Hey guys, I have two asterid 2200s. Fantastic machines. The Y axis motion is typical reprap style, bed moves with respect to head. Now this has always concerned me, even months ago when I was a total print noob, I still wondered why would this be a preferred design method. Even today, I still wonder, it just seems so very mechanically inefficient. The bed mass is large, the timing belts will see tons of extra tension due to the inertia of the bed in motion and during small gap cross overs (where the bed is jittering a dozen times a second). I feel that this is going to limit print speeds for this design of printer. I dont care who you are or what printer you have, when you have a 1 pound mass pounding back and forth on a timing belt that is directly driven by the motor, the motor will hate life and hence you will reach the mechanical limits. Not to mention the belts will stretch much sooner due to the high G loads due to inertia.

So, problem is long winded, point made. Now what?

We have these types of printers, what did you guys do to speed up your prints with these types of designs? First thing that comes to mind is bed mass. Make it light, light, light. But what about the firmware? Does it require a retune of the accelerations or jitter if you change bed mass? What are your thoughts?

Thanks

- D