# 3D Printing > 3D Printers (Hardware) >  How good is a sub ?100 3d printer ?

## curious aardvark

_Adding this here just in case you start somewhere in the middle and miss all the stuff that happened before I printed anything - 
DO NOT BUY ONE OF THESE AS A FIRST PRINTER !
 THEY ARE A FIXER-UPPER !. iF YOU DON'T HAVE THE EXPERIENCE OR KIT TO DO THE FIXING UP - BUY SOMETHING ELSE :-)_ 

Every now and then I look on ebay to see how cheap the cheapest brand new 3d printer in the uk is. 
Last week they'd dropped to just under ?80 - which is ridiculous. I mean, this is with courier delivery for a large box weighing about 20lb. 
I can't believe that they can go much lower.
I didn't want a used machine - this is all about brand new printers with that just finished factory smell when you open the big box of bits :-)  
_(also how come the forum no longer reoognises uk pound signs ?)_

You can also get a delta kit virtually identical to my he3d k200 for ?125 - my k200 was just under ?200, about 12 months ago. 
If I just wanted another workhorse - that's probably the route I'd have gone down, as it could sit on top of the existing one. 
I was going to get a monoprice mini-delta - but they're ?160 and I don't want to spend that much at the moment. 
It's still on the list - but not at the moment. Hoping they'll drop the price to match what it costs in the states, which is actually less than ?125. 
It's a helluva good deal across the pond - not quite so good over here :-( 
I will be having  a moan about that at the monoprice stand at ctc, at the end of the month ! 

  So this exercise is all about much cheapness and how good a machine you can have for under ?100. 

So at this moment in time there are actually three machines on ebay that ship from within the uk, for under ?100 including delivery. 

The standard a8: 


The 2018 a8 with a more rigid improved frame:


And this weird thing: X23D i3 3D Printer:


There are some dodgy looking plastic deltas that ship from china - but after tax they'll be over ?100 anyway - plus are really really nasty, use printpens for extruders - yeaurggghhh.
Now the thing above, I would not get for a number of reasons. It looks a little like a creality ender 3 - but don't be fooled. It lacks all of the decent features of the ender3.

The single left hand z screw is something I would avoid, coupled with a heavy cross bar and wheeled carriage, just screams uneven print.  
Also the bowden extruder on an i3 - why ? 
Then there's the single central rail for the heat bed. Really don't like that.  Just looks fundamentally unstable.

The basic W5 a8 has a 220x220x200 build volume (well some ads say it does, some say 200x200x180). 
That was tempting. 

So I've ordered - about 10 minutes ago - the ctc 2018 a8. 
why ? 

Primarily because it has a more substantial and rigid looking frame. 
Also it claims it comes in only 5 pieces/modules and apparently can be put together in about an hour. 
I liked the sound of that. 
So other things I like: dual z-screws, direct drive mk8 extruder, which i can modify for flexible filament in about 10 minutes.
Dual support rails for the heatbed - looks pretty stable and hopefully won't need calibrating too often (although we'll come to that).

The frame is plywood - okay pros and cons. 
Not as rigid as aluminium - but real easy to attach stuff too with wood screws or bolts.
The build volume is larger in the x&y than any of my current machines - so that's something I can really use. 

I have also ordered a sheet of 0.5mm pei from china for ?4.84. Considered printbite, but that would have pushed the cost over the ?100 limit, so decided to try it's poorer, and much much cheaper cousin.
I'll stick the pei directly to the hotbed with double sided vinyl tape. If I need something different I can get a sheet of 3mm aluminium and make some clips. The aluminium would not cost me anything as my local aluminium engineering firm, still owes me :-)

From the pictures: It needs a print area cooling fan - I have some turbo fans in stock, they were just over ?1 each i think. 
It also needs an on frame filament holder - not a problem. 
I also need to get an inline switch and make a power cable with an on off switch. No idea why the chinese don't think on/off switches are necessary - I like them :-) 
So that's ?2.86.

