As above. I have managed to get ABS prints as flat and as dimensionally accurate as I need, but once I get excelent bed adhesion the shrinkage is relieved by delamination. Although this delamination is slight, it is in areas where there will be stress so is not acceptable. I believe that just a small improvement in warpage of the material will fix this, but am unable to find any suppliers in theby leadinglights - Printing
O.K., perhaps having pretty pictures does not get anybody interested, perhaps if I definded a little more clearly where I am having problems with the software side, somebody may have some helpful tips or even pointers as to where to look. So, in detail: The first need is to have some output from a RAMPS board on SPI, I2C or even RS232 when a tool change is requested. The question is how to do thby leadinglights - Reprappers
In case this is of interest to anybody- and also in the hope that somebody knowledgable in the software can advise me. I have started printing the parts for my 5 filament extruder but am held up for some parts for a couple of weeks. To further clarify the design, I have included some drawings and renderings. Showing two geared extruders and 3 bowden hot ends. The idea is to move the required hotby leadinglights - Reprappers
I was lurking through this thread and noticed the August16 posting from dougal1957 where one photo shows a carriage made from a plate with a comment "Think I may have to re-think the Y carriages as they take up to much room". Possibly these may be of help to him and anybody else that finds the idea helpful. The square cutouts, in this case in 2mm hard aluminium, have chamfers for the LM8UU beby leadinglights - CoreXY Machines
Hi cat.farmer The main point of lifting it to avoid raking the unused hot ends across the print. It also allows things like bed leveling probes to be part of the weaponry The design is coming along very sweetly at the moment, things keep simplifying themselves and I am hoping to put together a proof of principle in the next week or so. The loading door and locking bar works well as long as youby leadinglights - Reprappers
The turret would be constrained to about one full rotation. Any more than that and the filaments would get in a terrible tangle. for example, extruder 1 could be swapped out and replaced by extruder 4 by going clockwise, but if extruder 4 were to be replaced by extruder 1 then the turret would have to rotate counderclockwise. Direct wiring would be possible here. Having said that, I am now muchby leadinglights - Reprappers
Each hotend would have it's own temperature controller except the one selected for the first layer so that temperature for thet could be higher for the first layers.by leadinglights - Reprappers
The reason for the direct drive is that softer materials such as Ninjaflex do not work too well with a Bowden setup. Since I hear that even softer materials (including a very soft Silicone analogue) are being trialed it seems to be a good idea to use a close coupled setup (I will call it close coupled to avoid confusion with ungeared extruders) Your point about Bowden cables is well taken thoughby leadinglights - Reprappers
If the extruders are laid next to each other like a mouth organ instead of a turret then many of the problems go away. The extruder with it's gear could still be lowered onto the driving gear, with a number of extruders driven by a single stepper motor. Using software to position the gears such that they are already in mesh when the extruder gear is moved onto the motor gear etc.. Advantages ofby leadinglights - Reprappers
Hi cat.farmer, That is a good idea. I initially dismissed it as I thought there would be problems if the gear teeth were not aligned when the bevel gears were brought together. However, after a bit of thought I decided that this is a good case for fixing in software by the following sequence 1) When an extruder is about to be swapped out the filament is retracted by the required amount PLUS a liby leadinglights - Reprappers
I like the idea of using an IR heater for your bed, but two immediate probelms come to mind: 1) Does this constitute a fire risk? 2) Is the IR heater fixed while the bed moves towards/away from it. If so, the controll may be problematic. If the heater moves with the bed then there is a significant mass penalty when the hot end lifts (bed lowers) which it may do when crossing perimeters eby leadinglights - Reprappers
That was my original thought but I went away from that when I realised that lifting the hot end off of the print to move or to switch hot ends takes a significant time already. Doing this with a turret of 5 weighing up to 2kg would be pretty slow.. It would be better to have an additional motor to lift only the extruder/hot end that is at the datum position. (or even just the business end - but tby leadinglights - Reprappers
I am building a new 3D printer and am hoping to short circuit some of the work on the software by picking the brains of the community. The whole philosophy of the new printer is to have an awful lot of extruders --- like this Initially I am hoping to have at least 5 extruder/hot ends and one other device - such as a bed leveling probe. since many extruders would result in great mass I have optby leadinglights - Reprappers
Is there any info on what is happening about the RepRap Hub at the above show at the NEC in September? I enormously enjoyed the 2013 show where I met many of the true heros of the RepRap community having read about it in: . If I manage to get my act together I may be able to finish my latest printer in time for this show and would like to know who to approach as I think that it may be of interby leadinglights - RepRap magazine
FFC has the advantage of being springy and can be relied not to flop into the mechanicals - such as extruder gears. Other flat cables such as ribbon cable are not nearly as good and anybody who has never had a snag with the just-plain-bundle-of-wires method is just plain lucky A simple way of getting the same springiness but keeping to the RepRap philosophy of making with common materials is toby leadinglights - General
There are several similar treatments which improve the tensile strength, inter-lamination bonding and flexibility of FFF printed plastics. One that is quite well known on these forums is Acetone and ABS. The fumes of Acetone soften ABS and polishes the surface, but less well known is that it improves the bonding between layers. Cold fuming over quite a long time allows the Acetone to penetrate deby leadinglights - General
I did not reply to this before as I had paid for the IP and felt that as the author had not put it in the public domain then I did not want to stand on their toes. Browsing through the web today I find that the author has released it into the public domain so you will find it here:- There is also a bust of Socrates on :- Both sites require you to register. Mikeby leadinglights - Look what I made!
