Builders/Links and Blogs/Individual Pages/Lake

My background: I'm a retired computer programmer who has never done any mechanic work. The last time I held a soldering gun was in the 1950s. I decided to build a RepRap because retirement is boring! This page is designed to note the things that I ran into as I began to build my machine. It isn't finished yet. My goal is not to repeat what is on other pages, but to note:

• How I made the choices I made
• Where (and why) I bought parts where I did
• Questions answered by my mentor
• What progress I am making and how I am solving problems.

I chose to build a Prusa because that is the model recommended for first-timers on the Main Page. As a retiree over here, my funds are limited, so I thought that I could buy parts as I could afford them and put the machine together at my leisure. I don't have all of my parts yet, but I have been able to source them. I learned years ago that if I bought auto parts and made my own car, it would be far more expensive than just buying a car. Well, the same is true for a RepRap also. I'll spend about $1,200 for the parts of this machine. I saw an ad on the RepRap main page for a Mendel kit for a total of $800. Oh, well. At least I'm able to buy exactly what I want. Basically, I want a machine that will not have to be tinkered with in order to keep it working. So, I've chosen to buy top of the line parts where I have a choice.

Mentor

I don't remember just what I did at first, but I think I said something on the Finnish RepRap User Group forum and on one other RepRap forum that I don't remember. Anyhow, I got an email from Anthony Aragues in the States who offered to mentor me in my effort. At the time, I didn't know that I needed a mentor or what a mentor could do, but I sure found out. Had it not been for Anthony, I would not be building this machine, for he has been an encouragement when I've felt overwhelmed, too. If you are just thinking about building your first RepRap, I'd recommend that you find a mentor before starting out. It would be better to have a mentor that you don't need, than to need one and not be able to find someone. One of my motivations in writing this page is to tell you all what Anthony has told me (and will tell me), so that mentors will not have to repeat information so much.

Here are some introductory hints he gave me.

• I don't suggest going the local hardware store route. I tried that several times, ended up paying more money for fewer parts and only finding about 10% of what I needed. If you go through a place like McMaster Carr they have almost everything you need, don't charge much for shipping and you get packs of 25+ for the price of what you'd for 4 at lowes ace or home depot. I can also send you a few oddsand ends so you don;t have to pay for 25 when you need 1.
• Electronics... I run the RAMPS electronics... so do many others, popular one is from ultimachine.com I know the guy who runs that, he's great. It's a reasonable route to go, biggest problem with it is that it requires stepper drivers that are constantly selling out worldwide. He's working on making his own though.
• Motors: you'll need 5 NEMA17 Bipolar stepper motors... those can be difficult to track down as well, but easier than the stepper drivers I mentioned.
• Power Supply: Keep your eyes out for a good deal on a big XBox power supply, or high power supply from a server or PC, should be able to salvage one for free.
• Extruder components: One of the most difficult parts of the machine is the hot end of the extruder, there are 2 designs being sold that I think work well, I've tried the rest and they've failed MANY times for me... this part will cost around $50 when you're ready for that part I'll give yo all the info for people who sell them etc, It's usually the last part.
• Belts: you should be able to pick up some steel reinforced timing belts, they don;t need to be in a loop so you can buy a large one and cut it down.
• Software needs:
  • Firmware development: That's the Arduino stuff. Some firmware works with some software chains, some features from one set need to be ported to others... less common components like paste extruders, heated bed, etc. are more difficult to configure.
  • Control Software development: There are currently 3 major software toolchains: ReplicatorG from Makerbot, Host software from RepRap, and Repsnapper. The unfortunate thing is that the hardware you get largely determines which softwar you use, and it shouldn't need to be the case. I personally prefer ReplicatorG and use it on my Old slow 3d printer, but my Prusa Mendel has hardware that only works with Repsnapper right now... in order to get replicatorG to work with it I'd have to get past the hurdle of getting it to recognize /dev/ttyACM0 port in Ubuntu. This doesn't even start to get into features that would be nice to have, best place to see lists of those is in the software repo for them.
  • gcode generation... GCode is the ancient language that the 3d printers use to communicate with the electronics. Objects are sliced into layers. given special instructions on extruder speed etc. and converted mostly by an app called Skeinforge. It has a LOT of features, more are always needed and more than anything else it needs to be simplified somehow. This one benefits from pretty frequent development, biggest issue is that it's only integrated into ReplicatorG, outside of that app you have to run it separate.
• Modeling and scanning and model manipulation. Creating models is one of the least developed things right now, OpenSCAD seems to be the most popular way to go that is open source. I like it but it can be daunting for a non programmer type. I'm getting into 3d scanning as well... which is very immature in the open source arena, you have to tie together 3-4 apps to get a model from a pointcloud, then noise and model stitching is still a challenge.
• Presentation / web stuff: RepRap is a great community and has a ton of ideas and hard working contributors. Makerbot has blown past them with marketing, presentation and making it simple. I talked to some of the reprap leaders about doing the same thing for reprap but they thought it would remove some of the openness and flexibility... something still needs to be done to make a simpler guide for people to get started. All of the getting started info is spread out and ambiguous as to which path is best to take because the reprap community is so bent on not having anything be official or sanctioned.

In the rest of this article, I'll refer to "my mentor", so you won't have to come back here to see who Anthony is.

Parts

I live in Tammisaari, Finland, so I thought I'd try to get parts locally, or, at least, within the country. I found an Arduino MEGA 2560 at Paeae. At this time, I had no idea how specialized some of the parts are. I went to the local Rautia store (sort of a Finnish "Home Depot" with the hardware list. (It's fun being an English speaker in a store where Swedish and Finnish are the main languages. How are you supposed to know the names of parts in those languages?) The bottom line was that, while Rautia had some of the parts, they lacked many of them. It would be quite expensive for me to go into Helsinki to look for parts, so I decided to go the mail order route.

Plastic Parts (RP)

My mentor offered to provide me with a set of plastic parts. In return, when this machine is completed, I've agreed to send him a set of RP parts for a Prusa Mendel. Of course, I'll be happy to do that for others, too. I reimbursed him for the shipping costs from near Atlanta, Georgia to Finland. That was $31.00

Vitamins

The term "Vitamins" as used on the RepRap site are the non-RP parts. I don't want to give you the impression that I think that the choices I made are the best ones for everyone. These are just my choices.

Hardware Kit

I am, even now, unqualified to select the best hardware, for I don't know how everything goes together. I decided to get a hardware kit from Thingfarm in the UK. (If you're in America or Canada and want to do business with these folks, they are at Thingfarm.) My money starts out in a bank account in the States, so it's easiest for me to buy things in USD. Something I appreciated in the UK Thingfarm is that they have buttons that give their prices and allow you to order in $, € or £. It was cheaper to buy a whole Prusa hardware kit than to buy parts that would go into a kit. My mentor had suggested getting hardware from McMaster Carr in Cleveland, Ohio. I don't remember why I didn't go with them, but it had something to do with shipping limitations or shipping cost.

--to be continued

--Alan Lake 15:26, 30 May 2011 (UTC)