Initially I don't see anything else obvious 

So currently I'm at about ?88. 
A knock off bltouch leveller probe can be had for around ?10.50. 
Not sure I'll need it as the printbed has my favourite - knob at each corner - levelling configuration.
But it's in budget should I feel like buggerng about with one at a later date. 

The printer should get here tuesday or wednesday. 
So watch this space :-)

Oh yeah one thing my beady eye noticed was that the adverts state that the machine uses .x3g files. 
Suggesting that ctc had a bunch of their makerbot clone motherboards stacked up in a warehouse and when they stopped making their clones, decided to use the boards in an i3. 
As I plan on using simplify3d anyway, this is not an issue for me. 
But it potentially gives a motherboard that can do dual extrusion, should I think about playing with a 2-into-1 extruder setup in the future. 

I wouldn't go for another dual nozzle setup - while easy to do - it's a real pita lol

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## curious aardvark

Well, as expected, parcel arrived while I was out walking the dogs this morning.
As it's royal mail they only try to deliver once, after that you have to go pick it up from the local depot. 
As it happens our local royal mail depot usually only opens between 7-11am.
But on a wednesday it's open ntill 20:00. 
I've just phoned them and should be able to pick up parcel tonight. 

More later :-)

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## AutoWiz

Just remember what i said about picking your printer. When considering the value of the entire machine, you only need to assess the frame for rigidity and build size. ALL other considerations are secondary as over its life if you are chasing quality you will likely change all or most components but you will always be working with that frame. So how well of a design is that structure? Is it flimsy? Like do you think in chasing performance with this machine you might at some point change the frame? Because if you ever answer yes to this, then the printer is a bad deal at any price because you will systematically replace the entire machine. And the initial purchase should be for a starting point, not just to collect garbage.

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## curious aardvark

I'm not like you :-) 
I don't 'chase quality'. 
I don't really care how smooth a thing looks and I am almost never going to print anything below 0.2 layer height.
As long as it's fairly dimensionally accurate it'll do. 
I've been making pc's too long to enjoy tinkering with them any more. 
3d printers similiar approach. if it doesn't absolutely need to be done - I'm not going to do it :-)

It's not for collecting dust. This will be a machine I use. 
Might have picked up a little regular job this week it would be idea for.  

Finally got the box after discovering that where I have always picked up parcels from in the past - sorting office - is not where this parcel ended up. So had to go back the following day to the actual post office - in  a different building in swad. 

Frame doesn't look too bad.
But once you start looking you can see where the money has gone and not gone. 
Plastic hobbed gears, fairly ropey looking belt assemblies - they do have built in tensioning though. Screen doesn't have card reader that appears to be on the board. 
The extruder is interesting - I've had it apart this morning. 
No tension or spring loading, just a wheel and a hobbed bolt (only metal one on the machine).
Curious to see if it actualy will grab filament. 
On the plus side I can't see any gaps, if it works, then it's already good for flexibles. 

Oh yeah and the z-axis screw rod attachment is hilarious. there are clear plastic tubes stuck over the small thread at the end of the rod - haven't watched the assembly video yet - but presumably you just push the tubes over the motor shafts. 
That's getting upgraded to a proper seated shaft attachment as soon as I can work out what to call it on ebay :-)
That said I had a quick play and it should work. 
Ingenious and cheap as chips ! 

The rods, screw shafts and motors are robust and very solid. 

I have to say, looking at it in bits. Most of the upgrades won't be frame related.  The belts need better anchor points and gears. Once it's all squared up and bolted together, that and the passive extruder are my current main issues. 

Came with a long power cable with uk plug, so I've fitted the switch at the psu end.

Right going to have some lunch, watch the assembly video and start assembling later this afternoon.Also 
going to find out if my aluminium mates can punch small square holes in 3mm sheet. In which case I might get the two end plates for the bed made out of that as they are not terrible straight or flat.  Failing that might just get a couple aluminium strips and bolt them on to make it a lot more rigid and flat.  

