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People building or using RepRaps.
Re: Update on the E3D All Metal Hotend (Now finally shipping!) 
[Lots of pictures] - 12 years ago
I have been running my printer inside a heat retention chamber with the E3D hotend without any problems. The chamber reaches up to 45°C, but then again, the fan is permanently wired to the 12V power supply, so that might affect how well the hotend works in the chamber. The snorkel idea is rather intriguing, though. I wonder if the added mass of ducts and associated springiness will in some way afby uGen - General
Re: How about air bearings made of plastic? - 12 years ago
I have tried nylon (taulman 618) as bushing material. I think it is safe to assume that it will last a rather long time: My test setupby uGen - General
Re: what is ithis - skipping outline ? - 12 years ago
Have you checked whether the filament spool can spin freely or if the filament snags up somewhere between spool and extruder? Or have you checked the Extruder motor driver? I once had similar looking problems, Infill looked fine while the outside was messed up periodically. Turned out that the Extruder motor driver was shutting down every few layers due to overheating. I guess the effect isn't nby uGen - General
Re: LM8UU VS IGUS - 12 years ago
ack, sorry, I was procrastinating this reply forever... I like nophead's loose bearing system on his Mendel90 for self-alignment. Simple, yet efficient. Is yours of similar design or did you design something completely different? And my printer: The heat insulating chamber is outfitted with aluminium coated styrofoam that I got in the local hardware store. It is normally being used to insulby uGen - General
Re: Bre Pettis does Mazda ads. - 12 years ago
OK, seems like I was wrong. Where did I get the idea that skeinforge was closely bundled into Makerware again...? Sorry about the confusion.by uGen - General
Re: Bre Pettis does Mazda ads. - 12 years ago
Finally had a look at the GPL terms. From how I understand the GPL, distributing closed source and free software together is acceptable, but enclosing - i.e. making it impossible to distinguish the free from the closed part - the free software is not, but that's not entirely clear cut in the license itself. Luckily, the FAQ helps out: aggregation vs. modification GPL software in proprietary systby uGen - General
Re: Update on the E3D All Metal Hotend (Now finally shipping!) [Lots of pictures] - 12 years ago
@ new to 3Dbob: that is strange. I have had much slower extrusions work with a hot end that conducts heat upwards way better without much trouble (although admittedly, I these slow feedrates only lasted for some minutes at the end of a print). If we exclude the construction in heat conduction, this leaves hot air and the filament itself. If the filament has got good enough contact to the hot endby uGen - General
Re: Bre Pettis does Mazda ads. - 12 years ago
@Dark Alchemist: Not exactly. The earlier Makerbots are released under GPL IIRC, including the first Replicator. The Rep2/2X is an incremental upgrade and thus should also fall under GPL (in case I am wrong here, please correct me; my understanding of the GPL is - truth be told - a little bit flaky). OK, this is their product; I don't really care that much about this particular printer, so this dby uGen - General
Re: Update on the E3D All Metal Hotend (Now finally shipping!) [Lots of pictures] - 12 years ago
@Bob: Have you measured the filament diameter? I have had jamming problems with 3mm FormFutura filament - the diameter and roundness varied greatly from somewhere about 2.6 to 3.2mm! Needless to say, the filament became stuck in the extruder (a Wade's derivate) itself and didn't even reach the hot end with the clog. Their 1.75mm filament also exhibits similar loose tolerances, but luckily, it hasby uGen - General
Re: Bre Pettis does Mazda ads. - 12 years ago
Dark Alchemist, you have a point in that a big part of the discontent is being fueled by Bre's (and Makerbot's) "sudden" change in mind and policy. There are a lot of closed source businesses and products around that we generally enjoy, fully knowing that the company behind that was never open to begin with. That Bre betrayed what he was so enthusiastic (?) about is of course sad, but he has toby uGen - General
Re: Timing belts - what's the story? - 12 years ago
