I think what a lot of the others are getting at, in their own way, is that there are a lot of challenges to building a printer and the first build for self sourced printers often do not go according to plan. Often getting things "Near enough" or temporarily fixed is ok. once the printer is printing, upgrades and permanent fixes can be arranged. This type of approach would be less acceptable in aby Zerker - General
are your belts slipping on the pulleys? or are the pulleys themselves slipping on the motor shaft?by Zerker - Printing
The one in your photo's is not one I've seen before, and is that fan pointing at the filament before it goes into the hotend? when you say clog, is the hotend completely blocked and not pushing out filament? or does it print for a short period of time and then stop extruding? if so does the filament going into the cold end continue to move? take a marker and place a line on the entering filamentby Zerker - Reprappers
Is your Z done with one motor or two? if two, are they in parallel or series? have you gone through the pictorial guide from the wiki?by Zerker - General
yup, pretty close now got the new termistor installed (arrived yesterday) and set to work with printing the bed leveling STL for calibration, I had trouble with the first Corner it was lifting up and forming a loop then sticking back down to the bed about 3mm later in the X axes. It took me forever to figure out why, turns out the layer was not adhearing to the bed properly so as the extruder rby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
Both of those attempt to do away with the Nozzle, this does not. I'm sure there will be some useful information in there anyway. @ggherbaz Thanks for the honour, I'm going to have to get one once the launch now I cant recall where I read up on how the different zones effect pressure in the hotend, but I'm a thinking that maybe the plastic melting higher in the glass, would be considered a longby Zerker - General
Have a look at his Post here he advises this is his direct response to the Prusa I3, the only problem I see with fishing line is the line "Walking" on the spool and maintaining Tension, which he covers in the thread anyway. Back on topic, is it worth doing a Prusa I3 kit or have there been sufficient advancements to make the I3 kinda dated? I'd anticipate at least a year from concept to kit beinby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
Question. For long duration prints, will the heat creap up the fillament to a point where the fillament outside of the hotend starts to transition? or will it not go that far? you mention in your testing seeing the Quartz tube filing up with plastic. For a name, how about QuartzE (pronouced quartzey) taking on the naming convention from the coreXY and coreXZ where the axes is capitalized at theby Zerker - General
the Prusa I2 did get a few bad reviews here and there in regards to the use of threaded rod frame, and a regular need for calibration, this can point to poor construction and calibration issues though. Not having built, owned or seen one in person, this is all hear say. I've seen recommendations from using Nylock nuts to using Locktite to overcome this. Trouble was when you had to re-calibrate bby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
Sorry AgentX that I didn't address your concerns in the above post, I work in a call centre during the day, so I tap out my reply in between calls. there are a lot of guides out there, and I think we can collectively collate these guides and get a forum sticky. I know josef Prusa wrote a book on 3d Printer design where he also goes over model creation, and there are a few books also dedicated tby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
That's more in line with what I was thinking. As far as the individual components go it would depend on what you are trying to achieve with the Kit, same as when you self source, there are a lot of options. What I want to get out of the way first is if people would prefer an entry level Prusa, Mendel, rostock, yada yada yada. On that note, I'm really impressed with Nicholas Seward's new coreby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
OK, well let’s take a slightly different approach, rather than looking at the market and what a local kit would have to compete against, let’s instead look at the conversation another way. if a Buddy of yours see's your 3D printer and thinks it's the neatest thing since sliced bread and wants to get one himself, but wants your advice, what kind of options would you like to see available for themby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
Hi all, after looking at the number of printers being built and the number of problems people are having with sourcing parts or getting parts only to find they are junk. it strikes me that there may just be a market here. Now I'm not in the position currently to provide a service like this, however I'd still like to explore the idea if nothing else, perhaps someone will pick it up and help growby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
One thing I would note against the non threaded tube is that once you glue it in it's almost permanent. If the glue can be dissolved with a solvent then great, however if it cant and you break the glass, your gonna need a new hotend. an RP printed "Clamp" could be made that slips over the end of the metal cold end and the back of the glass tube to hold it in place with tension in the RP part inby Zerker - General
