Heaven help me - I've just bought a delta kit :-)

[curious aardvark]

it'sa flat 4mm sheet that's just there to hold the cables off the ground.
Strength isn't an issue. I could just have easily made the majority 2mm, and used a brim.
I only used 4mm because that's the ideal thickness for the short bolts and strut nuts (that phrase just sounds so rude: 'strut nuts') to be easy to fit and get a real good grip without the end of the bolt touching the back of the channel. And I didn't think anything thinner would print like that.

I've got two cartesian style printers and until I got this machine I thought they were pretty impressive. This delta blows them out of the water, both for speed and quality and build size.
It's also a lot less complicated with fewer parts. So in the long run ought to be more reliable.
And if something does go wrong, it's much easier to see what and why.

I've clearly detailed all the issues I had and mods the kit needs.
Which amount to not much.
Would I buy another delta ?
In a heart beat ! lol
I'm also rethinking whether to make alexa larger: 3x 1 meter struts, 10metre roll of gt2 belt and some connectors to splice in longer cables. That would give me around a 2 foot build height. which with the 1.75m filament is realistically all you can expect the bowden setup to do, and I don't want to start buying 3mm filament alongside 1.75.
My other thought is to buy another complete kit and the extra expansion parts and just build the larger machine from scratch.

The other mod I did, which I'm not sure I've covered. I made a power cable with an inline switch - took about 5 minutes and £3 for the switch. Used an old computer power cable.
One of the things this kit doesn't come with is an on/off switch.

So I'd recommend you make your own.

Now none of the extras and mods are difficult - but add it all together and I still think it puts this kit out of bounds for complete beginners.
I will also detail how I level the heat bed at some point. The z probe is pretty much useless.
You need a small phillips screwdriver and digital calipers.
I've been mostly doing it by eye and experience, but I will write up a standardised method at some point. It's much much easier then playing with the z probe and messing about with numbers and plate tilt modelling.
If you simply make the plate level and zero z in the centre, you don't need to bother with all the complicated and clever stuff.

[S550Stang]

Excellent! I thought you were mounting something to it other than cables. Now you got me swaying toward the delta.. As for skill, it would be my first one but I am not worried. I've been doing mechanical design work for 20 years and I can hold my own when it comes to getting my hands dirty..
turned this
http://i774.photobucket.com/albums/y...psd1c898d1.jpg
into this
http://i774.photobucket.com/albums/y...ps0xcdkc0l.jpg



I'll be following your progress with this machine and I hop you continue as I find it entertaining and very informative!

-Mark

[curious aardvark]

yes but just pm wendy and give her your email address, she'll send it to you.
Actually I'll stick it on my thingiverse page. Print it fairly dense and make sure you get zero warp.
There ya go. It's on my k200 page.
Oh yeah I also enlarged it by 1% and the bolt holes were pretty much bang on. Tight, but you could still turn the bolt to engage the hexagonal nut.
He3d had actually drilled their holes after printing. So I figured a little extra room was probably needed :-)

Now I am currently super excited and there's nobody here I can tell who will understand why !!!!

She WILL PRINT FLEXIBLES !!!!!!!!
Yes she will :-)))))))))))))

So I started easy with polyflex.
20mm/s - ha !
I topped out at 60mm/s - no problem.
That is to say I stopped testing at 60 - there was no obvious difference in print quality between the 20 and 60 print.

On the makerbot clones 30-40 is as fast as I can print polyflex.
Yep the bowden printer prints flexibles FASTER than the direct drive machines. Ain't life grand :-)

I'm currently printing with filaflex, is she bothered ? Not my Alexa !
Currently printing trolley tokens as they weigh about 1/3 of a gram but show precision quite well.
So 20mm/s 235c - unheated bed. 0.3mm layer height.
Yep :-) No problem !
going to skip 30 and head straight for the heady heights of 40mm/s !
here we go....

