/diy/ - Do It Yourself

Alright, I need alternatives for Shapeways that print gold. They just changed their pricing structure for cast metals, and now the "minimum price" completely screws up everything. Now, for a lot of my models, I have to pay a $15-25 extra fee for "minimum pricing", and the price for some of my other models has fallen maybe 15 cents. I really feel the community got shafted here, but whatever.

tl;dr who 3D prints gold OTHER THAN Shapeways and i.materialise and ships to the US/internationally?

>>1185607
Found the link. The community is PISSED.

https://www.shapeways.com/forum/t/cast-metals-price-restructuring.80268/

>>1185513
Light autist leading the future. 3D printed signs soon.

>>1185647
Elaborate?

>>1185648

I have 3D printed my first sign. Probably more to come.

>>1185651
Nice. Socrates approves. LED lightstrips for the backlighting?

>>1185678
Yep. WS2812b cut to shape. I still need to work on it for it to be finished, but it's close.

>>1185678
Is that a xenomorph?

>>1185607
The fuck up rate is quite high, there is a lot of manual work involved and most of the times dealing with consumers and artists suck so I understand why they are raisin prices. 30 burgereuros for a custom silver ring is a very low price IMHO.

>>1185782
>Fuck up rate is high
I'm a little surprised, I've never heard of people saying their models won't print - I thought the automated system caught most of them?

>dealing with consumers and artists suck
Yeah, fair.

>$30 for a custom ring is low price
Well... The material is relatively cheap (gold's been going down yearly), but I agree.

I'm mostly irritated at the fact that they bullshitted the reason rather than just flat-out saying they're increasing prices. Jacking up the price and saying it's "finishing cost" on a part with internal details/crevices (or raw/unfinished parts!) that do not get polished rubs me the wrong way.

>>1185693
T-Rex. Here he is with his bigger brother.

3d Printing? Uh sure is getting advanced makerbot is fast and extrudes fast i would like to get one to make some good prints.

So if I want to use a 3d printer to make small parts for stuff (specifically guns and switchblades) out of metal, will most 3d printers be good for this use case using a filament, or will it be best to use shapeways? Or maybe would it be best to make a 3d printed master, and use a mold to cast it out of aluminum or something?

>>1186052
>will most 3D printers be good
No. It's not metal filament, it's "metal" filament - it's mostly plastic or some sort of carrier and only LOOKS like metal. There might be some newer filaments which are better at looking/feeling like metal but you're not going to get good metal parts out of some $500 desktop printer. Your best bet is shapeways, which can print using steel. You can also print a master (from PLA) and then mold it (from ceramic) and use investment/lost "foam" casting to get a part from whatever metal you can.

>>1186024
>good prints
shapeways

>>1186052
3D printers are good for making that kind of stuff. Join a hackerspace and machine the parts from solid chunks of the right grades of metal.

Guys, I need help. I'm finally assembling my I3 box frame (based on the openscad files by Jo Prusa) but I cant figure out how to get my y axis and the frame dead nuts square.
Has anyone done it/ has a technique?

>>1186358
I just found one where I live, 40 bucks a month for 24/7 access to a bunch of shit seems like a better deal than 2 grand for just one tool I might not use. Thanks for the tip!

>>1186358
>>1186605
***not*** good for making that kind of stuff

Can you use Makerjuice with a Wanhao Duplicator 7?

Is lulzbot mini a good choice?

>>1186643
An excellent choice if you're willing to pay that kind of money, if it's anything like the lulzbot taz 5.

Is auto bed levelling actually worth it?

I'm building a 300x200x~200mm corexy. The design I'm using has a mount for an inductive sensor on the printing head. It won't work with just a PCB heated bed and a glass surface, but it will work well enough if I add a 0.5mm stainless steel sheet under the glass. The sensor is so cheap there's no reason to not try it but I wonder if it's actually better than just doing it manually with a feeler gauge.

>>1185678
what printer did you print that on? it looks good.

Also I see some people post prints that are a really nice matte white like yours, is that a specific filament?

In terms of cheap printers, has anyone had good/bad experience with the cetus or the MP select mini? the fabrikator v2 seems like a competitor but there isnt much information about it.

>>1186902
micro-stepping sometimes creates weird artifacts. If you're constantly having to re-level the bed every few prints, something else might be wrong.
if you can't bear spending 5 minutes every 10 prints or so, Tom has a pretty good video detailing your options.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=il9bNWn66BY

>>1186917

I did watch that video, which is how I come to the conclusion that I should at least attempt to use the inductive sensor. It costs 3 dollars and a few thin steel shims in certain spots.

How worth it is using 400 step (0.9 deg) steppers?

>>1186968
a benefit i could see is that you'll be able to go below .03mm easier.

>>1186925
in terms of quality, your prints will be the same, will probably resolve some first layer issues and help with manual bed leveling. it can't hurt to try, its not game changing though. If i was making the printer, i would prioritize getting it working and making good prints, before QOL improvements.

>>1186925
Are you telling me those fucking $2 microswitch endstop sensors are better than a $40 bltouch? What a scam!

>>1186925
Would magnetic tape work with the inductive sensors?

>>1187005
I have no idea. I understand nothing about eddy currents, but for some people it works with aluminum foil.

>>1186910
Thanks. It's a homemade rig using ABS at relatively high temperature (245-250). I've used vinyl sheet to semi-enclose it, which seems to help a lot with ABS. It'll typically be ~40C in the enclosure when everything is at temp; my motors get pretty toasty though.

>>1187306
Motors should be okay up to like 70C ambient

>>1187327
Yeah I haven't had them punk out on me yet, but it won't surprise me if it happens.

Anyone use the Re-Arm 32-bit controller or the MKS Sbase? Looking for a cheap 32-bit controller.

I finally bit the bullet and built the anet a8, I will post my first print in a second

>>1188045
Pic related is the black rose from tf2 at 75% scale. The holes turned out pretty shit so I used bolts and solder to keep the thing together. Rate my first print/10?

>>1188046
Breddy gud

>>1188046
Bit hard to see any definition due to the contrast, but the lines/silhouette looks clean at least

>>1188046
Potato/5

>>1188045
Be prepared to replace your frame (mine started to crack after a few months). There's a guy on Ebay out of Vegas who does a good laser cut wood frame for the A8 for cheap, or there's plans on Thingiverse for an aluminum extrusion frame.

>>1188168
Why would it crack? Thermal expansion?

I have finally received all the parts I need for my printer, but its probably going to take a few weeks to put it together.

>>1188258

>>1188232
It probably doesn't help. I suspect acrylic is just too brittle to handle the stress you normally put a 3d printer under; the main rear spar that the Y connects to cracked in half, and I was getting fractures where the two uprights connect to the top.

>>1188045
I just finished my A8 too. I just printed a cube to test and then a new fan duct. I need more filament before any cool projects.

>>1188258
>>1188259
Looking forward to results, it looks like an absolute monster

Hi everybody, I think I just fucked up.

I was connecting my x and y end stops to my ramps board and I missconnected. There was a shorting sound, and some smoke in the DC power input into ramps (green ports). There was that characteristic smell afterwards.

I disconnected everything immediatly and inspected the board. It looked visually ok.

I decided to give it a try and turned it on. Now it boots up and I can navigate the menus, but when it comes to turning on a stepping motor, nothing moves and a RED LED light turns on.

Pic related is the red light.

The board is fried am I right?

I was just wondering here, my lab I'm in just got a Leapfrog Xeed. It's print quality has been average at best. Does anyone else have leapfrog products or specifically the xeed? And if so how has the quality of your prints been?

>>1188591
Ramps has a tendency to burn out the 5v voltage regulator if you connect endstops incorrectly.
Usually itll still run ok, but your LCD will look fucked up.
You might have done more damage than that since it wont work.

I would normally say replace the regulator, but you might wanna just buy a new board

>>1188627
Yes, my LCD also looks all fucked up, all white. you can still tell the menu and use it at a very steep angle though.

That is what I thought. Well, at least RAMPS costs only like 7 EUR.

>>1188258
Did you have those chassis pieces custom made?

https://formlabs.com/3d-printers/fuse-1/?utm_content=main-nav

Holy shit.

>>1188664
The waterjet aluminum plate and powder coated sheet metal was done by machine shops. All I am doing is design and assembly.

