New version !!! CubeItMod post-processor for CUBEX printers

[giovanni...@gmail.com]

Hi.

I've made some changes to original Evanery's Cubeit.

First of all, I'm not a good programmer like Evanery and that's not a "Foolish Proof" software like CubeIt was.

If you want make changes it's at you own risks.

Thanks to Evanery for the great work and for give to public domain the source, I never could made this software without that.

Thanks to Hugues, he did a lot of testing these days.

Thanks to Jonathan, hope you're doing well, even if your Kisslicer is no more under development is still the best slicer available.

This post-processor works differently from original Cubeit, at the moment the CubeIt.INI file is not required.

CubeItMod gets the parameters directly from the BFB file saved with Kisslicer, "Include Comments" must be turned ON.

As M227/M228 was not completely understood, I've tested M227 and cleared up how it works, at the moment CubeItMod works with M227 only.

There are no problems to add M228 in the future if required.

DO NOT change Prefix, Select Extruder, Deselect Extruder Settings and use the INI files that are included with CubeItMod.

CubeItMod needs some of these parameters to work, it also need that some other parameters are NOT presents into these settings to work, so please dont change them.

The printer also needs some of these parameters and as I wrote, at the moment I didn't manage the possibility that they are missing ( This was possible with Cubeit ).

You can change all the other parameters into Kisslicer but at the moment not the section PTr G-Code.

You can set Prime and Suck parameters directly into Kisslicer.

Looks like it works better if Suck is slightly higher than Prime, like Prime 0.3 and Suck 0.34 or Prime 0.2 and Prime 0.22.

This software is still under development, I've decided to put it here on the forum to get feed-backs to improve it and if possible to find someone who can program better than me, I didn't program since at least 10-15 years and it's the first time I've used AutoItV3, so please be understanding.

Instructions :

1 .Save your Kisslicers INI files into a different folder.

2. Decompress CubeItMod.zip into the Kisslicer Folder and replace all the files with those included into the zip file.

3. Rename CubeIt.Mod.exx into CubeItMod.exe

4. Run Kisslicer and enjoy 

Come on Cubex users, we have a good printer, Kisslicer is a good software, if we share our experience we can build a good Post-Processor and that's all we need to make good printings.

Waiting for U ...

Giovanni

 

[toranarod]

Thanks a heap . I done a bit of programming and I also to long ago. Totally  understand how much effort it takes to dig up the knowledge and apply it to the latest compiler.

Well done.   

  At the moment the software is producing some of the best printed objects I have seen and would be compatible with the big professional system printers. 

My BFB 3D system machine and i have a few of them run around the clock making objects for my business.  and I am very happy with the work being manufactured.Thanks Again

  Same Again form me.

Come on Cubex users, we have a good printer, Kisslicer is a good software, if we share our experience we can build a good Post-Processor and that's all we need to make good printings.

[Peter Gregory]

Are you planning on releasing a linux / mac compatible version?

I'm a professional programmer.

I work in Windows and Mac and Linux systems.

I'd be happy to look into getting the code to compile with gcc or mono or some other platform (depending on what language it is written in).

Are you planning on open-sourcing the code?

I use the mac version of KISSlicer and launch a Windows VM to run the post processing.

My initial test print looks good.

I'm kicking off a larger print that should run overnight.

[giovanni...@gmail.com]

Hi Peter,

the source is the Au3 file into the zip file, I've used Autoit V3 to test and compile under windows, it would be great if you could translate and compile it for other OS, I've put some remarks into the source to help to understand how it works.

Fell free to ask questions if you need it.

It would be great too if you could make the program a little stronger and "Foolish proof".

Thanks.

Giovanni

[Tom Tumilty]

not sure what I am doing wrong i copied the files in my kisslicer directory when I hit saved it just hung up on the black window box and would go any further any suggestions I am running windows 8 x64 kisslicer 1.1.0.14 (pro)

[giovanni...@gmail.com]

Try to change the file name, avoid complex file names, dont use spaces.

Giovanni

[Peter Gregory]

I had the same issues running Windows 7 in a VM.

I ended up killing the process and launching it from the desktop.

It will prompt for the filename and convert it.

However, it seems to get stuck after it finishes (which is why the post process never completes)

I also ran into a problem with large prints (15mb or so) where the generated BFB file would not validate on the Cubex, so the print would not start.

[giovanni...@gmail.com]

Hi,

there could be many problems :

1.- I didn't change the way the program manages the files. With CubeIt if you use long names for the file with spaces and strange symbols the program block into the black window and you have to kill the task. This appended to me many times and every time I changed the file name to a simple name like "print1" and the problem was fixed.

2-  Processing large files takes time. I just saved a file 25,5MB it took 2min 30sec to process on my laptop, if you run it on a VM it colud take longer. If you dont get the end of process message and you close the task the file is not ended and will not be validated by the printer. This appened to me also when I used CubeIt.

Giovanni

[Tom Tumilty]

cubeitmod seems to work if I run it outside kisslicer

[Peter Gregory]

As mentioned, here is the port of CubeIt to .NET Mono.

I've attached both the exe for windows and the app for OS/X.

It is written in Mono Develop and should just require the .NET runtime.

To use CubeItNet with the Mac version of KISSlicer, copy it to your applications path and add the post processing text:

I added 1mb buffered reading to the file input / output.

It processes 9mb in about 5 seconds on my machine.

The source is attached.

Both the windows and mac versions work inside KISSlicer.