I really want to see how it performs without the threads, and see if the cost can be brought down by not having the threading. Surely there is an adhesive that can be used if you select a maximum temperature. From what I've heard of the E3d, it's nearing perfection but still needs PTFE tube in the cold end to prevent Jams, the Glass being used instead would overcome this entirely? making it the bby Zerker - General
the hot end refusing to warm up could be a few things. if you can get it to come up to a good heat with a battery, I'd be looking to either the board or the power supply or the thermistor. if the thermistor is not detecting the temperature correctly then you wouldn't know if it was reaching temp or not. the resistor is going to need a certain amount of Amperage reaching it in order to reach tempby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
Adding up spend so far, I spent US$292.99 (NZ$ current 378.75) on parts from china and US, and a further, NZ$133.34 on parts, this figure has some rounding in it, don't has a guess for the Frame, I don't have the receipt as to how much I actually spent for the end frame (did not count the failed plywood frame build cost) as I don't have the receipt and I bought tools at the same time. I also hadby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
you said that you have your z motors wired up in parallel? why not serial?by Zerker - Reprappers
in pronterface at the bottom, right hand side there will be a text box for entering Gcode, type M119 and hit send, the Console in the upper right should send back some info. can you post here what comes back? Also when you move X Y and Z in positive increments, do they move away or towards your endstops?by Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
seems a nice price whats it come to with shipping? and you will want to get some heat sinks for the steppers. when I got my ramps, stepper boards and arduino through aliexpress, it came to US$72.17 all free shipping, thats without an LCD screen though. as the Melzi board has most of this stuff already built in, once you flash the board with Marlin would you have the same features? you can get anby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
according to the wiki it should use a USB Mini, not the micro that most smart phones (not apple) eventually adopted as a standard around 2012, if you have an older smart phone or even an old MP3 player or camera, it is possible that it uses the correct USB Micro cable. looking at this for you, I'm glad I went for a RAMPS Board. if you get fed up with the Melzi you can always opt to switche to aby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
Never mind about the Thermistor, I just got a PM from reifsnyderb who runs www.hotends.com and he advised that the replacement for the one that came with the Jhead is not available through nz.element14, and advised he will send me some, I even explained how it was my fault it broke, was happy to send a replacement anyway. it should take about 2 weeks for it to arrive form the states, but I'm hapby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
Yup, Definatly a broken thermistor, both of the wires cam eloose, and when I went to re-attach one of the wires broke right at the glass bead, i need to get another, this one is unsalvagable, anyone got an idea for a local supplier? this is the closest match i can findby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
have you used a spirit level to check that the X axis is level? if you level the bed but the x axis does not stay level then the bed will not be parallell with it anymore. this could be a problem if one Z motor is turning more or less than the other. did you wire your Z motors in series? Linked Pic is parallel which is not what you want, you want this if this is not the problem and it is insteadby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
"It's almost done, I swear", at least that’s what I told my wife after 2 days in the shed. Z couple is done for like the third or fourth time, soldered the Z motor wires so they now run in series. Thermistor and Resistor assembled into the hot end. used Firegum to seal did not have to wrap the resistor in foil as it was a nice fit, resistor comes up to temp nice and fast and cooked the fire gum.by Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
take this bit of advise below with a grain of salt, i havent wired up my endstops yet, but this is what I think could be happening based on what I've read so far the print file may have gcode in it to home the bed before printing. in your firmware's configuration.h you should have a bit of code that resembles this #define X_MAX_POS 200 #define X_MIN_POS 0 #define Y_MAX_POS 200 #define Y_MIN_Pby Zerker - New Zealand RepRap User Group
where did you get your first parts from? can they print a replacement? or are you meaning as a one off print for someone that does not have a printer? there is a wanted forum where you can post what you want and see if someone can do it. or there is a forum for designing a one off as well. the cost of a one of print will vary a lot depending on what you want and who is doing itby Zerker - General
did your old PC run windows 8? are you an administrator? you may not be able to run unsigned executables like pronterface. not sure how Win 8 works with thisby Zerker - General