It sounds expensive but even a basic attempt at a frame, heated enclosure, and electrical enclosure would cost a fair chunk of change and taken a ton of work.

I was willing to pay the additional cost for something nice and learned a lot about working with machine shops in the process.

Hey guys, just got my prusa i3 running recently and while I'm very happy to be printing, my print quality is a bit below what I'd been expecting. I'm thinking about buying a new hot end with a smaller diameter nozzle. My current one is 0.5mm. Does anyone have recommendations for a new nozzle diameter?

>>1188697
that's lit as FUCK

Recently bought a Geeetech prusa i3 mk2 and after a little bit of testing it looks like the z motors are having a really hard time moving in the last 5 cm at the bottom of the vertical threaded rods. I think the holes in the frame that the rods go through are not lined up perfectly, so the rods need to be bent ever so slightly to be connected to the motor stub shafts.
Any tips on how to fix?

>>1188697
>>1188779
Too bad it's $10,000. Good thing is it's not $100,000+ like the next ones up, though.

>>1188697
>>1188841
I don't understand the market for these high-end hobby printers.

It's probably not on par with the quality of industrial printers, much like how the Form 2 falls short in resolution and usable materials, and it's too expensive for most hobbyists to see value in.

Unless you're doing multiple small-scale productions of various different projects you're probably just wasting money. One offs you could just get printed from a service like shapeways or sculpteo which offer better resolution (down to 65um layers IIRC vs Fuse 1's 100um). Larger productions you'd be better off going to a chinese injection molding company, which will give you better detail and material strength than anything 3D printed. Even for small and medium production there are US-run injection molding services (the name escapes me, but it was a start up a while ago) that do runs in the hundreds of pieces for a few thousand dollars.

I imagine only artists will see a big use for that thing, but even then why go with SLS when you could just part your statue out and print it with SLA printer, like the Form 2, and enjoy higher resolution and then have it recasted in casting resin.

>>1188878
>hobby printer
It's not just for hobbies - small businesses use them as well. Also, $3500 isn't that much money if you save wisely.

>Form 2 falls short in resolution
I am unsure where you got that idea, pic related.

Prototyping is also a popular use for this - in-house means nobody gets access to your parts, and turnaround is faster.

The 10k price tag on the Fuse is unappealing to me, though.

>>1188944
>It's not just for hobbies - small businesses use them as well. Also, $3500 isn't that much money if you save wisely.

For a FDM printer I think it's a pretty poor value. I built my own for around $1700 with linear guides (supposedly genuine hiwin, not sure if I can trust the chinese tho) with several stages of prototyping. You can build something like a c-bot with quality hardware and electronics for like 1/2 the cost of a Lulzbot Taz 6. It just takes a few hours, but it's a drop in the bucket compared to the time you'll be spending doing maintenance on a FDM printer anyway.

Form 2 occupies a nice niche, but the resins have terrible mechanical properties on paper so for anything "production" grade you'd need to recast them using casting resin. I'd say even art-pieces should recasted. That said, a DIY option like the littleRP 2 offers similar quality in finish for half the price, though even worse materials apparently, with spec sheets hidden somewhere.

>I am unsure where you got that idea, pic related.
The form 2 laser spot size is 140 microns. Pretty sure there are at least a few industrial printers that go down to around 50-60. And IIRC even DLP using a projector can go lower technically, though I'm sure there are other problems with that. It's fine for most people I'm sure, but it's not the same kind of quality professional prototype shops offer.

>Prototyping is also a popular use for this - in-house means nobody gets access to your parts, and turnaround is faster.
Not sure why nobody getting access to your parts if important. If you're going to send something to production you have much bigger problems to worry about, like the chinese. Faster turnaround is good but you also end up having to do clean up, maintenance, and all related duties in house as well, so it's an additional cost. And I doubt Formlabs is going to offer professional support for you if you really fuck things up.

I'm sure there is a niche but I just don't see the point of it.

>>1188944
The main thing is that with cheap services like shapeways and sculpteo I just don't see the point unless you're making something suspect, like little anime girl statues or you're making large volumes of unique items. Which mostly artists do. The only real advantage I see is the turn around and I guess privacy for certain types of people. But you're facing a massive up front cost for a piece of hardware you've bought. Whereas services like sculpteo and shapeways will often get new machines, like the Carbon m1, which sculpteo offers for a premium cost but available nonetheless.

>>1188878
>I don't understand the market for these high-end hobby printers.
Small companies and large companies that want to speed up their product development. With 200k you get around 50 Form 2 printers or you can get a one industrial one. Both are useful.

>It's probably not on par with the quality of industrial printers, much like how the Form 2 falls short in resolution and usable materials, and it's too expensive for most hobbyists to see value in.
Form 2 has acceptable quality for the price. Of course it is worse in some aspects than a 200k machine.

>I imagine only artists will see a big use for that thing
You seem to be uninformed in a special way

>For a FDM printer I think it's a pretty poor value. I built my own for around $1700
Did you count your hours into that?

>but the resins have terrible mechanical properties on paper so for anything "production" grade you'd need to recast them using casting resin.
SLA is mainly used for prototyping

>And IIRC even DLP using a projector can go lower technically, though I'm sure there are other problems with that.
Typical build volume for a DLP printer is about the size of a cigarette box.

>Not sure why nobody getting access to your parts if important.
You wouldn't believe how paranoid some clients are with their designs

>And I doubt Formlabs is going to offer professional support for you if you really fuck things up.
Usually the ones who really fuck up with these machines know just enough about what they are doing to be dangerous.
Affordable SLS machine from a major player has been waited for years.

>>1188966
>FDM printer
We're talking about SLA (laser, not projector) printers, though. You can definitely build FDM printers for way cheaper.

>140 microns
Do you really consider this bad? Remember that most printers are limited by the NOZZLE size, which is from what I remember on average 0.4mm.

>the resins have bad mechanical properties
What's stopping you from using any other resin that has a curing wavelength of the same as the Form2? You don't need to use only the resins they sell.

>>1188591
check the fuses for volatge drop (should be zero)
pull up the schematic and use some basic electronics skillz

Aspiring maker, never 3dp on my own. A few of the makers in my area are debating the BuildOne on KS. Anyone have any thoughts pro or con. Biggest appeal to me is the price tag atm, but not sure of anything else.

>>1189143
Do your first print with a service, so you can be certain you'll have more than absolutely nothing to print.

I have a problem.
I have a prusa i3 based china clone and stepper on extruder seems to do nothing. When rotating the motor it just makes some noise and the shaft "shakes" around just a bit. I swapped the stepper on Y-axis and got the same result on low speeds, however I was able to make it move normally by triying the higher speed setting on the control panel on LCD or repetier host. So what setting should I fiddle around with, or could it be that my wiring is at fault? The printer itself has worked flawlessly for around 3-4 months before this.

>>1189154
Forgot to mention, I had to format my PC recently and lost my settings. I also moved to a now place and something might have happened during moving.

>>1189154
Check the pots on the drivers, that sounds like how motors behave when they aren't getting enough amps to deal with the load. This also happens if the extruder is blocked, enough current but abnormally high load.
Another similar thing is when one of the wires isn't connected, just go over the wiring with a multimeter and make sure everything's connected.

>>1189158
>Check the pots on the drivers,
Whats that? English is not my first language and I have not really spent that much with electronics. The motor should be under load since there is no filament and the spring thingy is not attached so it should not have any resistance. I will double check the wiring, even though the connectors seem fine.

>>1189160
Potentiometers, the A4whatever and DRV8825 stepper motor drivers have potentiometers to adjust the amperage that the motors get. If you have some custom board then this doesn't apply.

>>1189161
Alright, thanks. I will do some testing and let you know if I can get that shit working again.

Funny thing happened though. Removed the LCD board from ramps and reattached the cables wrong way and killed the LCD board. I guess I have to keep my laptop plugged while printing

>>1188795
pls respond

>>1188795
>I think the holes in the frame that the rods go through are not lined up perfectly,
This is retarded design, fucking chinks. Drill the holes to a bit larger diameter to give some free space for the upper ends of the rods.

>>1189161
>>1189162
Alright. There seemed to be a wire to the stepper that had resistance jumping all around. I replaced the wire and managed to get everything working again.

Thanks for the assist.

