MakerBot
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| Hive13 Project |
|---|
| MakerBot |
| [[<flickr>4027591597</flickr>|200px]] |
| Status: Active |
| Start Date: 07/01/2009 |
New Page Layout
This page needs a little bit of an overhaul. Work in Progress...
Notes/todo:
- Do you want to print something?
- Log of fixes, tweaks, skeinforge settings
- http://groups.google.com/group/southwest-ohio-reprap/
MakerBot Status
As of 11/21/2009: Working!
Roadmap
Tweak Skeinforge
- Increase object infill density
- Reduce excessive plastic extrusion
- Possibly slowd own flowrate or decrease temperature
Make More 3D Printers
- Print a spare extruder for MakerBot
- http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:958 (first, print the replacement retainer plate)
- Print Mendel parts
New Design Projects
- Eggbot Parts
- DIY CNC Router Parts
- I'd like to try to build and open source version of some of these biped robot kits: http://www.lynxmotion.com/Category.aspx?CategoryID=85 DaveMenninger 14:48, 5 August 2009 (UTC)
- http://www.amazon.com/Sprouting-Strainer-Lid-Wide-mouth-Sprouter/dp/B000N8MRW8
Story So Far
Buying the Kit
Pledgie.com fundraiser
- Dave purchased it and the club will re-imburse him via this pledge drive: http://pledgie.com/campaigns/5391
Building It
Even more photos can be found at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dave_menninger/sets/72157622034653288/
Day 1
Here is how far I got on Day 1. DaveMenninger 06:02, 14 August 2009 (UTC)
This is what you see when opening the box of laser-cut parts.
This is the so called "kit of kits".
This is the middle with the front and back attached.
These threaded rods raise and lower the z-stage.
This is the platform that raises and lowers, known as the z-stage.
This image shows the z-stage assembled and the top attached.
The bottom of the MakerBot attached.
The pulleys (and z-stepper) have been added to the top.
Day 2
Here is how far I got on Day 2. DaveMenninger 05:01, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
This is the X stage with the Y stage mounted on top.
This is one of the endstop opto-encoders that detect when the MakerBot reaches it's limit in the Y direction.
Day 3
Here's how far I got on Day 3. DaveMenninger 05:06, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
The small dino holds one side of the extruder.
The big dino holds the other side of the extruder.
Closeup showing the captive nuts in the acrylic.
The motherboard and the three stepper motor drivers all mounted to the side of the MakerBot and plugged in.
Testing / Calibration
Minor Issues
- z-stage stepper was wired backwards. (In all likelihood the other steppers are backwards too, but they are currently left as-is).
- fixed this by just plugging the z-stage stepper motor into the driver board backwards.
- z-stage was getting caught on the screws holding on the electronics on the side. was unable to descend.
- fixed by screwing the screws out a bit. we should find shorter screws, bigger stand-offs, or put the screws in the opposite direction.
- slight asymmetry of circular objects.
- y-stage belt was very loose, x-stage belt was slightly loose. tightened them up.
- build platform not perfectly level
- still working on this. it is a combination of leveling the top of the y-stage and keeping the z-stage perfectly parallel to the bottom of the bot
Extruder not extruding consistently
We had problems with extruder not extruding for quite a while. We could get it to print consistently by applying downward pressure on the ABS filament during printing, to prevent it from halting. Eventually we started to play with the settings in Skeinforge and were able to get much more consistent results if we increased the nozzle temperature and slowed down the filament feedrate. Since making these adjustments we have had barely any halting of the filament.
We recently did an extensive rebuild of our extruder head and we now have the opposite problem, it is extruding too much now. The rebuild included the following upgrade // maintenance sub-projects:
- First we dismantled the extruder head and nozzle completely. In doing this we discovered a couple issues. Molten plastic had been squeezed between the threads of the nozzle and the brass tube and completely encased the thermistor. This was causing our temperature readings to be too low, thus causing the nozzle to overheat which led to our second problem. The entire brass tube filled with molten plastic and then overflowed out the top of it causing a lip. This lip along with the large mass of now hard plastic made the extruder strip the plastic filament.
- Installed the extruder upgrade kit from Makerbot
- Installed a wider idler wheel from cleveland.
Since we bumped the gripping power of the extruder motor, we have two new problems, the extruder runs too well, while doing small infills, it will extrude a large quantity of plastic that it will run into in later layers. The second problem is that it starts to push the plastic before it is fully melted, this caused one of the retaining washers to break in half.
Object solidity
We're still working on this, but we found we could increase the solidity / watertightness of objects by tweaking several settings in Skeinforge. I don't have access to what settings we changed, but I will try to remember to look them up. Objects are not perfectly watertight yet, but we are closer.
Gallery
Things we designed
| s|frameless|none</flickr> | Hive13 coin: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:989 |
Other Things We've Printed
| m</flickr> | m</flickr> | m</flickr> |
| m</flickr> | m</flickr> | m</flickr> |
| m</flickr> | m</flickr> | m</flickr> |
| m</flickr> | m</flickr> |
Misc Links
- these may need to be turned into other pages for CNC, RepRap, etc
- http://bitsfrombytes.com/
- http://wiki.muc.ccc.de/reprap:start
- http://www.villageplastics.com/
- http://objects.reprap.org/wiki/Software_Tools
