[ELECTRON] Proposed new club + Arduino meet up

Tue Nov 8 22:48:34 UTC 2011

As I said in my ps.  I have just received a bundle of nuts and bolts, which
should cover the needs in that department.  I have marked them as on order
on the RepRap page at goshg.  I should change that to yes when I get a
chance.  

I have also been working on some ABS prints for the printer as well.  I am
still refining the hole sizes for the bar clamps.  What I have made so far
is probably useable, but I would be happier if I can get the tolerances down
a little before attempting more critical prints. 

I have been using parts from Greg Frost's repository for this as he has a
more robust looking Y bracket.  I will probably use one of the close but no
cigar prints to upgrade my own printer.  

As for changing nozzles on the fly?  The hot end is bolted into the extruder
(if using a Wades which is the current fashion) with two 3mm bolts.
Changing the nozzles over is probably going to damage the hot end if done
frequently, but changing hot ends is certainly possible if fiddly.  If it
were me I would be tempted to carry two extruder/x-carriage/extruder
motor/hot-end combos for an easy swap over.  Use a durable connector to make
the electronics easy to swap and Bob is indeed your mammies sister's ball
and chain.  

For what we are hoping to do, sticking with the standard sizes would make
calibration that bit easier especially if we use the
Pronterface/Sfact/marlin firmware options.  You can get pretty good prints
after a pretty simple calibration routine.   It's only when you are trying
to make mechanical parts that you need more precision.

Blair

-----Original Message-----
From: members-bounces at electronclub.org
[mailto:members-bounces at electronclub.org] On Behalf Of Kieran Wyse
Sent: 08 November 2011 22:29
To: Discussion list for the Electron Club
Subject: Re: [ELECTRON] Proposed new club + Arduino meet up

Once the reprap is built we can certainly thing about enclosing it, it may
well improve build quality. As to the fidelity it does seem just from visual
inspection of the parts printed that the limiting factor seems to be the
size of the nozzle. Which begs the question is there are any way to change
the nozzle size on the fly? If it were possible and I do not know how I
think it would likely turn the reprap into a VERY capable machine.

I have been told that the motors are going to take another 11 days to
arrive. They should be here by the end of the month i reckon. Has anyone
else had more progress than myself?

Kieran.

On 8 November 2011 21:56, Blair Thompson <mail at justblair.co.uk> wrote:

> I have seen other reprap experimenters talking about using enclosures.  
> I for the life of me cant remember whom.  What I do seem to recall was 
> that they were using the heated bed as the main heating source for the 
> enclosure and then using a temperature controlled fan to maintain the 
> ambient temperature inside the case.  I seem to remember a temperature 
> of around 40c as being in the ballpark as to what was useful.
>
> If I remember quickly, what the experimenters were trying to achieve 
> was reduction of distortion in taller models.  Warping occurs 
> sometimes when parts of the model at the base cool while those at the 
> top i.e. the most recently printed are stil hot.  An enclosure serves 
> to reduce the difference in temperature from the most recently printed 
> parts of the model to the least recently printed.
>
> I have been trying to perfect my machine and have found that fan 
> cooling of the filament as it is laid down makes a difference to the 
> quality of the prints in either ABS and PLA.  For ABS however I also 
> have to lay a skirt which reduces the cooling at the bottom of the 
> model from either my cooling fan or from the movement of the Y axis.  
> I was getting lifts from the build plate before I started using the 
> skirt.  I don't know if this will improve PLA prints as I have not 
> tried it yet, Imanaged to get good prints without it.
>
> The layer thickness you reference for the Reprap of 0.3mm depends on 
> the extrusion nozzle aperture width.  With a 0.5mm width and 3mm 
> filament the layer thickness works out at about 0.4mm using the sfact 
> software as a slicer.  You can get lower by using different filament 
> thickness and different nozzle aperture widths.  What you gain in 
> fidelity you lose in build speeds though.
>
> One idea I had was to not build the reprap using triangular vertexes, 
> but rather to build an MDF cube but use the Prusa dimensions and 
> mechanical parts.  This would certainly allow experimentation in terms 
> of retaining some ambient heat around the models being created.
>
> Regards
>
> Blair.
>
> Ps  I just got a delivery of various screws and bolts that I needed.  
> I of course ordered a few extras.  All but the M8 washers arrived today.
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: members-bounces at electronclub.org 
> [mailto:members-bounces at electronclub.org] On Behalf Of Brian Loudon
> Sent: 08 November 2011 21:29
> To: Discussion list for the Electron Club
> Subject: Re: [ELECTRON] Proposed new club + Arduino meet up
>
> Hi to those interested in RepRaps, I came across this patent relating 
> to temperature and flow control for professional Fused Deposition 
> Modelling systems ;
>
>
> http://www.google.co.uk/patents?hl=en&lr=&vid=USPAT5866058&id=OgUXAAAA
> EBAJ&o
>
> i=fnd&dq=stratasys+patent+fused+deposition+modelling&printsec=abstract
> #v=one 
> page&q&f=false<http://www.google.co.uk/patents?hl=en&lr=&vid=USPAT5866
> 058&id=OgUXAAAAEBAJ&o%0Ai=fnd&dq=stratasys+patent+fused+deposition+mod
> elling&printsec=abstract#v=one%0Apage&q&f=false>
>
> The stratasys Dimension printers achieve .178 mm, .254 mm or .33 mm 
> layer thicknesses,
>
> http://www.dimensionprinting.com/3d-printers/3d-printing-comparison_ch
> art.as
> px
>
> the reprap is quoted as a layer thickness of 0.3 
> http://reprap.org/wiki/Mendel
>
> The patent above emphasises the importance of temperature and the 
> professional machines all have enclosures, makes me wonder if the 
> reprap performance can be optimized?
>
> cheers
>
> Brian
>
>
>
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