>>1189180
will that be ok though? Won't the rod sway left and right if I do that, messing up the y axis?

>>1189182
Smooth rods keeps it at place and threaded moves it up and down.

>>1186052
>small parts for guns and switchblades
>sears
You're best off using a plate of the right thickness, glue, design printed on paper, and a hand file.

>>1189184
>>1189182
This. The Y axis screws on Prusas are supposed to be loose on top by design, to keep them from binding.

why are they 3DPD threads?

>>1188795
post x-axis rods, and the lockrings.
do respond.

>>1189400
same guy, fyi, i have successfully solved all the problems with that printer, without the z-axis modifications.

>>1189220
*Z

Tested the sheet metal fits and printed some covers for the wiring.

>>1189627
Did you design this beauty on your own?

If 3D printers are so useful, why doesn't AvE have one?

>>1189694
hes an imbecile

>>1189400
by X-axis you mean the vertical one? Just to make sure, because in my instruction manual vertical is z, left-right is y and forward-backward is x. Also I'm a noob.

>>1189668
Yeah I did the cad and paid for most of the fabrication. Honestly I'm pretty surprised it fits as well as it does because there are a lot of parts and sheet metal tolerances stack with every bend.

Is this a good beginner 3D printer?
Mainly wanna create busts and statues to paint.

>>1189753
Stick out your left hand in a finger-gun with the first two fingers out and thumb up. Bend middle finger so it's at 90deg to other two. Thumb is Z, first is Y, middle is X. Universal reference.

>>1189753
the axis that moves left to right, that's not the bed, and holds the extruder.
my hypothesis for the z axis binding, is that when you tension the x-belt, you pull the z axis rods together, causing them to flex, but it becomes harder to flex the rods the lower the z axis is.
by changing the configuration of where the lock rings are, you keep the x-belt from unduly affecting the z-axis and causing binding.the way the manual states to place the rings is retarded. .also consider a teflon lubricant.

i'm unsure if your problem is the same as mine, but a photo would confirm.

>>1189944
mspaint for axis labels, to be abundantly clear

>>1189950
>>1189944
Oh I see what you mean. Yes the locking rings on my X axis rods are on the outside of the carriages, which is indeed what the instructions said. Like you said I did have the suspicion that tightening the X belt would pull the Z carriages in, thus bending the Z rods. Also in my case the holes for the X rods on the Z carriages were super tight, had to make them larger with a file but they're still tight enough to impede the X rods from sliding, even without locking rings; I think this makes the problem even worse.

I hope this is the issue because it would be a very simple fix. I'll do it tomorrow and post photos. Thanks for the help.

>>1189992
this was exactly my case, glad i could help, rods included.
modifications i was able to make:
part cooling fan.
replaced z rods to leadscrews.
various bits and bobs.
i lurk here pretty often, so if you need help ill probs be around.
i'm away from mine currently, or i would post pics.

>>1189871
I have the dreamer and I wish I had got the creator pro. It's cheaper, functions the same, and is more modular.

Is the E3D Chimera a terribly designed hotend? It's impossible to design for it and no one seems to use it. Looking for a print cooler shows basically no results

>>1190094
I know alot of people that tried to use it eventually went with the cyclops because it was really difficult to align the nozzles on the chimera

>>1190234
The thing I don't like about the Cyclops is it has no nozzle variety. I want 0.25mm nozzles. Otherwise I would've picked it

>>1187004
BLtouch is kind of a scam to begin with, it's just a solenoid with an opto endstop...

>>1190234
I think dual x-carriages like on the BCN3D Sigma is the future for dual extrusion. No alignment issues, weighs as much as a single extruder at any given time, its self-cleaning so no need for a priming tower...

So I have been thinking of building a smartrapcore recently. I have read some alright reviews about it and I'm interested in the coreXY design. it would be pretty cheap and it seems like it wouldn't be all that hard to make. I feel like it could be a good starting point for some of the ideas I have for later and as a general learning curve however do you think I should just go with aluminum extrusions instead of a wooden frame? I like the idea of using wood because then I can play around with mounting different Z axis designs without having to attach extra aluminum and if something fucks up or I want to change it, it wouldn't be hard to replace the wood. Eventually I would like to experiment with another build to try to use a modular head for cnc and laser engraving attachments but I would want to have a printer already to test out different printed parts. What do you guys think?

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:651117

>>1190655
I'm thinking about moding my printer to something like that.
Do open souce firmware and slicers support that printer style?

>>1189807
You gonna release the files and parts list? I'd download and start budgeting in a heartbeat for something this clean. Nice work anon.

>>1190655
Isn't the 2nd extruder still mounted on the moving y-axis? And you need a second belt or something to support it so it's a little additional weight.

>>1190746

There's supposedly support for it in Marlin (the Sigma uses Marlin), but i haven't investigated yet. I'd like to do that mod too at some point in the future.

>>1190786

On the Sigma yes, but it's not such a big issue there since it uses two bowdens. On something like a Prusa though, the extra weight is supported entirely by the Z axis so there's virtually no performance impact compared to a single extruder there.

>>1190746

Btw forgot to mention - it works with the "Tool Change" command in gcode, the rest is done by the firmware. Any slicer that supports "Tool Change" ought to work.

>>1190655
>>1190810

Isn't the Prusa's multi-material extruder already a better solution? It mounts a single E3D with a "multi material heatbreak" that takes up to 4 materials.

>>1190825

Prusa's solution is closer to an E3D cyclops, so you need to waste more material and print time on purging the nozzle when switching materials. You're also restricted to using materials that don't vary too much in their printing temperature or you risk clogs from either printing too cold or burning the material. Lastly it's limited to only bowden drives so i'm not sure how well it performs with flexible filaments. (It probably does OK with 3mm flex)

It's a pretty cool design and i can see it used a lot for multi-color stuff in the future. Its biggest advantage is being able to do 4 filaments instead of just 2. It's not a universal solution though.

I bought the MP select mini and it works out of the box as advertised, but it has pretty garbage z banding for one reason or another.

Is there a quick fix for this or should i just deal with it for muh functional parts?

>>1190894
a quick google search leads me to believe that the z coupler is garbage, but it seems replacing it is a pain in the ass.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kKYI7Q0Dso

>>1190838
Isn't waste unavoidable with multi-extruders? You're going to be drizzle that you need to purge.

Something that can feed different filaments continuously like it was one would be ideal in terms of quality, though you'd be limited to similar temp materials, which is fine for most people probably.

>>1190812
neat, now I gotta figure out how to add a sixth stepper to my rambo.

>>1191048

A single nozzle wastes much more by comparison. On the other hand, Prusa's approach is far simpler mechanically and is thus much cheaper to implement. I'd like to see how well it handles water-soluble PVA filaments as that's more important than color.

>>1191562
PVA is a meme though. You can just pair stuff like PETG with PLA and get easily removed supports without the hassle of possible PVA clogs.

And how does the 2x single extruder set up allow for better alignment? Does it have autobed leveling for each hotend?

>>1185513
so, i'm using a barebones orthogonal view program to make 3d models, but mostly because i can easily create depressions/subtract material by drawing a shape over an object then simply typing the negative z value (eg. like putting a hex hole (or any shape) on top of a screw (or any object))

the only thing is that is doesn't import complex models well or at all, really


is there any program (preferably not solidworks) that can do this and accepts complex imported STLs?
can 123D Design do what i need?

>pic unrelated

>>1192082
Why not use Blender?

Anyone else getting an error page when trying to download Cura? Both 2.5 and 2.6 are giving me errors, security and missing page respectively.

Hey 3dpg, I have a problem. My reprap seems to have overheating issues in either the motors or the drivers. I know that the usual response is to lower the voltage via the trimpot on the stepper driver, but I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place. If I lower the voltage through the motor by the trimpot, then the motor stops spinning due to low current. If I raise the voltage, then an hour or two into a print, the extruder motor and extruder motor driver heat up to the point where it once again stops extruding. My driver is this...

http://reprap.org/wiki/G3D_driver

I tried swaping the driver out with another unused one with limited success. I also swapped the motor between a Wantai NEMA 17 1.8 degree step motor and a Wantai NEMA 17 0.9 degree step motor. Both experienced the same problem. I have also checked the extruder gear and bolt to ensure it turns easily, and print at a high enough temperature that forcing plastic through the hotend shouldn't be the problem.

