it's all in the name: coreXY. Z axis operation is not part of the design. Any z axis design will work and it doesn't effect the kinematics of the XY operation. when the gcode tells the printer to move the z axis 0.1 mm, it turns the z motor x amount of steps to achieve a 0.1 mm movement. That "steps per mm" dimension is determined by you, the operator, through calibration. You do this my tellinby Buback - Mechanics
it's very neat but i wonder about the activation method: heat. it's not the easiest to work with. i'd assume you have to keep the muscles at a regulated temperature in order to get the contraction you expect, which i imagine would be some type of water cooling (like sous vide). activation would also be tricky. first thing that comes to my mind is a resistive wire element, but i wouldn't expectby Buback - General
it's certainly not difficult; you will just be changing some numbers, not writing code. what you're changing really depends on what firmware you are using. if you don't know, find out and start googling for help. I use marlin, and the configuration.h file (what you're going to be editing) is very well commented, so just open that and see if you can figure it out yourself. What to change your numby Buback - Reprappers
You can probably use a lot of the current parts if you upgrade to something like a Prism. I'm biased, but it's as sturdy as anything else on the market and provides an easy upgrade path. you will have to print all the parts as i doubt anyone sells them. regardless, Most of what you have is still good. your wades is still good. i use mine from 3 years ago with no problems. same with the j-head.by Buback - Reprappers
of course, if you change to acme leadscrews, you are likely going to need to change your steps per mm in firmware. You are also going to want to familiarize yourself with the parameters for z direction and endstop location in case you need to change those as well.by Buback - Reprappers
the filament also has a lot more surface area to absorb water out of the air, or possibly even other stuff from the air that could degrade the quality of the plastic. But consider this; why didn't dot-matrix printers follow moores law, with a print head with finer and finer pins? it's because laser and inkjet printers were vastly superior. it's the same for SLS; as soon as those patents expire,by Buback - General
sorry to be a downer, but I'd be impressed if you could build one of these machines for the price of one NASA spacesuit. (sometimes I feel the community can sound discouraging to new ideas, but I think of it more like a gauntlet that you have to run your idea through. if it makes it through in one piece, it has passed a great test) the first two things that come to mind are: -how would you prinby Buback - General
here's a study you can read: I think if you have concerns, move it out of the house and into the garage/workshop. a case would likely only treat hypochondria.by Buback - General
That's not really the scope of this thread. The idea here is a large motor off the x carriage and a small motor on the x carriage. many designs can't fit one nema 17 on the carriage, let alone two(whether it be size and/or weight constraints). Those printers use a bowden-style extruder, which can have oozing issues and can't print certain materials, such as filaflex.by Buback - Mechanics
I'm doing no such thing. It's only an idea, after all. And it is increasing complexity, from my way of printing at least. I've been printing on blue tape on an unheated bed, on a Sells Mendel derivative with only a single z motor. Most everything since 2011 is added complexity to me. The question is whether it may produce better results for boden extruders, and whether the complexity is worthwby Buback - Mechanics
Has anyone tried using a second small stepper, like a NEMA 8 or 11, just above the hot end to help with hysterisis and retraction? the idea has been in my head for years., but i've never had a reason to go bowden so never investigated it. the introduction of elastic filament makes me think that others might be interested. I'm assuming you'd need another stepper driver since the specs of the twoby Buback - Mechanics
From my quick perusal, it is using standard FDM with a special filament. this feels like a marketing ploy so that they can say "CARBON FIBER". sure, it will be stronger than typical pla or abs or whatever, but it's still got the same issues with inter-layer strength, i assume. I feel like this is similar to mixing powdered steel into abs, and then saying you can print steel. Who will be the fiby Buback - General
Here are a couple of considerations to keep in mind. - playing with the forces in my head, having the z smooth rods farther apart means that more force, imparted by x movement, is required to deflect the z axis. this also depends on the distance between x smooth rods, and i imagine that for a given length x and given length y there is an optimal ratio of distance between parallel rods to limit tby Buback - Mechanics