The reason the end plates were bent is because when they bolted it together in the factory - they did so off kilter. I've adjusted and made it as straight and square as I can and it slides okay. But in the long run, probably needs fettling.

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## AutoWiz

> I'm not like you :-) 
> I don't 'chase quality'...


Give me credit. I have 3 little kids that I want to be able to use these printers. It is not just about the quality. It is also very much about ease of maintenance. How hard is it to clear a filament jam? How much teardown does it take when that dreaded heat creep happens and you need to remove the thermal tube? Anyways, Have you seen the latest progress on my Air Force? Now with Attrition Tolerance..

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## curious aardvark

not getting at you in any way - you're a blooming inspiration mate :-)

Where you get the energy from - I have no idea :-) 
Not to mention how amazingly neat and tidy your work area always is. 

But you tend to have standards the rest of us can only aspire to :-)

Weird thing is, I've never had heat creep. Not on the rep clones or the delta. 
Clogs have been purely with flexibles and once you modify the extruder that goes away. 

So anyway the beast is built. Couple of things to do today. 
Going to drill the extruder shaft from input to drive gear to 3mm and insert teflon tube. Reason being it's really bloody hard to shove it manually through the existing 'shaft' and it did come with some teflon tubes - not sure why might take the nozzle off as well and see if there's one up there :-)  

Actually came with a bunch of spare parts including 2 spare y axis motor mounts.  Though I might change the original plywood one for a more substantial printed one anyway. 

The other thing I need to do today is move the y stop about 10mm towards the front of the machine. As it stands at the moment, when both y and z are homed the extruder nozzle is about 3mm beyond the edge of the build plate. I've got plenty of leeway in the belt tensioner to take up the slack and I can move the whole assemblage forward with spare thread on the rods so i don't lose any build volume. 

Despite the plastic belt gears and wobbly tensioner modules, everything moves smooth and cleanly. 

Oh yeah my main issue is the firmware - it's truly bloody awful. No idea what it is, but it doesn't have a calibration option and you can only move the Z axis and extruder  1 mm at a time - real pita. The 10mm option only allows x and y movement. 
It's just crap. 
So thinking about installing marlin - as that way if i have a problem, I can hassle Roxy :-) (lol)

It's an atmega 26-something chip. Presumably it will take marlin. 

I'll put some pics up later but meanwhile this is the build video. 
I didn't take any in-build pics as this is exactly what i did. As you cans ee it's really well packaged and laid out. I got a dvd with written instructions which i glanced through - and promptly ignored. Also links to 2 youtube videos, the build one below: 



Compared to the he3d k200 delta, where I got zero material of any kind with it. This is pretty good. 

Apart from screw locking rings _(which I don't think I need - unless they are what stops the top of the z-axis screws from wobbling)_ and whatever he adds to the smooth vertical guide rods - everything was present. That said the holes for the smooth vertical rods are a tight fit and I don't have an issue with that. The z axis screw rods on the other hand tend to wobble a bit, not sure what i can do about it - or if it's worth doing anything about it. 

So without printing anything yet - my initial impressions are pretty favourable. The fact that all the major parts come pre-assembled is a real bonus and not something they needed to do. 
It's very easy to put together. The lasercut plywood pieces lock together tightly.  The tabs and holes all lined up clean and tight. 
Plenty of spare bolts and nuts and washers, all the allen keys you need. The plywood looks fairly flimsy at first but once it's all locked together it's a very sturdy and rigid frame. 