It has been working for months. The only thing that changed is summer brought a small heat wave which makes my shop reach around 90 degrees F during the day. I didn't think drivers or motors would be sensitive enough for that to stop my printer though. Any suggestions?

>>1192443
You could stick a ceramic heat sink on it, looks like the ones for the rPi would be the right size.

>>1192443
Stepper drivers are typically supposed to be rated for a 60C ambient temperature, as in they'll run in fucking hot situations. Otherwise they'd have little use in actual industrial machines much less a hobby printer made of wood.

I'd say put heatsinks on your drivers and try blowing a fan over your drivers. I have a 12V 120mm PC case fan running across my atmega/RAMPS and to my SSR's heatsink. It's virtually silent but has decent airflow and is enough to cool 3x Chinese a4988s and 2x drv8825s.

>>1192336
>Blender
it can do that?

i've just started to learn blender, but it seems a bit complicated, specifically when getting things aligned

with the program im using now, i cheat by drawing lines and drawing circles over those lines to measure and position things correctly (shapes snap to each other at points and center points)
and then there's rotation: i copy and rotate the depressions 120deg and snap the end of the lines to the center of circle


i dont even know where to start with those operations in blender

>>1192667
Yes and no. What you're talking about is booleans. Yes, aligning things is a bitch - the snapping feature helps (you can change it from increment to vertex and some third option I think). You can also move things by specific values by just typing in the number (it'll show up in the bottom-left, above the timeline).

Honestly, if you just punch in whatever you need into google (like "Blender snap vertex") the community is large enough that you'll find 50 different ways to do it. Alternatively, if you break what you need down into small steps I can try to help out with specific functions and tools.

Pretty much what you need to know is G Grabs, R Rotates, S Scales, TAB goes into Edit or Object mode, Shift-A Adds, and CTRL adds snapping to the current operation. Also, you can align something to a specific axis by pressing X, Y or Z and to a specific plane by pressing one then the other key (X -> Z, Y->Z, etc.)

>>1191764

Perhaps, but you can't use PETG with PLA for everything, like supports that are mostly on the inside of the object and only liquids can get to them. As for alignment i'm not sure, it might still be difficult. Two bed probes may help. Or you can have the second hotend adjustable with a thumbscrew so that you can do the "paper leveling" procedure on it at a single point to make sure its Z is aligned with the first one.

Can PETG use PVA supports btw, has anybody tried?

Are cantilevered beds actually more stable than something that's balancing on the middle? I have two leadscrews on each side of my z-axis bed and it rocks back and forth whenever I try to adjust it. A cantilevered bed wouldn't do that right? It'd just sag a little on the unsupported side but it wouldn't rock.

>>1192670
alright, thanks for the tips

i'll try these out when my design requires it, i'll give blender another shot

>>1193128

No, your implementation is probably flimsy. Cheaper ultimaker clones often have that problem where the cantilever bed wobbles too much. Plus it shouldnt be supported only by the leadscrews, the backlash on the nuts will cause the whole bed to move. You need linear rails or rods also.

What's the best cheapo 3d printer one can get in europe ?

>>1193343
Just bought an anet a8 £130 pretty decent results so far

>>1193314
>You need linear rails or rods also.
I have two on each side but the bed still rocks. Maybe I need a 3rd leadscrew

Is it impossible to print Polywood without stringing between islands? My Baby Groot heads come out pretty nicely but the bodies require significant cleanup no matter what I do with retraction.

I'm printing at 80μm layer height.

>>1193513
Looks like that stuff prints @ PLA temps; you try burning the strings off with a heat gun? Not exactly a solve, but it would at least make cleanup easier.

>>1193517
Thanks, that does work but it tends to smooth out the finish, defeating the point of using such a pricey filament to get that wood-texture straight off the printer. At the moment, I'm using a dental pick.

What do you all think of this prusia i3 clone? http://m.gearbest.com/3d-printers-3d-printer-kits/pp_343643.html

I've got an Alunar 550 from Amazon that I have to a point where it will print pretty well. I replaced the PSU, cured the stupid wiring, and got it stable. I can't print any faster than around 50mm/s without the machine beating itself to death, also I can't get any more precision out of it without flashing skynet and calibrating it from scratch. I was able to print a full bed of 32 wire drag chain links and only had 2 fuse with the support material, the rest were perfect.

My goal is to build a oversized Hypercube style machine with a few changes to move the steppers outside the box so that it can work in polycarbonate without killing itself.

Should I try to milk the last bit of precision of this chinese shit before moving on or just say fuck it and build the next machine knowing the first job will be to reprint itself? It will all have to be PC parts eventually anyway, but I want those precise and right.

Also the leading candidate for controller for my next machine is a Beaglebone black with Replicape or maybe a Smoothieboard. Anything else I should be considering?

How is it that Simplify3d is still the only slicer to support custom placeable supports. It's like they're fucking lightyears ahead of everyone else and they don't even give a shit so they stopped working on it.

>>1193773
meshmixer has comparable supports, though its slic3r is prop. , you can however, export the supports. I think its nice for organic models, but its mediocre for anything else.

>>1193781
* slicer.

>>1193781
You'd think after all this time someone else would implement it into their slicer... The cura generated supports might as well be part of the model when printed in PLA. It's impossible to remove.

>>1193671
take what you learned from getting good prints, and apply it to the design of your custom printer. Get the new beaglebone with the built in wifi chip, so that you'll be able to use it as a server and controller. you won't need a computer tied to it that way, and you can reposition it without it being a chore. Client/control can be a nearby PC.

the larger the xy axises are, the stronger the z will need to be. Get proper 8mm leadscrew/s instead of threaded rods. If you get z-wobbles, check that the z-coupler isn't the origin of it.

get a larger bed, but don't hob-cobble multiple beds together, as heating will be pretty nonuniform; the silicone heating pads are pretty great. cover the bed in kapton.

a dry-box for the polycarbonate filament to stay in during printing and storage.

polycarbonate makes a lot of micro-fine particles, print in a very well ventilated area.

tiredposting, sorry.

>>1193810
>Get the new beaglebone with the built in wifi chip
Beaglebone Green?

>the larger the xy axises are, the stronger the z will need to be.
I'm thinking a 200x400 bed with a carbon fiber plate for the sled and carbon fibre x-axis rails.

>silicon heating pads
i want to use mains power for the bed, wiring it safely is the easy part for me. Code and modeling is my struggle.

>well ventilated.
one of my design parameters is for the work area to be enclosed and insulated. I wanted a more sophisticated controller so I could add environment controls easier. I'm finding that pc and nylon are the two materials most relevant for the type of things i want to make, so the machine will accommodate not killing it's users from the start.

>>1193819
>carbon fibre x-axis rails.
wut

>>1193671
>Also the leading candidate for controller for my next machine is a Beaglebone black with Replicape or maybe a Smoothieboard. Anything else I should be considering?
Azteeg x5 GT

>>1193819
>bbg
either that one, or this one. Not sure on the board compatibility.
https://beagleboard.org/black-wireless

>code/modeling
what are you using as a modeller? I've been using freecad, its very easy to define 3d printer part like shapes using sketches, its very easy to keep dimensions consistent.
i found openscad lacking greatly in that regard. I've heard solidworks preforms adequately.

>>1193823
this stuff, or similar. fraction of the weight of aluminum and extremely stiff.
https://hobbyking.com/en_us/carbon-fiber-tube-hollow-8x750mm.html?___store=en_us

>>1193825
That's the best smoothieboard based system I've seen, but by the time I add drivers equivalent to the bbb/replicape the price is close enough to be a wash. I need to examine these two a little closer.

>>1193828
Blender. I learned it a while ago when I wanted to know how to make motion graphics. I'm not designing from scratch yet, just trying to figure out a work flow that produces accurately sized results on the printer.

Thanks for the replies all. Very nice board here.

>>1193832
>this stuff, or similar. fraction of the weight of aluminum and extremely stiff.
>https://hobbyking.com/en_us/carbon-fiber-tube-hollow-8x750mm.html?___store=en_us
I highly doubt carbon fiber has the stiffness of steel rods, or the hardness after hundreds of hours of use.