Just to put this into perspective I have never been able to print filaflex or ninjaflex on my makerbot clones. But because there are no gaps anywhere in the feed system on Alexa where the filament can bend or get tangled. the only way it can go is out the extruder. I have the top feed tube right down to the hobbed bolt and the teflon tube I actually sanded slightly so that it actually goes a tiny way into the feed tube.

extrudersetup_452x480.jpg

Okay 40mm/s is looking a bit 'ruff'.
So that's fine. I reckon she'll do 25-30 without any problems.

That said the final token doesn't look awful. But I'll stick to 25 I think for the ninja and filaflex. But because this stuff sticks to just about anything like glue, you can up the first layer speed to 50% which saves a lot of time.
(a little later) actually I'm doing my first proper filaflex print, 25mm/s and decided to do the first layer at 100% Plus I usually print these things at 0.2 layer height and 3 layers. This one I'm doing at 0.3 and 2 layers. Cuts it from 2.5 hours down to 30 minutes.

My delta prints filaflex :-)

I need to get that on at-shirt - talk about nerd-wear :-)

The white ones are the different speed polyflex and the 2 red ones are filaflex. The good one was 20mm/s the slightly dodgy one 40mm/s.

alexaflexitokens_640x378.jpg

squashtoken_640x480.jpg

Don't forget I'm using the 0.5mm nozzle. But i can't see there being a problem with any of the smaller sizes.

@s550stang - wow, that is some job on the bike ! And come on ! A delta that prints even the wobbliest flexible filaments - the prusa is slower has way more movement and vibration and doesn't look anywhere near as cool as a delta plus the prusa has a lot more to go wrong with it. It's a no brainer ;-)

@number40fan - any questions, let me know.

[curious aardvark]

says 110 - but unless you enclose it, there's nothing you're going to print that's likely to need anything above 60 - that's all I had it on for petg.
But remember I'm using printbite.
I'm well known to be anti-abs on 3d printers, so I'm not even going to bother testing it on alexa. Hate the smell and the reliance on acetone and the fact that in an unenclosed printer it's just weak and crap anyway.

I've looked up the aluminium extrusion.
Realistically 1metre struts are as tall as it would be sensible to go with a 1.75mm feed system.
It currently has 680mm legs, so with the bit you lose for the heatbed the extra 320mm would take her to a total of 590mm printable height.
I'm in no hurry. Currently got zero need for printing anything that tall.
It's just interesting to work out how to do it :-)

[curious aardvark]

They are sensibly metric, as all precision measurements should be :-)
it's 2020 aluminium extrusion: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Aluminium-E...nium+extrusion

Or to be more accurate:
2020 Aluminium Extrusion Profile 20mm T Slot/ Slot 6



So we move on from building to slicer settings.
Here's why you need to make sure you have 'don't cross model' switched on.

whyyouneednotcross_538x480.jpg

Now the weird thing is that I don't get any stringing when printing multiple objects, just when its crossing the model.
The head movement is so fast and smooth that having it go the long way round is not an issue.

I've just changed my simplify3d settings to these:

avoid crossing.JPG

So that's today's lesson :-)

Part 2: well that didn't work. So I've just upped the 'avoid crossing outline' setting to it's 999 maximum.
see if that works !

***

That's more like it. So todays lesson. Don't bugger, about just set it at 999 and forget about it :-)

[curious aardvark]

why ?
They actually walk their way up the arms anyway.

And I think if i re-tick 'force retraction between layers, it might also get rid of the stringing.

[curious aardvark]

they also do that at the bottom. if you slide them up to the top (just tried it) they will rub and catch on the belts - and that's probably a bad thing :-)

Given that my carriage is rock solid and she prints like a machine costing 5x more - I'll leave them at the bottom ;-)

[wkarraker]

Excellent documentary on your delta, congrats. I have a SeeMeCNC ROSTOCK V2 (previous version of this - https://www.seemecnc.com/collections...rinter-diy-kit), just love the delta configuration. It has a spring gizmo on the arms but it attaches to the same set of rods instead of the next arm over. Maybe I'm not seeing it correctly from your photo, I guess if it works for you then don't mess with perfection.