Right going to see about getting it to talk to simplify3d :-)

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## curious aardvark

> Attempting connection at \\.\COM9... READ: zO6?v?Jp?5???5?5??aP2??NttpN?6ra(*6?AptP.
>  READ: ?B:J??F>AzO.@?F>@?J?J?%HB??zQ*f*??$E]&|:A4AFz?&|:A?:PH>?4?6('?`>I?20nvt>I?2
>  READ: zO>?v?Bp?1??9?%???Fp|<n>?AptP.
>  READ: ?]a>J??F>Az_.@?F>@?B?J?%HB??jU:n.??<MQ&|>I$  ENj?&|*A?>P@>?0?&('?h:I?60~~|:I?6
>  READ: ?A?j?Ar?
>    Testing plaintext communication protocol...
>    Testing binary communication protocol...
>    Testing alternate communication protocols...
>    Attempting RTS reset and trying again...
>    Connection failed.


which is what i get when trying to communicate with the printer. 
Drivers seem fine, com port appears. 
Just get gibberish from the machine. 
Play more after lunch.

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## curious aardvark

Decided to move it into the workshop and see if it will talk to the windows 7 machine (this one is still on xp) which should have all the drivers already installed. I think the laser engraver has an atmega 2560 chip - and I can definitely talk to that. 
Also easier for printing mods, and saves me sticking a new battery in the digital calipers on this desk :-)

Less space to work - but the machine is actually smaller than I was expecting.

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## curious aardvark

Ah ha ! 
I have now got it (gonna need a name) talking to simplify3d !
Everything else I've ever used over a com port -real or usb - has talked at 115200
This thing talks at 250000 - figured that out, problem solved. 

And it's apparently running marlin 1.0
I'm not impressed I have to say. Maybe it's down to the config file. 




> READ: Marlin1.0.0 READ: echo: Last Updated: May 10 2018 16:04:12 | Author: (John, default config)
>  Last Updated: May 10 2018 16:04:12 | Author: (John, default config)
>  SENT: M135 T0
>  READ: Compiled: May 10 2018
>  READ: echo: Free Memory: 12026  PlannerBufferBytes: 1232
>  Free Memory: 12026  PlannerBufferBytes: 1232
>  READ: echo:Hardcoded Default Settings Loaded
>  Hardcoded Default Settings Loaded
>  READ: echo:Steps per unit:
> ...


I've also moved the y stop forward 10mm. 
So my final maximum build volumes are: 
x: 195
y: 193
z: 180

I've also drilled and and lined the extruder shaft with ptfe tube. 
Next job, heat and calibrate.

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## curious aardvark

so that went fairly well.
though for some weird reason s3d just kept moving the head to the same 3 spots. centre, middle left and back left. 

But then I spotted a fairly serious issue with the extruder setup. 
Between the extruder and the heating arrangement and the nozzle is an aluminium block. It's what you puch the bolts through to hold the mottor and extruder in place. Between the bottom of the extruder and the top of the metal block there is about a 5 mm gap. 
I guess whoever drilled the block drilled the extruder mounting holes in the wrong place. 

Not something you'd notice untill you load flexible filament and watch it come out sideways :-) 
So that need sorting today. 
Also need to start designing a top mounted filament holder.

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## curious aardvark

Been perusing thingiverse. 
Now either the wrong people are buying these (ie: newbies) or nobodies publishing their mods. 
Can't find a sensible print area fan duct and nothing on top mounted filament holders. 
All the extruder mods are massively over complicated. 

Kinda like the he3d k200 - looks like it's down to me again lol :-)

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## curious aardvark

Extruder modding finished. 
Moved the heatblock up, drilled out the bottom of the extruder and inserted short length of ptfe tube between the two.
Works a treat now :-) 

Here's what the 3dprint workbench currently looks like.  An I3, makerbot pro clone and a cheap delta. Think that covers about 99% Of the common fdm printer types.   
workbench_800x450.jpg

I had to tidy the desk and fridge up - the flashforge is currenty on a shelf awaiting serious troubleshooting. Dunno what's gone wrong it just won't print - extrudes when loading filament just not when printing. 
So I moved the knp off the fridge and put it next to the computer (mini-itx in a small wooden box behind the monitor) which left the fridge for the ctc. 

Weird the pics of the final extruder mod have vanished. 
Oh well - right onto the filament holder.