QuoteMattMoses Maybe I should go find a forum where the art students hang out... Oh so much cynicism from one so young. (O.K., I don't actually know how old you are, but being a gambling man, I bet large gobs of money that you are much younger than me.) Being occasionally cynical myself, but also a realist, I would have to admit that I don't ever think of kickstarter campaigns or any other kindby leadinglights - General
A point I saw made in an article (possibly on Slashdot?) is that patents exist for commercial purposes. If an idea is published for non-commercial purposes then there is no foul if the idea is taken by somebody and called their own - i.e., nobody loses any money if the idea is corralled by somebody. At the time of the article, and presumably now, it had not been tested in court, but the simple exby leadinglights - General
Thanks 3dkarma, I have looked at Slic3r for slicing and repetier firmware for control. They do seem to give enough that I can build on for a larger number of extruders, but I think that I will need to make a suitable extender to control the extruder swaping motor as well as the extruder motor(s). As only one extruder will be active at any one time, it will need to be able to swap the outputs fromby leadinglights - General
I have started construction of my next (4th) 3D printer, but realised quite late that I had not thought out the software implications of my design. I have the build stage moving in both X and Y directions with multiple (up to 6) extruders mounted on a turret or similar mechanism, the extruder to be used is moved to the index position and moved down slightly before extruding. The unused extrudersby leadinglights - Repetier
I have started cutting metal and printing parts for my next 3D printer, but now I realise that I don't have the slightest idea how I am going to address the software implications of my design. The printer has a build stage that moves in X and Y with a bank of extruders moving only in the Z direction. When each extruder is needed it is moved to the index position and extended downwards slightly.by leadinglights - General
From my experiance with my own build Rostock with end frames cut on a fretsaw from Perspex (Acrylic), I managed to keep the worst errors of position of the rods to under 0.2mm. I calibrated and trimmed until I could do no better and have not seen errors greater than 0.5mm on larger parts. Over the whole print volume, 210 mm dia by 326mm tall on mine, I think that it is likely that the worst errorby leadinglights - General
It swings well and the stay and slider mechanism works so that it will rest in the up position both ways, but I can't say I have rung it, as it goes sort of "clik clok" instead of "ding dong" Mikeby leadinglights - Look what I made!
I think that if you compare the latest Stratasys printer to a home brewed FFF printer built with 3D printed bits, bits of threaded rod designed for house building, bits of MDF or plywood from the local hardware shop, electronics and software largely courtesy of the Open Source movement made with sweat, persistance and enthusiasm, then the Stratasys will win. But if you keep it calibrated and welby leadinglights - General
Hi Bill, It is printed on a Rostock. Print is in natural PLA at 0.25mm layer height and 20% infill Mikeby leadinglights - Look what I made!
A2 is right, but sadly so is Dr. Simon Ford. My best prints I will hold up against anything from the commercial FDM printers for finish, strength or dimensional accuracy; but my first attempt of anything substantially new will like be well short of this standard - a standard that they are required to achieve most of the time. If I could venture my thoughts on why this shouled be: I think that ouby leadinglights - General
I have tried using nozzles as well as a ring jet very close to the nozzle. My intention was to cool the extruded plastic to a point where it was solitd enough to resist creeping, while hot enough to minimise distortion. Also seen in You will notice that I also use the exhaust from the heatsink fan directed against the (insulated) square block of the heater - this creates burble - turbulence wby leadinglights - General
I have found that Bostik Extrufix works very well on PLA. It seems to act like a solvent weld type glue and soaks into the PLA making for a very sticky surface but it sets within a minute and seems to get to full strength in an hour.. Use it very sparingly as too much turns the surface into something like breadcrumbs but a very little makes the PLA more flexible and the bond is very strong. So faby leadinglights - General
Thanks Reinhold, The scribble from Jack_n confirms what I guessed but I will look up the other sources that you quoted. I think that the narrow cross form should not suffer from racking - the very short length of belt is the main reason that I went for this form although the geometry makes it difficult to get the best X and Y travel in a small overall footprint. I am still playing off various wayby leadinglights - CoreXY Machines