Whoa, those parts really look impressive. Am I right in assuming that you only use loops and perimeters for the pulleys to minimize loss of concentricity due to the infill pattern?by uGen - General
Re: Bre Pettis does Mazda ads. - 12 years ago
Can we PLEASE stay friendly for the sake of the forum? I think Stratasys bought Makerbot to have something they can pitch against their concurrent 3Dsystems (who have the CubeX in this price range). What really is a pity is that Makerbot set out to build machines everyone could afford in order to spread 3D printing. With each iteration, they got more and more expensive and as Dark Alchemist alrby uGen - General
Re: Screw / nut blanks for threading with tap + die - 12 years ago
I have tapped M8 nut prototypes printed with taulman 618 (it is explicitly stated somewhere on his site that you can tap it) by hand - works quite well, but my tapping technique seems to suck because I ended up with tilted threads. The person I originally intended these nuts for then tapped the final version of the nuts in a lathe with far better results. Now he is using these as lubrication freeby uGen - General
Re: Bre Pettis does Mazda ads. - 12 years ago
Can we please stay factual and friendly here? As it stands, Makerbot profited a lot from "the Open Source 3D printer community" (however you may define that) without contributing much themselves. After taking these peoples ideas, they closed their sources, claimed everything as their own and refused to acknowledge and attribute their original developers. For example, they are in violation with tby uGen - General
Re: Update on the E3D All Metal Hotend (Now finally shipping!) [Lots of pictures] - 12 years ago
@SanjayM: Just wondering, how many iterations did you go through until you were satisfied with the nozzle? I mean the top layers look so perfect, at a glance, you can't discern them from a loosely printed bottom layer and what is maybe even more amazing to me is that the nozzle stays clean - no charred plastic creeping up the cone. My old hot end while not bad in general needed cleaning from timeby uGen - General
Re: Bre Pettis does Mazda ads. - 12 years ago
More like the PR face of the industry? From what I read, most of Makerbots developments are actually made by their community and pre closed sourcing also by the RepRap community. E.g. their host software is running skeinforge in the background if they didn't change that already. Even their user support seems to be mostly managed by a google group of more experienced Makerbot users.by uGen - General
Re: LM8UU VS IGUS - 12 years ago
Hi Marinus, my DIY bearings also wiggle a tiny little bit, but that seems to be OK. Theoretically, an adjustable clamping mechanism might solve tolerance issues - a screw that compresses the holder could do the trick. That way, even wear compensation may be possible by just tightening the screw a little bit more. I would also go with chromed stainless hardened shafts the next time if I used LM8by uGen - General
Re: Botobjects color printer - hoax? - 12 years ago
Maybe not a scam in the sense that the product is vaporware like in so many 3D printing scams (anyone remember Japica with their V-Rev or something?). I am pretty sure that there are overblown claims involved, though, in a similar fashion like Makerbot. If they heat up PLA more than we usually do, maybe they can pull off thinner layers with higher speeds - I rarely print with PLA, though, so I lby uGen - Developers
Re: Botobjects color printer - hoax? - 12 years ago
They have posted a video of their(?) printer printing now. Basically, you can't see much besides the fully enclosed head printing a vase, so it could be anything. I remain very skeptical as the video doesn't include sound - it might have been sped up, with the sound removed to hide the higher pitch. Some of the shadows in the background after the last cut are also moving quite fast. Not sure if iby uGen - Developers
Re: LM8UU VS IGUS - 12 years ago
Thank you, but I don't use this kind of bearings. Just asked out of interest. Well, let's hope that the inherent flexibility of the plastic makes this work even if the bore doesn't comply to any tolerance class. I have several PDF files with ISO tolerance specifications, though, if you are interested.by uGen - General
Re: LM8UU VS IGUS - 12 years ago