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## curious aardvark

Fair bit of progress

Got top mounted filament holder - works but still needs to be a little more rigid. 
Picked up a sticky print surface at tct. Not sure what it is but it's good stuff. 

Bed levelled like a dream. Aluminium plate appears to be really flat. 

First three things I printed were trolley keys. 
Did the first one at 50mm/s - 2nd at 100mm/s and the third at 150mm/s. 0.32 layer height. 

All three are dimensionally accurate and I can't tell which was printed at which speed. 
Very impressed.

Also did a 190x190mm square frame. Useful to have but also great to check edge bed levellness. 
Again went perfectly. 

So that's all good. 
On the negative side I don't think the micro sd card reader works. 
It appears springy but the card won't click in :-( 
I do have  a basic screen with sd reader attached - so might try that at some point. 

Very impressed with how fst it can print. particularly given the un-sprung extruder.

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## curious aardvark

so we've hit the first serious issue. 
card reader on the motherboard is definitely broke. 

I have a screen with built in card reader that never worked on the big delta. 
Doesn't work on this one either - I will have to admit the screen's dead. Tried just plugging the card reader in and while it sort of recognised it, wouldn't actually read it :-(

So okay I need to buy a screen with card reader. Not a huge problem - ?7 from china. 
However it also doesn't like being connected by usb. This could be possibly related to the 250000 baud rate. 
So I can't currently even use it tethered with any reliability. 

I suppose I need to find out how this marlin thing works (if it updates from  a card, I'm stuffed lol) and how I go about changing the baud rate. 
I feel an email to roxy coming on :-) 

On the really positive side this print surface from lameda.com is amazing stuff. 

I can run the first layer, with no smoosh, at 50% - and that's on a 100mm/s print speed ! 
This makes the damn thing significantly quicker than the delta with printbite - which doesn't like fast first layers at all.

I was going to keep the second sheet as a backup - but now thinking I;'ll fit it on the klic-n-play instead. Now that I'm using flashprint - that's back up and running again :-) 

But yeah actually needing to replace a electronic component isn't good. 

Still keeps me under ?100. 

When it's working - even without a cooling fan it's an impressive machine. 

Oddly enough when i told my dad how the bed moved forwards and back and the printhead went side to side. His first response was:_ that'll be faster then._ 
:-)

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## spegelius

To change baud rate, I'm afraid you'll need to recompile Marlin. I'd upgrade to newest version while doing that. I've had some problems with longer USB cables and 250000 br, but with short cables (like the ones that come with ramps, ~20cm or so) I've been running that speed happily. Of course the short cables aren't any use if there's no PC nearby. I use Raspi and OctoPrint so that's not a problem.
Oh and make sure there's no power cables near the USB cable, I've really interesting problems when that happens.

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## hutchouk

Hi

I've just built one of these today and am slowly getting it going.

The SD card reader on my control board was faulty too, but I managed to dislodge the spring catch by putting a thin kitchen knife into it (with the power off of course).  Then after "squidging" the card in a few times it started to click in as it should.

I must say I'm quite impressed with it so far.  I'm currently printing out some spacers to fix the horrendous x axis wobble.

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## curious aardvark

cheers I'll try the knife trick. 

Have ordered a screen with full size sd card reader. Just going to be more convenient that messing around with a mini-sd on the board. 

Plus as I'm not using the pei sheet any more I've got ?5 extra on the budget So ordered a screen for ?11 - should get here sudnay as opposed th the same one from china for ?7 that wouldn't get here till the end of october :-) 

I will no go and poke the card reader :-)

currently working on turbo fan duct for it. 

I'll post mods on thingiverse. 