If you are having problems with the springs 'walking' maybe you can print a 'c' shaped clip and snap it over the ends of the springs to keep them from moving.

C-clip2.jpg

[curious aardvark]

little cable ties are what I'm using to stop the springs walking. Cheap, and effective.
I know it'e tempting, but sometimes non-3d printed solutions are easier :-)

I've got the springs at the v's where the pairs of arms meet and on the three pairs as well.
It works. There was a small amount of play before I fitted them and none now.

My next job is to make a cooling fan bracket. Made a pet-g tool last night, the broom handle socket is pretty rough. But who prints pet-g at 75mm/s and no cooling fan ? lol
It was also the first 0.2mm layer prints - no problem.
So I'm wondering if I can print 0.1 layer height at 150 mm/s Now that could be interesting :-)

So as the fan fits on the heat block and that gets pretty warm, I've decided to simply get a thin sheet of metal, drill a few holes, bend it and attach a fan to that. Most of the deltas I've seen have a similiar arrangement with the cooling fan just held up and at an angle at the side.
Seems pretty straightforward.
Just need to look at the board and see if I need a three wire fan or a two wire job.
Also check that standard computer screws will fit the holes in the heat block, as I've got no more of the bolts left.

Oh yeah i also made the simplest mod yet. a 20mm wide, 4mm thick, 100mm long bar that simply bolts onto a strut and you clip a webcam on the end.
Gives me a pretty decent angle for build videos, no vibration so the camera doesn't wobble, and because it sticks out to the side, the carriage doesn't block much of the view.
Still playing with best position, but works pretty well. Using the free version of video velocity for time lapse videos. Probably acquire the pro version at some point for hd recording. Very comprehensive and easy to use software. Pretty much the only limitation on the free version is that the video is limited to 640x480.

Camera mounted on top of the printer:

camera-top-mount_640x313.jpg

Using it side mounted:

camera-sidemount_355x480.jpg

And before anyone asks, I have no clue what make the webcam is. It was on my desk. Someone probably gave it to me as I don't remember buying it.
Nothing special, but does the job.

I use wondershare dvd slideshow deluxe to make my final videos. Very easy to use while at the same time having pretty much every feature you could want.

I've just ordered a 25mm 12v 2 wire fan. The trick is going to be keeping it close to extruder. With the extruder at the full 200mm diameter the carriage is pretty much touching the rive belts. Going to have to think about this. Couple of available screw holes on top of the extruder carriage. Maybe a duct with small nozzle that comes down between the bolt holders on the carriage.

Got a busy long weekend so can't see my getting this done before next week.
Plus fan might not get here till monday.

Thinking time :-)

[curious aardvark]

Meanwhile, back at The Aardvark Burrow, I think I've worked out how to use the 1watt laser from my super tiny laser engraver, with simplify 3d to use the printer for laser engraving.

Looks like it's a simple gcode command to switch the ramps board into laser printing mode. A black and white image can be extruded. print the first layer, theoretically it should work.
Just got to extend laser wires and make a bracket for it.
Once it's in laser printer mode. It will burn on g1 moves and not on g0 moves. Which is presumably how the printer handles plastic extrusion anyway. So it ought to be as simple as creating a seperate profile in s3d with laser on and laser off in the start and end scripts. The printer profile should do everything else.
Sounds too easy - so we'll see, lol

Actually looks like if I mount it on the side of the heat box cooling fan with a cable tie (I'm all about hi-tech), I can leave it there. The only other place would be where the cooling duct is going to go. Plus on the side of the heat box - which will be off when lasering - it'll get a little active cooling as well.
Might have to drop my top print speeds a little, but can't see these two add ons being too heavy for her.

Hell I could probably print and engrave the wood filament in one operation.

We shall see.
Stay tuned....