You certainly live up to your user name...by Buback - Developers
Compare the defect with the pitch of the threaded rod. If it's the same, it's mechanics of the leadscrew, somewhere. I had the same issue and I'm not entirely sure that this was the answer, but it's gone now that i've moved to acme leadscrew and completely replaced the drive mechanics of the Z.by Buback - General
My Prism uses belt-driven leadscrews and i'm perfectly happy with it. I never really saw the appeal of a dual motor z axis.by Buback - Mechanics
I've just uploaded a vertical X axis design for Prism. It's working superbly! I need to update the photos, files and instructions on the wiki page, but wanted to announce it here first. An integrated carriage/Geared extruder will follow but the current carriage works great if you like your existing extruder. You will probably loose 50mm of Y travel, though, and the belt path is a bit trickyby Buback - General Mendel Topics
I created the original Prism, and it's great to see that it's still active. I just created a new vertical X axis for the Prism based on the Vertical X Axis standard, so it should work with mendel as well. I just had to work on the printer to add the new X axis and it was so easy to work on compared to the Sells mendel I had years ago. That's one of the main things I focused on when designingby Buback - General
Nice work on the PrismX! Life takes over, so I haven't been able to revisit the original Prism design in a long time, But I'm glad to see someone taking it and evolving it! Good Luck!by Buback - Extruded Aluminum Frames
NASA has done something like this, but with electron beam welding. From what i understand feature size can't be made very small because of the size of the melt pool, the thermal conductivity of the metal, and the surface tension of the molten metal. But you can create blanks that you can then CNC. printed parts have to be heat treated to remove stresses, but when finished are close in strength toby Buback - General
Not a whole lot of responses, but i appreciate the input from those that offered it. I'm sure that as the years go on this will be a bigger deal. I've also intentinally stayed out of the mix, but maybe i should have bumped it every once and a while (but have been way too busy the past 3 months). The biggest change that has some concensus is mendelmax, which i agree with. Does anything else reallby Buback - Developers
I'm starting a new topic for 2013 since it's about that time.by Buback - Developers
It's time again to start reviewing components for a new LSB version of reprap. Goals of the LSB: -Promote the "best" recent developments from around the Reprap community. -Pull new component build instructions into the Reprap.org wiki from sources scattered around the web. -Define a stable build milestone to base Reprap.org build instruction around. A LSB helps the community solve newbie problby Buback - Developers
Kt Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > There is no reason a thingiverse alternative would > need to host any user created files, it could have > all the social and media aspects of thingiverse, > but only host a torrent to download the user > created files. > > Using torrents, needing to generate an absurd TOS > would be less of a concern becaby Buback - General
I've had a similar problem before, and I think it's got to do with the printed pulley and belt not meshing correctly. Perhaps the pulley is slightly off center. I think the 'thunk' is from when the tensioned belt finally slips into place and it's somewhat like strumming a guitar.by Buback - General Mendel Topics
Your fillament looks too blob-y and fluid. maybe something is too hot, like your hot end or bed. or maybe you have your firmware set to extrude too much per step.by Buback - General Mendel Topics
Great work! and feel free to add a link to the prism wiki page!by Buback - General Mendel Topics
Endstops aren't required. you can run your printer just fine without them. You'll have to manually home and remove any homing gcode commands, and be extra vigilant for crashes until you know how your machine behaves. I've been running without any endstops for about 10 months with no problem. I upgraded a couple things and just haven't gotten around to setting up the endstops.by Buback - General
In my experience, that's definatly XY backlash or skipped steps it seems like it's moving the most on the upper layers. This could mean that it is stronger the higher it gets from the bed, or that the jerkiness of the smaller layers are causing backlash or skipped steps. It could be that there is some resonance with certain movements that is pushing past the holding torque of the motors. I'm goby Buback - Printing