out Sergio on ML: - I purchased a lot of parts from him and it went really well with all parts OK!by LarsK - Reprappers
Hello DonleySimon, Did you have a look at some of the national suppliers? Extruded alu from Forseti: - 5 USD per m for 20x20 - Can't be done cheaper Electronics from Proesi: - They have endstops and all the connectors you will need. I also made my own board that mimic the RAMPS controller layout and functionality - That is not something I recommend. It was really time consuming. PSU yoby LarsK - Reprappers
Hello Redhatman, MichelleF over at the laser forum part posted about her Kickstarter campaign; They do what you say, use plastic printed parts for the frame (but only XY, no Z because it is a laser). Also you may want to have a look at SlotBot ( ) and Uconduit ( ). Both these printers are using other frames then extruded alu. Finally, when talking about extruded profiles I really think tby LarsK - CoreXY Machines
Yeah, you could spend hours testing but I would say your time is better spent just waiting for the other board and test that. If that works you can go back to the other and test one more time. But the chance that you can fix burnt out drivers or broken copper traces are both pretty slim. Remember that stepper motors are not like dc motors. Because they apply torque all the time they also run poby LarsK - Controllers
I am just thinking that it is strange all of them died. That indicated a problem downstream from the stepper chips. Now that we know the Atmel chip is still OK then somewhere between the two. It is difficult to troubleshoot that.by LarsK - Controllers
Are you sure they are getting the "En" (enable) signal? If the controller is not starting then the drivers wont do anything. Can you connect to the board? Can you turn on anything else? Fans running, heaters etc? Can you see the board in windows device manager?by LarsK - Controllers
I was referring to aluminium foils in the above. With reference to: Why is alu foils so much better then plain alu sheet? No idea, so much to learn.by LarsK - Controllers
QuoteDavid J What is your bed made of? You only get 10mm range when the metal it's sensing is iron or steel - if it's aluminium you can only expect around 4mm, maybe less. The heated bed is the MK2a. You are right It has an reduction factor of 0.3 to 0.4 for copper ( see: and ) I did test sensing the heated bed with some 2 mm range sensors that I have and these did not seem to have aby LarsK - Controllers
hello, I just ordered some proximity sensors (hall type) for my Z probe. I ordered with 10 mm sensing range so that they can reach through the glass and sense the heated bed. The 10 mm is given with a tolerance of +- 15%. I assume that this 15% is the absolute value and not the precision. Does anybody know what kind of precision I can expect? Remembering this funky chart: I don't care so mby LarsK - Controllers
I had a similar issue when the heatsink for the heated-bed was touching the heatsink for the extruder. See if the two mosfets backsides are maybe touching each other? It would Murphy law type of thing because you tried two RAMPS but worth checking anyways... (there is no need for heatsink on extruder so I removed that and problem solved)by LarsK - RAMPS Electronics
Hello Dave, First off, I agree with the others. The concept with two motors will complicated and the gains rather limited. If you want to move the gantry then sticking to the leadscrews moved by one motor is better. But for the gantry movement motors; You should remember that the motors are not really that heavy and the Z axis do not move that often. Mass reduction versus loss of stability is noby LarsK - CoreXY Machines
Hello, Why that soldering on the underside of the barrel on the Arduino? If you want to power the Arduino from the 12V you might as well use the build in feature in RAMPS. See: And look at section: QuoteD1, D2 - Diodes These must be placed in the proper orientation. The band on the diode must be turned the same way as the mark on the board. Definitely solder D2 in. D2, F1, and F2 are shby LarsK - Delta Machines
QuoteMichelleF Hi Larsk, Thank you for your feedback but I'd like you to take another look at our project. There is in fact a warning label on our page, as well as in our documentation. All kits also come with a pair of safety glasses as shown in our images and on our parts list. Again thank you for your time but know we've been developing this for quite a while and all of your concerns haveby LarsK - Laser Cutter Working Group
Unfair criticism. I need to learn to read better.by LarsK - Laser Cutter Working Group
The usefulness of this installment is maybe a little limited but one cool thing would be to make it 1 meter tall and put like 4 or 5 levels. Each level with its own X-Y gantry and bed. Then when the motors moves for one item you are actually producing 5 at the same time.by LarsK - CoreXY Machines
First off, I don't understand the red and blue lines in the lower left corner. It looks like you want the X-Y belts to also run in the Z axis - But at the same time it is my understanding that you want two Z axis rods to double as linear guides and transfer rotation to the X-Y gantry? Assuming you want to make a normal system but with the steppers transferring through these linear rods - I doby LarsK - CoreXY Machines
Hello Viktor, I have now looked more at combining lasers with prisms and what. I looked at: Which gives a fairly good explanation in my opinion. - One PBS cube is starting at 40 USD ( ) and that would allow combining just two lasers. I guess for just 6 lasers I could do knife edging (~5 usd per mirror but only one focal needed so almost same balance). The advantage of knife edging is thaby LarsK - Laser Cutter Working Group
Hello, Try to start by cleaning out the hotend completely - Then start at a very low temperature - Well below what worked for you last time. Then increase the temperature steadily until you are able to extrude. What most likely happen when you had a very high temperature was that it was OK in the beginning, but the heat goes up into your hotend and the melting area gets bigger. Eventually theby LarsK - Delta Machines