>>1193834
>I highly doubt carbon fiber has the stiffness of steel rods
I'm not the first to do it. A youtuber built his Hypercube with them, but his steppers were still inside the build area.

>>1193834
>>1193838
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Pg-L1pQ6qU
youtuber in question i suppose. i imagine it will be fine.

>>1193832
>blender
if you plan on doing a lot of boolean operations, or are planning on using it for your project, i would advise against it.

glad to have you here, we appreciate updates if you make progress.

>>1193840
>boolean operations
Blender has a boolean modifier that's pretty easy to use. Overall, it's fiddly to set up for sure but you can work in real measurements reliably once it is set up properly for it, and I already know quite a bit of Blender.

>updates
for sure. I'm going to start printing hypercubes parts soon. will post pics.

Is there anybody on here that has an idea if there's a torrentable version of Matrix 9? Or some such way to go about getting it? Please and thank you.

Does anyone sell their services on 3D Hubs, is it worth doing and how did you work out how much to charge?

>>1193854
>Matrix 9
You can add JewelCraft to Blender and do almost all of that for free.

How much torque would a stepper motor need to power a single motor, closed loop z-axis bed that weighs like 15lb empty? I'm talking like 400x400x6mm aluminum plate on aluminum extrusions for a very big printer.

I'm looking at a 5:1 geared stepper motor but I don't like how it loses an inch vertically to accommodate the gearbox.

>>1194080
depends higly on your lead angle and lubrication.

>>1194080
Get a ballscrew, immediately you have 50%+ more power from efficiency of transfer, probably more since they have a smaller lead angle than the typical chinkshit screw people use.
A small-ish NEMA23 rated at 12.5kgcm should handle it either way. You can also use belt drive to gear down the stepper.

>>1193861
>Does anyone sell their services on 3D Hubs, is it worth doing and how did you work out how much to charge?
Yes
No
too much

Have fun dealing with tards.

>>1194207
Thanks for the reply. I think I might give it a miss.

>>1194085
I'm not buying a ballscrew. They're like $200 a piece.

>A small-ish NEMA23 rated at 12.5kgcm should handle it either way. You can also use belt drive to gear down the stepper.
A smallish nema23 is about the same size as the geared Nema17 stepper motor I'm looking at so there's no real size advantage, and the Nema23s all have wider and longer dimensions while being just as tall. And I'm pretty sure my RAMPs and DRV8825s can't drive a nema23 at full torque so I can't make use of it anyway.

>>1194080
Add a counterweight. It will affect responsiveness as it adds inertia, but Z moves are slow anyway, so it might be fine.
But don't add the same weight for counterweight, because you could get problems with backlash. There should still be enough force to push nut to the thread of leadscrew constantly in the same direction at all times.

>>1194243
Chinese rolled screws are like $30 an axis shipped, and you can get reduction via timing pulleys. A stepper at 3:1 or even 2:1 should have no problem lifting 15lb, but you can do the math to be sure.

https://www.aliexpress.com/store/product/1pcs-Anti-backlash-ballscrew-1204-L-260mm-with-end-machined-1pcs-SFU1204-ballnut-for-CNC-Route/314742_32759759551.html

Assembly is going to be quite a task, the wire management has to be somewhat iterative because there are a lot of cables and not very much space.

>>1194379

>>1194380

>>1194378
Based on this calculation: (pi * TPI * oz-in)/8 I found on cnczone a larger nema17 could hold up the weight. Even after multiplying by the poor efficiency of the leadscrew (0.2). Although another posts says 4-start screws actually have pretty high efficiency, which is what all those chinese leadscrews are.

I'm trying to print an Eiffel tower in ABS but the quality looks like shit.
Do any of you know what settings I should adjust to make it look better?
Print temps are 235/90

>>1194486
another pic

>>1194486
Your retraction settings might be a little off. Why are you using ABS instead of PLA?

>>1194525
I have mastered PLA and thought I should get experience with ABS before moving on to things like TPU

I'll post my retraction settings in a bit when I'm at my computer

>>1194378
Speaking of ballscrews has any made a ballscrew driven printer for the Y and X axis? How could I convert my corexy to a ballscrew driven gantry? The x-axis seems simple enough, just needs one screw on the x-axis rail. But what about the y-axis? Do I need ballscrews on each side or will one do?

>>1189154
My cheap Chinese i3 started having stepper current problems a month in, started getting shifts mid-print, I checked and rechecked the stepper driver pots, luckily I caught the vref changing on me. It was moody and SOMETIMES provided enough current. Apparently the 5v source on the Arduino mega is prone to failing, if you remove D1 on RAMPS you can provide 5v to the aux pins (look up the RAMPS schematic, it's next to the service output pins). I use a wall-wart. Have not had any stepper problems since, and I've been using it like this for almost 2 years now.

>>1194727
you want to drop the entire cross belt fun mechanism shit?
well depends how big the table is and how fucking good your slides are.
probably one in the middle if you can fit it in why not.

>>1194525
here are my retraction settings

>>1194727
Ballscrews aren't well suited to printers. The problem is that they need to spin up pre-reduction so every gram of ballscrew is maybe 50 times harder to accelerate than a gram of extruder.

Here's an example of what I mean. A typical printer might rapid at 150mm/s. Matching that speed with a 5mm pitch screw requires spinning it at 1800rpm. Changing direction is a net 3600rpm change on maybe 600g of steel. At that point the weight of the extruder becomes virtually irrelevant, spinning the screw up and down just takes way too long.

Stratasy's high end FDM printers use fast-travel (>20mm pitch) ballscrews with servos, but they are throwing around four direct drive extruders and each axis is probably 20 grand in parts.

I just put a silicone thermal sock on my e3d heat block and I heated it up to 250 with everything together and my printer started to smoke a bit.

Is it normal for new silicone socks to smoke when they're first used?

It could have been the ABS that I'm doing a test print with that was in the nozzle

However it looks like the smoke stopped for now but I'm afraid to leave the room while it prints

I bought a kit. Wiring needs some work though.

What's the legality of selling Thingiverse prints? I was thinking about printing figurines and stuff to sell at a convention, but there must be some legal issues with that. Some people at cons sell posters and shit of characters from shows and games, but 3d printing has to worry about the intellectual property and the model designer.

>>1194841
if you took the sock off, was anything under it burnt?
could you have burnt the internal tubing of the extruder?

>a mere $120000
https://www.desktopmetal.com/products/studio/

>>1194379
>>1194380
>>1194383

the fucking hotness

>>1194815
>Stratasy's high end FDM printers use fast-travel (>20mm pitch)
If the pitch is 20mm then what's the lead? 20mm lead ballscrews aren't exceptionally more expensive than shorter lead ballscrews, given it's still like $500-700 a piece for brand name manufactured ones.

Sort of related

Has anyone gotten metal cast from shapeways? How accurate are the castings? Looking for a relatively cheap way to create stuff that's accurate under 0.1mm

>>1195191
For a hobbyist build I was thinking more of the rolled chinese screws which don't have much variety.

But yeah, if you are buying ground screws then getting the longer lead is no problem

>>1195134
What business would ever reach a break even point on a machine like that? A toy company that makes figurines makes sense, but there are way cheaper machines they could prototype with. Who is the market for a 6 figure printer the size of a small copier?

>>1195671

It would be way cheaper to just print a part with PLA and then cast it in metal.

>>1195534
Linearmotion2008 on ebay has 10mm lead ballscrews. RM1610 and RM2510

There's definitely some variety out there in the Chinese and Taiwanese markets

ebay for automation surplus, they are either cheaper or just as much for name brand old/slightly used stock ground ball screws in sizes 6/8/10 mm in nice variety of pitches , for the same price as chinese rolled new

the surplus rolled ballscrews are even cheaper than new chinese rolled ballscrews

usually come with all the blocks, name brands like THK NSK IKO KSS

>>1195728
used ones usually come in extra long or extra short varieties it seems. Unless they do cuts for you

>>1195226
I've gotten Sterling silver cast and while I didn't measure it, it "looks" right - it was a ring and it would have been pretty noticable if the gaps were smaller/larger than they should have been.

My printer is melting the wrong plastic :/

>>1195775
Way too much current for the connection. What does that do?

>>1195776
It comes off the power brick for my malyan m200/mp select mini clone.

I had been running it for about 8 hours and it's hot as fuck in the UK right now.

