Another battle in the string wars: cabled z-axis working
It took me 10 hours and fifty minutes to print the first print table bracket and I got a few measurements wrong, but it appears that the cabled z-axis concept is going to work.Since the speed of the...
View ArticleA Z-axis gear set for the Sampo 3D printer
Few experiences are more satisfying than a creating a useful device of great intrinsic beauty
View ArticleNEMA 23 connected to the Z-axis lead screw
With the completion of the gear pair last night, the connection between the NEMA 23 and the Z-axis lead screw is complete. That milestone meant that I had to move Sampo into the front room so that...
View ArticleWinding up the String Wars
I was finally able to finish making the connection between the z-axis lead screw and the cable turnbuckle for the z-axis positioning system. Given that the 3/8-24 threaded rod moves 0.945 mm per full...
View ArticleStepping into firmware
Having had good experience with the Rapman's PIC32-based controller, I decided to stick with that MCU for my new printer. As I mentioned earlier, rather than buy a $1k+ C compiler from Microchip, I...
View ArticleReady to install the print table
I got the last of the y-axis brackets printed and light mounted.It looks like the print table with be 420x420 mm. I've designed a bolt-on template that seats the table on the brackets and shows me...
View ArticlePrint table installed
I had gone to considerable trouble to make sure that I sited the bolt holes in the MDF {medium density fibreboard} print table properly. To that end I designed a template for each of the brackets that...
View ArticleA "string wars" approach to the y-axis
Darwin and it's direct derivatives uses two belt loops driven by a shaft connected to a NEMA 23 stepper. In Sampo, that dual loop arrangement has been replaced with a single large loopThe belt guides...
View ArticleFlex cable carrier
I've never been happy with the way that Rapman handles axis and extruder cabling, so I decided to print my own flex cable carrier system. I saw several possibilities in Thingiverse. Most of them were...
View ArticlePrinting flexible cable guides...
There is not much to say about this. Once I got two of the links printed and assembled so that I knew everything fit together, I bought a few hundred #4-40 3/4 inch machine screws and nuts to hold the...
View ArticleY-axis test firmware operational
After a delightful chat with Bogdan this morning about the PIC32's MIPS core processor, I was able to get the y-axis test firmware working. Bogdan has done a lot of work with the PIC32 and is very...
View ArticlePicking up speed
The MIPS core that PIC32 uses is a very high performance CPU that was used in high end Windows workstations in the early to mid-1990s. It doesn't behave much like the 8 and 16 bit PIC chips, so it's...
View ArticlePrinting a Mendel derivative
After talking with my son recently, I concluded that he needs to start printing a lot faster than I'm going to have Sampo debugged and duplicated. I have a lot of 8 mm linear shafting and linear...
View ArticleMendel frame takes shape...
I had a major crash of the Rapman 3.0 printer and for several hours I thought I was really knackered. One of the leads to a phase of the extruder stepper parted because of fatigue from thousands of...
View ArticleMendel z-axis stepper mounts done
I managed to get some hours together to do some more work on my son's Prusa Mendel, the z-axis stepper mounts this time.I printed the z-axis stepper mounts at a 45 degree angle to minimize parts...
View ArticleLeveraging Bogdan's anti-bounce circuit for Sampo...
In developing the Darwin-derivative, Rapman-derivative Sampo 3D printer project as a kaizen exercise I utilized the same sort of microswitches for limits checking as are specified in the Rapman design....
View ArticleX & Y Axes operational from the controller
I was finally able to get time to integrate the full anti-bounce board with the x and y axis limit switches. The two axes are playing ping pong and running at a speed of 65 mm/sec with no slippage and...
View ArticleBogdan makes a measurement suggestion...
After I got the x and y axes operating independently, Bogdan suggested that I measure the steps between the limits switches to see how much difference in measurements might be attributable to the...
View ArticleSampo's touch screen begins to work...
Adriaan has been working hard learning the TFT programming protocols and has his first touch screen menu working on the Sampo controller board.
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