Hi devtty1, It is really a shame that things have gotten to this point that such action has become necessary. If the TZC folks would have communicated with people, even if they were having difficulty filling orders or whatever, IMO things would have been much better. I know in my experience with them, the most frustrating thing dealing with them was the lack of communication. What communicby ShayWalters - General
I also bought a TZ laser-cut kit. I will certainly say that all the problems other people are reporting here are consistent with my experience. Most of TechZone's problems all boil down to one problem: COMMUNICATION (specifically, lack thereof) I ordered my kit over a year ago. It took a while to arrive; long enough that I was getting concerned, but it did finally arrive. I had no missing pby ShayWalters - General
brnrd Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > The correct choice is Sanguino. But it won't show > up until you install the Sanguino extensions from > this site: > . > > You can read more about firware installation for > Gen 3 in the wiki. Thanks - I'll go get that. Now that the weekend is over, it might take me a day or two to get back to it, butby ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics
I think that it's a spot where you can run the extruder and have the material fall there rather than on the build platform. There is a small piece of plywood, maybe 20mm x 50mm that mounts to the Y-axis carriage that sits below this notch to catch the refuse.by ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics
OK - I've found (what I think is) the right firmware file, but I'm stuck at this point. I got the arduino-0022 software, and it runs, but I don't know what type of board I should select. The chip I have is marked ATMEL Mega644PA MU1108, but there is no such chip listed in the choices in the arduino software. If anyone who has successfully re-loaded their firmware on a TZ Reprap v1.2 controlby ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics
So Bnrd, since I've never had to mess with the firmware before, I don't have a clue where to begin. Can you tell me anything that would help (like a pointer to a FAQ page or something) ? Even if it's just to re-load the TZ firmware, if that got it talking again, it would be something. Or if the Sprinter firmware will work on the TZ m/b, I'd be willing to try that. Anything else will mean wby ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics
The motherboard I have is silkscreened with "RepRap MB v1.2 - TechZoneCom.com remix". It was purchased earlier this year (maybe 6 months ago?) So it sounds like the COM errors might not be anything I can fix with the electronics I have. But at this point, I'd be glad to get back to having the COM errors. :-) I have been thinking about replacing the electronics, and what you're telling me iby ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics
The cable is only about 4 inches long, so I really don't think it's long enough to be a problem at 19200, which is what I'm pretty sure is the right speed. The firmware is whatever was flashed by Techzone. I've never had to do anything with the firmware to this point - I wouldn't even know where to begin. As I understand it, there's a jumper I'd have to short on the MB to flash it, and I'd eveby ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics
Traumflug, thanks for the reply. The only other thing I can think to add is that when it had been working, I was getting a lot of COM errors (checksum or LineNr errors) while it was printing. So I was thinking that maybe the ribbon cable between the USB/TTL board and the MB was picking up noise, so I took the cable off and wound the ribbon in a spiral to make it a bit like twisted-pair wires.by ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics
I'm not sure what I've done. I have a Techzone LC Mendel which has been working with an older version of repsnapper. Yesterday I loaded up a new Linux machine and put the latest repsnapper on it. It had the wrong baud rate on it, and I hit the reset button on the motherboard several times in the process of trying to get the software communicating. Never did get it to connect. So today, I goby ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics
I got things apart and found that the hot end hadn't pushed out of the wood, the oak block seems to be a lamination of several layers and the interface between two layers split apart. There was a single screw through the layers to hold them together, but it spread apart on the end opposite that screw. Now that I've removed some of the PLA, I can see that I was mistaken, it's a solid block of wby ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics
I've read that plastic soda bottles need quite high temperatures and pressures to extrude. I have no idea what the properties will be once extruded. Perhaps it won't stick to an earlier layer? I don't know. But I like the idea of finding a use for this ubiquitous source of plastic. I know that my experiences won't carry over to other designs, but I just ran into a problem with the pressurby ShayWalters - General
EtherDais, thanks for the tip about bamboo. I will see if I can work up something using it. As fate would have it, I ran into this problem printing out some parts in preparation for a demonstration of the printer at a local Linux User Group. Perhaps I can get things working again in time for the demo. Looking back over some of the earlier messages in this topic, I see that there was some disby ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics
> With experience of some ~10 wooden hot tips, these > are the failure modes we've identified: > > 1) charring of the wooden threads, leading to the > brass hot end popping out. This is exaccerbated > by having a tip overheat and start smoking. If > you can avoid this, it is less likely to happen. > > 2) cracking of the wood near the brass, letting > the brass sby ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics
> Reason 2 - The gears are slipping off the motors > (I was advised to buy some polyurethane glue to > keep it on). I had this same problem. Here is my answer. It works as long as you have the steppers with the flats on the shafts. If you need these and don't have access to a laser cutter, send me an email at shaywalters (at) gee mail dot com.by ShayWalters - Huxley
I think this is a fairly generic question, but just in case it matters, I'm working with a TechZone Lasercut Mendel. My question is where to set the limit switches. I think I'm OK on the X limit, since I set it at the left edge of the build area. On the Y limit, I set it outside the build area so that I can access the purge slot. Is there a guideline on exactly where to set this? And especiaby ShayWalters - General
I would recommend this page: TechZone InfoHubby ShayWalters - Reprappers
I had trouble with my Z motor also. It was the speed setting for the Z motor. I was using repsnapper software and the built-in setting was 50(min) to 150 (max), and my Z motor would buzz and vibrate when I tried to make it move. I changed that to 40(min) and 50 (max) and then it worked fine. Perhaps I can set it higher than that, but I haven't experimented with that yet. If your motors aby ShayWalters - Reprappers
Woo Hoo! That was the problem. The software defaults to the Z speed running from 50 min to 150 max. I changed it to 40 min to 50 max and now my Z-axis moves just fine! Thanks!by ShayWalters - Reprappers
Re: wiring: As I said, when I try swapping the Y and Z axis wiring, I'm swapping everything. The entire combination of cable, stepper-driver and stepper motor works when plugged into the Y-axis, so if it were a wiring problem, it would still fail when plugged into another axis, but it doesn't, so I know there's no wiring problem. That is why I went to the trouble of replacing the circuit boardby ShayWalters - Reprappers
Well, I know that the current setting is OK because the cable/driver/motor combo works fine when it's plugged into the Y-axis connector. I have been looking for a forum like this that is specific to the Techzone but haven't found it. Do you have a URL by any chance? Thanks.by ShayWalters - Reprappers
I have a Techzone lasercut Mendel. I have everything assembled and am at the point of getting everything running. But I can't get the Z-axis to work. I am using a recent compile of repsnapper under Ubuntu 10.10. X and Y axes work fine, but the Z axis just buzzes. It will turn a bit if I remove the belt but it seems like it's fighting itself. So what I have done to test where the problem iby ShayWalters - Reprappers
Follow-up to my previous post: I just heard back from Kurt at Techzone and he confirmed that the special firmware is already pre-loaded. So that's a big load off my mind.by ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics
Now that I've basically finished assembly of my TZ Mendel, I've just discovered this forum. I wish I had discovered it several weeks ago. There were many things that would have saved me quite a lot of time if I had some good instructions. As it was, I found stuff on the internet with older incarnations of the printer that had different parts in various places. A number of times, I figured thiby ShayWalters - General Mendel Topics