After letting the plastic cool it fits back in the hole after a few hard jams.

I'm going to make that tower fire in london look like a tealight.

>>1195781
You should consider direct soldering and just remove the connector. That's not going to get better.

>>1195671
instead of hiring a CNC guy and CNC machine/tools or jobbing out prototype CNC, you make an "office friendly" machine that is easy enough for engineers to use within their department , if the company had a big enough engineering department or is an engineering firm then probably for something like that

>>1195671
Plenty; if that $120 grand machine lets you fufill multimillion dollar contracts, it's a drop in the bucket.

>>1195804
>instead of hiring a CNC guy and CNC machine/tools or jobbing out prototype CNC
>>1195805
>it's a drop in the bucket
The new Kurzgesagt video is pretty spot on I guess. Hopefully I will stay qualified to repair our new overlords.

>>1195781
>>1195782
I think I would just resolder a new connector and address it if that one melts too. Direct soldering might be a bad idea, as it's just a band-aid if there's a bigger electrical problem. That plastic shouldn't be melting, as you know

>>1195822
>That plastic shouldn't be melting, as you know
Replacing the connector should be the last thing you do. Presuming the power brick and connector are sized correctly for the load I would wager 3:1 they are not, there is a high resistance failure somewhere else that caused that connector to fail.
I would strongly suspect a failed or failing connector in the bed circuit that caused that main power connector to melt.

Are there any decent gun designs yet?
A basic self-rolling revolver would be nice

Here is the 3d printer finally moving. I've been trying to keep the wiring neat but there is a lot of wire and not much space.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rLaKQDeTfo

I had a bit of a scare powering it up for the first time because the servos draw a ton of power on startup which was tripping the overcurrent protection on my power supply.

>>1195942
Slicker than owl shit.

>>1194379
>finger indicator
thermal expansion and warp of your plastic is probably going to be bigger than the entire range of that thing

I look forward to your 100mm/s prints with that servo feedback

>>1196027
I don't think this was ever meant to be a fast or good printer, just a "do it for the hell of it"-type of project

>>1196029
Sure, as far as I can tell it's silliness throughout. But if any printer is going to manage incredible speeds without ringing, this is the one.

>>1196031
That printer strikes me as being very repeatable. Precision and speed aside, I would anticipate that the quality would not vary much over a pretty wide rage of conditions.

>>1195912
>3D printed gun
Stop. It's not viable and this meme needs to die. There are plenty of discussions why it won't work, go read one of them.

>>1196136
You can do lower recievers with the right materials.

>>1196167
go a step further and print a low % fill lower and cast it with aluminum in your back yard

>>1196167
An AR15 lower does not a revolver make. The lower is a relatively low-stress piece and one of the only parts that can be printed that could be considered "part" of a gun (as opposed to accessories).

>>1196179
Maybe you're not US? Legally, you're incorrect.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/921
>3) The term “firearm” means (A) any weapon (including a starter gun) which will or is designed to or may readily be converted to expel a projectile by the action of an explosive; (B) the frame or receiver of any such weapon; (C) any firearm muffler or firearm silencer; or (D) any destructive device. Such term does not include an antique firearm.
Assuming a weapon with both an upper and lower, the lower is considered the operable part of the weapon (everything else in an accesory).

>>1196187
>Legally, you're incorrect
No, because that anon mentioned a revolver, and an AR15 lower is generally not used to make a revolver (bar some people making weird builds), so legality has nothing to do with that.

If you're being pedantic, yes, you can make a peashooter "which expels a projectile by the action of an explosive" AND it is possible to 3D print a "frame or receiver", but it's not a VIABLE method. Sure, you could get a few shots off before it gets ruined, but it's not a good method of making a gun.

If you want to make it untraceable or completely home-built, then for the price of a printer and materials that could make a long-term receiver or "gun" you could easily buy a CNC or rent machine time for much less.

>>1196136
The Liberator has been "viable" for years already.
The Shuty has already gone through a few generations and is a semi-automatic pistol with magazine feed.
There's also a functioning revolver (or a pepperbox, really) called the Washbear, which seems pretty good.

In addition to that, there a many simple shotguns and a bunch of rifle parts.

>>1196027
I've been doing everything as precisely as I can (because why not) and so far every axis is flatter than I can measure (<0.0002") and square to <0.001" over full travel against a granite reference.

I'm currently trying to tune gains. Pushing the speed up on these stages is nerve wracking because older servo drives don't have good testing/tuning features and they go fast enough to do permanent damage if you lose control.

>>1196090
Yeah I'm not bothering with a bed sensor because I expect alignment to effectively last forever.

Why do my prints look like shit? This is supposed to be an angled utility knife, but thats not important. See how mine has a lot of gaps and looks sloppy with the plastic not touching together?
>PLA
>210C extruder
>60C bed
>10% infill

>>1196402
First things that come to mind:
-Underextrusion
-Nozzle width setting too big (i.e. you have a .4 nozzle and settings are for .6)
-shitty/undersized plastic
-speeds too fast
-layer height miscalibration (should be .2 but is moving .3)

First print, started doing this, or are they all like this?

>>1196406
The cube and the utility knife holder have their bottom most layers being shown. The cube is the first thing I have printed. The ring on the right is showing the top layer, which seems ok. It has jagged edges, but that is unrelated and intentional. I just checked and the nozzle matches the settings. Layer height is 0.2mm as well. Print speed is at 50mm/s. It very well may be the filament since it's just some sample stuff that came with my printer, I just want to know the possibilities.

>>1196418
Underextrusion might be the culprit, then - check the filament diameter and extrusion speed, you might be feeding less than it needs for a good layer. I can't think of anything else at the moment.

I've got a video of it hitting 500mm/s here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYjPZ60ahYs

I didn't bother pushing the jerk/accel very far because I'll have to retune once the bed/extruder are mounted and it's a fairly tedious process.

The datasheets for the stages claim they can reach speeds and accelerations 4x higher than what I show in my video. In practice I'm expecting maybe twice the current acceleration once I've added 500-800g to each axis.

>>1196507
How does the interface for the drivers work? Does it have a stepper emulation interface?

Do you control acceleration via the linear servo drivers, or via your RAMPS/whatever?

I'd be surprised if you need any jerk limit, the current control loop ought to be incredibly fast on those things.

>>1196518
The servo drives run a PID with feedforward and optional filters.

They emulate a step/dir stepper drive with some tweaks to communicate limit switches, fault signals, and z-index back to the Smoothie.

I can set acceleration/jerk in Smoothie, but the servo will apply its own vel/accel/jerk limits and of course what the servo can physically achieve will depend on how well tuned the gains are.

Technically I could let Smoothie run infinite accel/jerk and let the servos work things out, but that could create smoothing or desync in the toolpath. On the other hand, at realistic printing speeds the servos might just accelerate so quickly that infinite accel/jerk is a reasonable approximation.

There are a lot of options and I'm not really sure how they will affect prints (or if it will even be noticeable).

>>1196136

Considering that an AK47's receiver is made out of stamped steel and that somebody made a whole rifle out of a shovel (pic related), it's not that far fetched to be using a 3d printer as yet another instrument for making something.

With that being said, it's the media's fault for creating this meme out of nothing.

>>1196530

(forgot pic)

>>1196528
Yeah, Marlin at least accounts for acceleration in its path planning - it'll spend extra time to stop and turn at corners, rather than round them out. It also proportionally slows down the extruder - there's enough lag that I don't think this is wholly effective, but at least causes the right total amount of plastic to be deposited, which is important for infill. (infill is probably where your accel settings will matter the most - 180 degree turns, so if you set infinite accel in smoothie, you might fail to connect the infill to the perimeter)

There are very few people who have done closed loop, I'm curious to see how it goes. I've wanted to do something similar, but with traditional steppers and the AS5048.

Can someobe explain why my retraction is fucked? ( anet a8, retrac dist and speed are in mm)

>>1196714
Try lower temperature. Or different filament. Once I had some PLA and was printing at 160°C and quite a lot of retraction. It was still oozing. (I couldn't set lower temp due to firmware restrictions).

>>1194488

Kio-towers.jpg

>>1196714
Yeah, i'd deal with temp before retraction. Check that your hotend is built correctly; on my A8, my hotend was assembled with the thermistor outside of the block; spent a good week trying to dial in on false temp readings.