I don't have x-axis wobble. Unless you mean the screw rods moving about ? 
Going to make caps for them later/ That a quick easy design. 
More for the fact that I keep putting my hand on them and then they start  moving lol

****

I owe you a drink hutchouk :-)

Made a furtling tool and poked till something clicked - card reader now working :-)
Well sort of. It only recognises the card if you switch the mcahine off, insert card and switch back on. Once it's on you can remove and replace as much as you like and it just says: no card. 
Still I am now running a job from the card :-)

Any other tips - let us know :-)

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## hutchouk

Cool, glad it worked for you too.  

I think I meant z-axis wobble earlier.  Yes it was the threaded rods wobbling.  The caps I printed seem to do the job well, although you might be able to do a better job.  I've just tried to attach the STL file but the forum wont let me yet.

Are the screens interchangeable then?  The buttons on the screen are really annoying.  I'd much prefer one with a card reader and rotary actuator.

Also, when levelling the bed, how much clearance should there be between the bed and the nozzle?  I've dug out my feeler gauges from the shed.

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## curious aardvark

when levelling the bed you need a sheet of paper to just slide between the nozzle and the bed - with a little resistance. 
I prefer to use 90gsm paper. 
You can then fine tune - depending on your print surface - from the slicer. 
Do each corner and the middle of the bed - then do the four points midway between the level screws.
Though if the corners and center are the same - the rest should be as well. 

For this lameda stuff, I've actually got an extra 0.2mm z height added before printing. Pla sticks to it like glue. 
If you have even the slightest amount of 'smoosh' it's a real bastard to remove. 

And no - the screens are not plug and play :-(
So there's probably nothing wrong with my original one lol

I think you have to set the screen type in the firmware, it's starting to ring vague bells from when I had  a quick furtle with the touchscreen for the mks sbase board.. 

So figuring out how to do that is my next job :-)

Whole bunch iof things I'd like to be able to do with the control panel. 
Not least of which would be loading and un loading filament. What kind of 3d printer firmware doesn't even give you that option ? 
Marlin 1.0 apparently.

Also the current firmware prints things smaller than they should be - found this: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2284225/files
Mine has the atmega 2560 chip (2650 somthing like that) - so if you play with the above - check the chip on your board first. 

I blame the huge plastic drive cogs.

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## hutchouk

Well, my controller board is dead already  :Frown: 

The extruder driver chip seems to have blown.  But since it's an all in one board, I cant swap out the driver module.  I've messaged the seller hoping to get a replacement.

I'm not too disheartened as a direct replacement as it looks like i could put in a proper ramps board for less then ?25 quid and this will hopefully create potential for lots of future upgrades (dual extruder, laser engraver, food 3d printer with syringes). I was hoping to explore the in depth technical side of 3d printing with this machine, just not this soon!

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## AutoWiz

> Well, my controller board is dead already The extruder driver chip seems to have blown.  But since it's an all in one board, I cant swap out the driver module.  I've messaged the seller hoping to get a replacement.I'm not too disheartened as a direct replacement as it looks like i could put in a proper ramps board for less then ?25 quid and this will hopefully create potential for lots of future upgrades (dual extruder, laser engraver, food 3d printer with syringes). I was hoping to explore the in depth technical side of 3d printing with this machine, just not this soon!


If you need to replace the control board you should consider the MKS gen-L board from MakerBase. You won't find your old ramps board for much less and this is the latest and greatest from MakerBase for our cartesian printers. It uses the same exact marlin you are already used to, it has a small footprint, and it supports the full color touch screen. I don't know why anyone would buy or install anything else today. Here is a link to the first ebay ad I could find for this controller:  https://www.ebay.com/itm/MKS-Gen-L-3...cAAOSwL4lbIHFD  It will work with the screen you have now, and later whenever you feel like spending the extra change you can always add the touchscreen. here is a link to that: https://www.ebay.com/itm/MKS-TFT32-F...MAAOSwYIxYAIPP  It is well worth the upgrade and makes you feel like you have a much higher quality printer when it responds to you touching it's screen. Here is a short video of me playing with this same touchscreen on one of my printers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veQp-ANKWKE  It is 2018. We should not have to contend with dials, knobs, or buttons.

