Re: 3D Printing

[Peter van der Walt (Gmail)]

Its worth trying.    If you have issues with SD you can try HALF_SPEED SPI in marlins configs

Atx wins on price and convenience.  Walk into any pc shop and get a replacement.   Agreed though the bulk is a pain.

My 1.75mm converted jhead has done a day of prints so I am ready to admit that its an easy upgrade for less than R50 in materials

Ps panelolu looks awesome

http://www.openhardware.co.za
http://www.itux.co.za

Excuse the brevity of this email. Sent from my mobile.

On 12 May 2013 9:54 PM, "Pieter Swart (gmail)" <pieter...@gmail.com> wrote:

I may have to try something similar. Pity I spend money before doing some research! I've always assumed that 1.75 was best suited to printers that need to make use of a bowden extruder since 1.75 is much more flexible (i would think).

I like what you are doing with the controller. The one thing I don't like about the computer PSUs are their bulky dimensions. I bought a low profile PSU for my current printer. The only downside to it, is that it doesn't have electronic on-off like with the PC PSUs but it works great and is quiet (even when the fan switches on once in a blue moon). I'm sure you can make your own low-profile case for the PC PSUs but at the moment I simply don't have the time to look at such options. I can't deny however that PC PSUs are the cheapest means of providing power.

So this weekend (yesterday evening actually) I finally convinced myself to assemble the Panelolu. Printed the Front cover yesterday and the back today. Assembled the electronics and that mess of wires and mounted an electronics back-plate to the printer so that electronics will be sitting in a fixed location (has been on my to-do list for weeks). I was also hoping that I would be able to bring the Panelolu all the way to the front but the cable is simply too short. Is it possible to use a slightly longer cable or will I start picking up issues on the SD unit?

Thanks!

On Sun, May 12, 2013 at 7:40 AM, Peter van der Walt (Gmail) <peter.p...@gmail.com> wrote:

In reply to the rest:

Yeah even with a machined PEEK tube to prevent heat creep that QU BD Suffers

I got one of my 4 to work - but after EVERY print I have to pull filament, snip the mushroomed bit off, load just past infeed of tube. Start print and it goes for the duration of the print - only jams once every 20 prints or so midprint

But it took the whole automatic start away.  I have to preheat as from loading filament to starting prints you have seconds...

I still love my 3mm PLA (:   1.75mm PLA is very difficult to use as the heat creep issue becomes more noticible. )

I run 1.75mm ABS on two of the bots - no issues.  I have switched all my ABS to 1.75mm

The 1.75m filament extrution machine is being built - waiting for some of the imported parts to arrive :/

We are adding 3 machines (total 4) so we can ramp up production and drop the price

For PLA I converted a 0.35mm JHead to 1.75 by replacing the PTFE liner with a 6mm PTFE rod drilled out to 2mm on my lathe.   I also have a fan blowing over the peek (PLA loves cooling after all so fan not an issue.  ABS hates drafts as it causes warps)

Will forward you a quote on the carriages with the bigger bearing mounts and filament seperately

Attached PDF exports of the new controller's schematics and board (WIP)

Need to add SD and Encoder to schematic.  Board layout about 60% done

Still considering whether to add the ATX24 back in as all the Gen 7 users love it

I also add connectors near extruder on my own - for most people its no use as they rarely remove it (;

Peter

On Sat, May 11, 2013 at 10:17 PM, Pieter Swart (gmail) <pieter...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi

Thank! The attachment didn't make it through.Can you send it again :-) I also finally received a missing part for my QU-BD extruder but from what I've read from your comments and others I shouldn't hope for too much with the heat creep issue.

I still have a lot of ABS 3mm but will have to start looking at new PLA soon. Was very happy with the Blue PLA I got from you guys. Have you made any 1.75mm ABS filament?

The Drylin bearings from igus are 16x25 (a bit bigger than the standard bearings). I would like to use them on both the x-carriage and the y-carriage. Also, I would like to use 4 bearings for each carriage.

If you could give me a quote on two units of both carriages for that size bearing and 1kg natural colour filament that would be great!

Can't wait to see the final specs on your controller. I slightly modified the controller on my current printer by moving all the FETs off the main board. I also added connectors to most of the electronics. This has made maintenance a lot easier. Even the extruder can be easily removed for maintenance. In the photo you can see that its just the fans that I still need to sort out. I also made sure that all the connectors are properly selected to support the amount of current that some of the components require (like the 15Amp heated bed). I made some bad choices on my old printer and had a lot of heating issues on my wiring.

I also bought one of those LCD units from the OH website. Just need to print the plastic parts and assemble. (I know you were also looking at developing a better version that uses I2C)

Cheers vir eers & thanks!

On Fri, May 10, 2013 at 7:12 PM, Peter van der Walt (Gmail) <peter.p...@gmail.com> wrote:

Here's the 1.75mm extruder I mentioned you might like

On Fri, May 10, 2013 at 11:57 AM, Peter van der Walt (Gmail) <peter.p...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Pieter

1. Still not 100 percent.  I still prefer Ecksstruder for 3mm.  If you want 1.75 i have a scad youd like...

2.  Good good.   Prototypes at board house (:

3.  Building stockpile.  Have about 6kg natural and busy extruding black abs.  You know you can just mail me (:

4.  R150 for carriage.   Ill adapt to your bearings for free and cut one...
Can send you dxf

http://www.openhardware.co.za
http://www.itux.co.za

Excuse the brevity of this email. Sent from my mobile.

On 10 May 2013 11:34 AM, "Pieter Swart (gmail)" <pieter...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hey Peter

I've been out of the loop for a while with other responsibilities taking up most of my time. I have a few questions for you:

1) How far are you guys with your new extruder design? Do you have something that we can order already?

2) How's your custom Controller board coming along?

3) How's the local filament project looking? (I can't see anything new on the OH site)

4) What's the costs for that aluminium bed on the Ecsbot and I think I also saw an aluminium x-carriage on one of your pics?

5) I bought some igus dry linear bearings and rods a while back but was unable to use them since I could not print parts accurately enough to NOT affect their performance (on my old Ecsbot), however they should work using similar laser-cut parts as the ones you have been making. The bearings are however a bit bigger in both width and length so I will probably have to design something myself. You didn't perhaps design those parts using something like openscad so that you can easily re-size some of the holes (or add one if needed)?

Hope to hear from you soon!

[Peter van der Walt (Gmail)]

http://www.openhardware.co.za
http://www.itux.co.za

Excuse the brevity of this email. Sent from my mobile.

[Pieter Swart]

Thanks! I would like it even more if the panelolu control could be completely wireless with a docking station ;-)