>>1196714
Take a close-up pic of one of the prints and I'll give you a good guess as to what you need to adjust

If you could send a message back in time to yourself when you started 3D printing, what advice would you give yourself?

New to 3d printing and a friend gave me an m3d goddamn is this thing a piece of shit. Do you guys have any tips on getting prints out of it that aren't fucked all the time? Like the lack of a heated bed makes damn near everything impossible.

>>1197027
buy a heated bed, they cost like ten bucks

I have been printing okay with this white Spectrum PLA, then the top who prints happened.
Did the same print with the same settings with a different filament on the bottom, Verbatim black PLA, and it was fine. Both rolls sat in my room for months, the nozzle was clean, temperatures the same. Why does this happen?

>>1196714
Fiddle with temperatures too.
Maybe lower retraction speeds would work too. I have noticed with PETG high retraction speeds do nothing, but below 30mm/s it starts to get better. Its still stringy as fuck but thats just PETG.

>>1196402
Check extrusion speeds and your nozzle size, maybe relevel your bed. I had something similar to this (but no where near as bad) due to the bed being too low

For those of you whom bought chink kits, how many more dollars did you put into making them better?

>>1197483
We counting printable upgrades? I think I'm @ $75-100 on top of my printer, +@1/2kg of plastic in printed upgrades. The bought parts are mostly spread out in $5-10 Amazon stuff though; could have probably saved a few bucks if I was willing to go through Ali/Ebay and wait.

>>1197483
Own an anet a8 and nothing so far, replaced the horrible tape with simple pritt stick and and rest is just printed upgrades, supports/fan blower that sort of stuff

>>1197483
replaced acrylic frame of the anet a8 with aluminum extrusions for around 50€

This is at 500mm/s and 20,000mm/s2. The small movements are 20mm wide but look small because of the blurring.

https://my.mixtape.moe/haeiyo.webm

>>1197908
Also the 20mm movements complete in 4 frames at 60fps, which means they are achieving an average speed of 300mm/s and therefore are not acceleration capped.

The 100mm steps take 13 frames for an average speed of 460mm/s.

>>1197908
>>1197911
The plastic isn't going to cool quick enough for that shit man

>>1197483
values in usd. Not counting essentials, lubricant, filament, tools, and time wasted.
8 for replacement LM88U flange bearing.
5 for better couplers.
16 for 2: 4-start acme leadscrews.(replaced threaded rod)
10 for a fan for pwm control.
8 for replacing cracked plastic filament idler.
somewhere around 200g of test ABS.
so, something like 80 bucks. printer was 250.

would i do it again? yeah.
would i buy another chink kit/good kit? no.
i would use the knowledge, and working printer, to build another better printer, like something similar to the hypercube.
sorry, tiredposting.

>>1197966
its not going to be a matter of how fast it can cool down, but how the extruder heater can maintain a stable high temperature.

but, small, single wall/hollow objects are obviously out. i would say it largely depends on the object printed assuming he can even hit 200 mm/s practical use. I think he will add an aquarium line blower for cooling, if it becomes a problem.

What's the hello world of 3D printing? I have no experience with CAD programs and the like, but really want to get started constructing my own cases.

My goal for now is to build an RC tank from scratch. Is building the case feasible for someone without any CAD experience? Or should I build something else first to get into it a bit more?

>>1198379
The best way to learn CAD is just to jump in. Do the best you can, and by the time you finish the model you will probably already know how to improve it. Practice costs nothing.

I'd recommend pirating Solidworks so you can learn a real CAD package. The free stuff always seemed pointless when its so easy to get a copy of the real thing.

So, i'm guessing the lower part was too hot?
it kept grabbing onto the nozzle.

halfway i lowered extrusion and temperature.

>>1198379
for cad: a box, a hollow box, a hollow box with several holes.
for 3d printing tests: a box, or popularly; the benchie.

>>1198415
>>1198442
Thanks guys. I got Autodesk Fusion 360 for free because I'm a student, I guess that works too, right?

>>1198442
Looks like it's over extruding a little too. Use calipers to measure your filament size or just just decrease it by 0.01 till it starts to look better.

>>1198451
Fusion's awesome. I used to think Sketchup was good, Fusion makes it look like trash programming.

Is there any easy way to add additional heater cartridge (hotend) and thermistor to RAMPS?
I am looking for something pre-made, just like you can buy stepper expander board for extra stepper motors, or fan expander for extra fans. But I can't find anything like that.

>>1198379
>What's the hello world of 3D printing?

A 20mm cube.

If you know code, learn OpenSCAD.

If you don't, learn F360.

>>1185513
I have a large obscure piece of equipment with x,y, and z movement I was considering converting to a 3d printer, but all the motors are servos. None of the mounts are nema or anything remotely standard. How hard would it be to servo drive a 3d printer?

>>1198698
I actually do, and OpenSCAD looks pretty cool. And the resulting model is no different to models made in Fusion? As in, I can use them both for the same printers or print services?

While we're at it, I'm using OSHPark for custom PCBs. What's the aquivalent for 3D printing? Is there some cheap printing service that's widely used and doesn't burn a hole in my pocket?

>>1198455
it was definitely over-extrusion. I had my extrusion calculated way off, for some reason.
thanks.

>>1188795
did you ever get this sorted anon?
i forgot to mention that i also increased my stepper voltage, as the z-axis steppers are both powered on a single driver. Not to mention the z-axis has the highest loads.

>>1198806
Yes, both OpenSCAD and F360 export to STL which is a 3D mesh file format. A mesh is a bunch of triangles which form a convex solid.

3DHubs is the most popular print service. Price really depends on who is around you and what material you want. There's a guy near me who does dirt cheap PLA and ABS, but if I want PETG or Nylon then I have to get from other people who charge more.

Are motors with integrated leadscrews a meme? Wouldn't a rigid coupling do the same job? These motors are pretty expensive and only come in weird pitches like 8x4mm

>>1199180
I'd imagine they're for a niche application - a situation where you have no room for a coupler in the first place.

>>1199180
Might be useful if you want a super compact printer, saves you some 30mm of space, but otherwise no reason to use them

>>1199180
>rod gets bent in shipping
>motor is ruined

>>1199183
>>1199184

The idea is that they supposedly are perfectly centered and will never wobble

>>1199191

Yes. Ohgad.

>>1199180
Where did you find such motors?

>>1199193
>The idea is that they supposedly are perfectly centered and will never wobble
But that shouldn't really matter since you should be using guides to keep the motion straight

>>1199298

The original Prusa i3 Mk2 has used that type since release last year, it was one of their advertising points. There are plenty of them on eBay and Aliexpress now but they're expensive.

>>1199300

In theory the Z-leadscrews should be completely decoupled from the linear guides on XY, but in practice that's somewhat hard to do right. On my printer i've noticed that the entire x-axis rotates slightly in a swinging motion even when X and Y are supposedly decoupled.

>>1194486
>>1194488
Do a complete print of a bridge test and a simple cube and post pic of both

>>1186052
You're looking for a 4 axis cnc - not a 3d printer

see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYdJZdeMTzE&feature=youtu.be&t=2m

>>1198739
Depends on what electronics it has and how smart you are.

The ideal case is that the servo drives take step/dir input and connect directly to the controller.

If you have amplifiers or no electronics at all things can get messy.

I've been learning how to finish 3d prints until they look like they're injection molded. Right now the process is wetsanding with 100, 150 then 180 before using body filler and then sanding with 220 and 320. After that hell it's a two coats of a filler primer. The print is a scattergun from TF2, I made the model as well.

>TFW your autistic monitoring of the filament odometer pays off

Also, if nylon is just oozing like crazy from the nozzle with occasional bubbles appearing on the extruded filament, does that mean it's absorbed water? This is a 10m sample roll that's been in a sealed bag with a desiccant since I received it.

so, with slic3r, my bridges don't anchor to a perimeter, they just don't go far enough.
does anyone know how to fix this?

>>1200644
figured it out, occurs when 0 infill is active.

>>1200188
Cool. Why not just acetone it? Seems like it would be a lot less work. Never thought of using body filler, though, but looks like it works well.

How expensive are SLA printing services these days?

Does it still cost $100+ to print a 6'' x 6'' x 4'' object?