Interesting, PTFE alone has rather bad wear (but excellent friction) characteristics, but apparently by adding fillers, it is hard-wearing enough to be used in all kinds of different polymer bearings. Normally, the kind of bushings you bought (and pretty much all of Igus' inexpensive products) are supposed to be fit into bores complying to a certain tolerance in order to reach their designed inneby uGen - General
Re: Timing belts - what's the story? - 12 years ago
Sounds interesting, Jan. Sublime did the same with his Tantillus printer; going as far as printing pulleys for the Z axis in his cable driven Z design. I never got the prints come out perfectly round, so I pretty much abandoned the thought of having printed fishing line pulleys. Can you upload some photos and tips of how you printed those things? My interest is rekindled at least.by uGen - General
Re: Timing belts - what's the story? - 12 years ago
This sounds interesting. The imperial pitches are supposed to have less backlash, but aren't able to transfer as much power as the T belts because they are shallower. The trade-off of the T is increased space between the flanges of the belt and pulley teeth according to these sources (Gates). The AT profile on the other hand sounds like it would be ideally suited for our needs and in fact, thereby uGen - General
Re: Curling and problem with inside edges ;/ Slic3r PLA Prusa i3 - 12 years ago
A surefire way I have found to work well with RepRapWorld PLA is glue stick applied to the heated bed. Different brands will yield different bonding strength: UHU: had to chisel the parts off, ultimate bond. Probably, soaking the glass plate in water for a long enough time might help with part removal. Tombow: Bonds really well, after the bed has cooled to nearly ambient, the parts just snap off.by uGen - General
Re: Printing Fiber-loaded Material - 12 years ago
@Simba: Similar to how we push filament, I guess? As long as the pinch wheel is close enough to a guiding system and the carbon fibers go through a pipe butted against the plastic like in a bowden cable, the way with the lowest friction should be straight into the plastic part as long as the carbon is hot enough. Of course, after a short length, the carbon might want to buckle in the plastic, butby uGen - General
Re: LM8UU VS IGUS - 12 years ago
Hi Marinus, yeah, that's true. The specialty filament is still a little bit expensive and even though the E3D hot end is priced lower than some traditional ones, these things don't come cheap. Have you considered sintered bronze bushings? They should be relatively cheap, too and are supposed to last quite a long time with the right amount of lubrication. If you have a Conrad electronics store orby uGen - General
Re: Update on the E3D All Metal Hotend (Now finally shipping!) [Lots of pictures] - 12 years ago
@Sanjay: That was rather confusing for me, but in the end, I attributed it to the open front end of the cartridge being irregular or that the filling has swollen out of the cartridge in one or two places. The marring traces inside the 6mm bore at least suggest this hypothesis. Just when I noticed it not fitting easily, I checked the resistance - somewhere around 4 Ohms if I remember correctly, soby uGen - General
Re: What kind of grease for threaded rods? - 12 years ago
I am using bike chain grease on my threaded rods with great success. That being said, I am also using brass nuts. The standard steel nuts left me a little bit unconvinced. For a long time, the linear rails remained unlubricated (I am using UHMW-PE bushings, so I didn't see the need for lubrication) until they began squeaking. After that, some silicone spray improved the situation drastically.by uGen - Reprappers
Re: LM8UU VS IGUS - 12 years ago
I have dealt with Igus before, too. If you have a project as a student, they are really one of the best companies to work with. You can get free samples and information pretty easily. The only thing you have to do is to send them your concept with some photographs so that they can put it onto their site. This way, I got some Igus W series linear rail, but it turned out to be too heavy and not preby uGen - General
Re: Filamentsituation - 12 years ago
Angel, wo hast du denn dein Filament bestellt? Ich benutze auch 1.75mm und hatte bislang keine Probleme mit Nachschub. Bislang habe ich von reprapworld (ABS), FormFutura (taulman 618, ABS) und plastic2print (PLA, PET) bestellt, wobei FormFutura ziemlich teuer ist. Würde ich nicht unbedingt weiterempfehlen, da deren 3mm-Filament (Robotic Grey) sehr stark im Durchmesser schwankt. Für den Preis istby uGen - Offtopic