[hugues]

I'm using KISSlicer64 1.2.0.1 20130625a and it work in KS, is it possible that the 2 versions have different "comments" in the bfb code ? 

I wanted to show you my last print test with cubeitmod, there is something really interesting and  hopeful for our cubex.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwvkEZk49WpGUF9pRmVWdUlESXc/edit?usp=sharing

Printed in PLA

Layer height : 0.05 mm

PS: 0.1 / 0.12

Speed : 17

 I forget to check the jitters angle setup on 0, and i started the print. 

The result is that a loop evolve in diameter. It's too thick at the beginning and it reach is good size at the 3/4 of the travel. My Prime and Suck were low 0.1 and 0.12, i found this combination clean on PLA during my test on small cylinders.  If someone have an idea, wipe? Speed for SP ?

But the surface and the details are amazing on the left side of the frog, it's really smooth you can't feel or see layers and there is no irregularity . So now i'm sure that the cubex have a really good hardware stability during a print. 

If people want to test, please post your setup and a pic of your print !

[Peter Gregory]

CubeItMod uses the comments to get Suck, Prime and SuckPrimeSpeed for all the extruders.

It will display a report at the end of the conversion of what it detected from the comments.

If the comments are different in your version of KISSlicer, it will not pick up these values.

So, if the report message box has your Suck, Prime and SuckPrimeSpeed values in it, all is good.

[giovanni...@gmail.com]

Hi Peter,

good job, now the processing time is a lot shorter, less than 1 min for a file that toke more than 2 min before.

I noticed that now a M103 is added after each M108/208/308, but kisslicer already puts a M103 just before.

The M103 must be added only after the first M108/208/308 that is present after the the extruder is purged.

Here it's OK:

M542

M104 S230

M227 S651 P592

M551 P1500 S150

M543

M106

M108 S1.4

M103

G1 X-64.95 Y39.86 Z0.4 F12000

Here it's not OK :

G1 X-64.89 Y39.98 Z0.15 F597.8

G1 X-65 Y39.91 Z0.15 F597.8

M103 Original M103 By Kisslicer

M107

M108 S2.1

M103 ( ADDED BY Cubeitnet )

G1 X-65.24 Y39.17 Z0.15 F12000

The M103 is the trigger for the Suck function, if two Suck are done U'll have a lack of material at the beginning of the next track because only one prime will be done ( M101/201/301 is the trigger for the Prime function that will compensate the previous Suck function).

[Peter Gregory]

Great catch.

I missed that bit of logic in the conversion.

Here is the updated version 1.1 that fixes that problem.

Thanks again!

[Tom Tumilty]

Peter whats the difference between mod and net is net loaded thanks

[giovanni...@gmail.com]

Hi Tom,

there are not differences on the processed files but net is faster.

Giovanni

[Peter Gregory]

The NET version only does 1 pass instead of 2 passes.

It assumes the comments will always be at the start of the file (Which they seem to be).

So, instead of reading the file once to get settings and a second time to process the data, it does it all in one go.

That's where the speed difference comes in.

[shaun Hamontree]

So for the OSX version, do i put the app and the .cs file inside the Kisslicer folder?

Thanks! 

[Peter Gregory]

I put the .app it there.  But it can go anywhere.

The CS file is the .NET source code and is not needed - in case anyone finds a bug and wants to look at the code.

Just specify the path the the max/linux executable inside the package and it will work.

Be sure and surround both the path and the <FILE> in quotes.

[giovanni...@gmail.com]

The changes are described into the initial post.

Looks like that without M228 the printer works better and I've also managed to reduce the initial poop. 

Le jeudi 13 mars 2014 17:39:22 UTC+1, Ron Konkoma a écrit :

So, what exactly is your mod doing that CubeIt is not doing?  What changes have you made that improve the print quality?

[giovanni...@gmail.com]

Il giorno venerdì 14 marzo 2014 17:01:23 UTC+1, Ron Konkoma ha scritto:

You can easily remove the any/all M228's using CubeIT simply by changing the contents of the INI file.  That is kind of the point with the INI file, users can change the functionality of the code by modifying the settings in the INI file.  However, they don't have to if they don't want to...

Hi Ron,
with the mod you can save into Kisslicer the appropriate M227 P/S values for each sort of material and if you want even for each layer thickness.
I've also added the trigger when the extruder leaves the trash bin, this is specially with the purpose of testing, because I've read the comments of many people about theirs tests with CubeIt to try to understand the M227/M228 and they mentioned "no suck when quitting the trash bin", but that wasn't reflect the way the function works just because the trigger was missing.

I was thinking that maybe the best way to put the parameters of M227/228 is neither what I did with the mod and neither what you did with the ini file.
What do you think to put a section into the Printer G-Code of kisslicer with something like that :
;M227 S234 P234
;M228 S234 P213
and use these values into cubeit.
By that way it's possible to save many printer configurations for each needs and easily select them from Kisslicer.

I also would like to ask you if it's possible to improve the "save file", a lot of people has problems with that and many discards the program because they think it is not working, just because there are issues with the file name when saving. I noticed that if you put a space into the name the operation fails. I'm not good enough to fix that so please can you do it ?

 

Are you doing anything else in your code?  Are you making your source code public?

Yes I've compiled a new version to improve the quality when the flow of the extruder is low, it'll be useful when printing on 0.1 or 0.05 layer thickness, I'll release it within a couple of hours.
Did you receive my PMs ? I've sent the source to you for evaluation 10 hours ago.