>>1200960
Try 3Dhubs, you can upload a model and it will generate offers. You're still going to pay a lot because resin prices haven't really dropped and there's always a hefty markup.

I've had great success with FormFutura HDGlass (a modified PETG filament) but it's bloody expensive. Does anyone have any experience of using it as well as generic PETG and how do they compare?

Also, if anyone can recommend a solid budget brand that's available in the UK that would be very much appreciated.

Just watched a video on a 3D printed turbine engine, figure you guys have reposted it often enough to know which one I'm talking about. Give me a quick rundown on what he actually did.

>>1200997
Essentially, he printed everything upstream of the combustion chamber and said chamber was modified to increase the distance between fuel injection and combustion. In a turbojet, the compressor is what needs to be manufactured to a high precision while the turbine (the part which spins the compressor using the energy of the burning fuel) can be made much more crudely, provided you don't mind it being more of a showpiece than something you'd use to generate energy/thrust.

The massive airflow through the (radial) compressor and fuel injection system keeps them from being heated by the nearby combustion (though I'd still suggest that more than a few minutes of operation is impossible. If you look at the point where the engine is stopped, you can see that the 'turbine' is the most horribly janky fan it is possible to manufacture from sheet steel with a pair of tin snips.

>>1201000
What did he make the combustion chamber out of?

>>1201006
It's hard to tell. If he's smart, he's used refractory cement, if he's less smart/more brave. plaster.

Have any of you made your own enclosure? I'm doodling up designs to make one from foam board and this thick plastic wrap I found in my garage.

I bought these M3 threaded inserts, but I cannot find a spec sheet for them. Any idea what size the whole should be for them? The OD is 5.4mm on the knurling, 5.2mm on the smooth part and the length is 5mm. I was thinking of making a hoe with an OD of 5mm and depth of 5mm.

The UPC is 190268297004

>>1201136
they follow the same convention as fasteners, so for M3 they are 5.5mm OD, M4 would be 7mm OD, ect

How do I stop my cylinders being edgy? I want them round.

>>1201414
put: $fn = 100;
anywhere in your code, it will have 100 faces

>>1201422
Awesome, thanks!

>>1200991
Emotion tech sells rebranded dutch filaments. They are based in France so shipping shouldn't be too expensive.
If your into petg, then try their g-fil

>>1201422
>put: $fn = 100;

>tfw there is no such thing as a circle

>>1194928
If you're going to be selling a lot of something, pay a bit and actually get the rights to something that wasn't designed by an idiot or ripped directly from the files of something else

>>1195822
Put an xt60 connector or whatever the higher amperage version is called on both ends instead, it's not only designed to take the current, the plastic won't be bitch-tier

>>1201427
Thank you very much.

>>1196402
>underextrusion everywhere: check if your nozzle is clogged, reduce printing speed, recalibrate your extrusion rate
>perimeters not bond with solid infill: might still be related to the above but you obviously run very few perimeters so try increasing them, also increase the overlap setting off your infill overlapping with outer perimeters

>>1197081
what are your storage conditions? moisture and UV rays can greatly alter the quality f your filament.

>>1201506
Both of them sat in the room, so there shouldnt be any difference.

I am wondering, what is the general volume of the average print for the users of this board? I'm noticing that despite the large number of printers with generous print volumes, that people hardly make use of all of it. I'm definitely set on getting one of those mini printers from monoprice, but I don't want to spend $200 only to think months later "I really should have sprung for the more expensive model".

I expect to only print small things, so I don't imagine much of a problem.

So I discovered this board and this thread 5 minutes ago, before this I was assuming a 3D printing thread would have been on /g/ and not having ever found one there before I thought this website was not interested.

So Ill be purchasing a Wanhao Duplicator i3 Plus from Microcenter for $350 some time next week. Everything Ive read says its a decent printer for the price and good for beginners. What Im curious about is the price of filament and how much I should be spending on it. So far the most expensive Ive seen that isn't a special circumstance like ninjaflex was around $35 for matterhackers, cheapest being some new shit on Amazon called Melca for $15. So I suppose my question is do need to get expensive filament, is average priced filament good enough, and will I notice a difference if I get cheap filament?

>>1201519
I have a printer with a 200x200x210 print area and I think on average my prints are no bigger than 100x100. I think the largest thing I made was 150x100.

>>1201606
Good filament used to be sold for ~$20 + shipping a year or two ago. Unsure what it goes for now, I still haven't used up any of my spools. MeltInk3D and Hatchbox were the brands I used, both around ~$21 when I got them.

"average" filament is very usable, but be careful with cheap filament as you CAN (not necessarily will) get burned. I'd spring for the slightly more expensive stuff considering the mileage you get out of printing.

>>1201666
Went ahead and ordered some silver pla from a brand called bamtack, it had higher ratings than the hatchbox. For pretty much anything else Ive heard now from a few places hatchbox is quite popular so I guess Ill stick with that, thanks.

Dont suppose you have any experience with the inland brand sold by microcenter? Hatchbox black has been on back order and by the time I get my printer I expect it to be again.

>>1185513
Any good deals out there for the 4th of July?
Looking for coupon codes for good filament.

>>1201669
>microcenter
Honestly, never even seen one. A couple of my friends in the central/eastern US say they're everywhere but I hadn't even heard of one before they mentioned it.

>>1201732
Ah darn.

Their filament is like $15 for a roll, supposedly it's made by esun. Before that the cheapest brand I've seen was tianse on Amazon.

Was mainly just curious if any of the cheap stuff was worth the money saved.

>>1200987
what's the markup these days for 3D printing? I own a CNC laser and I usually charge depending on the complexity of the design and the time it takes to cut it.

>>1201664
how long does it take to print a 100x100 piece?

Does slic3r have any setting for skipping small extrudes? Or some post processors?

The printer spends half of the layer time extruding traveling around and plopping down material shorter that the extruded width.

>>1201825
there is a post processing script in their github repo https://github.com/alexrj/Slic3r/blob/master/utils/post-processing/decimate.pl

>>1201815
a 100x100x100 cube is roughly 15-17 hours, on a hobby printer. that's looking at the upper maximum; unless you go crazy, don't expect things of that size to take more than 6 hours.

but, its not about the largest volume you can make something. The space is nice so that parts are not limited by dimensions, orientation, and printing more than one thing at once.

with that, i think the 200x200x200 volumes are the standard, and just big enough. It cuts down on the occasional gluing.

my printer is personally 200x200x190

>markup for a hobby printer
not enough to be worth it.

>cost
if the volume is a matter of $50, you'll be kicking yourself later for not getting the larger.

>>1201828
Thank you!

>>1201846
So I'm gonna build myself an enclosure so I don't have to listen to my printer during overnight jobs. Quite possibly going to use the ikea lack meme strategy unless I can find a table or something I already have to do it.

I've jimmy rigged a couple of my pc case fans to some old usb phone chargers to use as ventilation for the electronics. I'm most likely not going to be printing abs until I get a printer with a better heated bed than the Wanhao plus. My question is is the ventilation necessary, and if so will one 120mm fan bringing air in and one pushing it out be sufficient?

>>1201993
Did not mean to quote the post above me...

>>1201519
>>1201664

Yeah the standard 210x210 bed area is pretty sufficient. With really large prints there's an increased chance of things going wrong and the time it takes is often too much for a single go. So even with big stuff it's usually better to print them in sections. A large bed usually requires mains AC with an SSR too.

>>1185513

Is there any money to be made on 3dhubs? I imagine it might vary by region/market.

Kinda surprised this thread lasts so long for how slow it moves.

I just ran a manual bed leveling (4x4 grid) but when I want to print anything, it looks like the home point moves +3mm in x and y and thus the print head shifts. The Gcode is fine, but the only way to get it printing is to disable bed leveling in epprom. I'm running marlin on an I3 box frame, using slic3r prusa edition.

>>1202958
This may or may not be your issue but its worth a shot. Check to see if your slicer has a setting enabled called "machine center is zero".

Some printers default home position is 0,0,0 and others are not, so if you have that setting on or off depending on your printer it can fuck it up when it tries to home before a print.

Thats my only guess.

New slide part.

>>1202579
Yes, but you have to deal with horrible people.

>>1202579
I was actually planning on using my CR-10 to make movie props and shit that I can finish up and sell on etsy or ebay.