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## curious aardvark

That's a bugger. 
I don't have a problem with my board - yet. 

Don't forget the mks gen-L also needs seperate stepper drivers. 

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/MKS-Gen-L...UAAOSw3uhbMXzW
?16.48 from uk - goes as low as ?13 from china. Depends if you're in a hurry or not :-)
And it doesn't support dual extruders. well there aren't enough stepper sockets for it anyway. 

I do have a spare mks gen 1.5 board around if this one dies. 

I do have a serious issue with the firmware. It's truly awful, plus steps are wrong so prints stuff too small. 
Thinking of switching to repetier, like the delta runs. 
Not as good as sailfish on the rep clones - but from what i can see, way better than the version of marlin on the i3. 

I mean what kind of 3d printer firmware doesn't even have the option to load and unload filament ? 
I'll tell you: marlin 1.0

However never having flashed firmware on  a working machine - currently awaiting to see what wisdom roxy has to share on upgrading marlin.
Got no problem with a twiddly-pushy knob screen. The most important bit of the upgraded (even if still real cheap) screen is a full size, easy to gt to sd card slot).

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## hutchouk

Thanks both for your tips.

Unless I'm missing something, I think I'll pass on the MKS Gen L board.  I really want to do the dual extruder upgrade asap as I want to start using PVA for the supports (I'm sick of trying to remove supports already, and I've only printed a few things).  The touch screen doesn't appeal to me either - i prefer good old fashioned controls.

Looking round, I think a RAMPS 1.6 board would probably suit me best.  Having a seperate Arduino board leaves more scope for hacking, and if either board packs up I've only got to replace one of them.

Regarding fire safety (a big concern I had for the original set up), do the RAMPS boards have decent MOSFETs built in?  Is it worth me upgrading to 24volts?  And if so, would it then be a simple case of switching power supplies or would I have to replace other parts?

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## curious aardvark

Why are you using things with supports ? 

Guess it depends what you're printing. 
In 6 years I've yet to design anything that needs supports :-) 

Dual extrusion is iffy. to put it mildly lol.
Seriously consider a 2-into-1 nozzle setup. Once you've got two seperate nozzles you're just asking for trouble. 

Autowhiz has a much better idea of boards than I do. I've got a mks sbase and a straight mks base. 
I try and do as little messing about as possible, while he regularly rebuilds and upgrades all his machines :-)

Think about a 32 bit board that can run smoothieware. What i like about smoothieware is that you can easily change settings by droppig a text file on the sdcard and booting the board. 
None of this buggering about arduino ide and having to compile every time. 
Smoothieware also comes with really great instructions and manuals.

Actually one of the things I noticed at tct this year was a lot more hi-end boards. 
basically the chinese are now trying to clone the duet - so there are a bunch of boards around that are both cheaper than the duet (what isn't) but still have most of it's features.

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## AutoWiz

> Having a seperate Arduino board leaves more scope for hacking


That thought is not rooted in reality. Please allow me to explain. ALL 3d printer boards ARE ramps + Arduino mega. Whether it comes on old separate boards or combined on the same PCB. They all use the same marlin firmware and all are made to the same specs. Features are the only difference. And as such coding, programming, and 'hacking' is the same across all of these identical platforms. The difference is how much space and how big of a rat's nest do you want to dedicate to your printers control solution. All of these boards will support multiple extruders and you can even add extra stepper drivers when all the sockets on the board are already in use. If you prefer to stay with what your printer came with then do that and be proud of your choice. But let's keep it real. Smoothie of course is the exception as it has a much better processor

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## hutchouk

I was assuming that by having a separate arduino board I'd be able to access the unused GPIO pins.  Does the MKS Gen L board still give easy access to these pins then?

I'm actually struggling to find detailed information on any of these boards.

----------


## spegelius

Most boards have some extra AUX pins that can be used for stuff like controlling servos, relays what ever. Also pins normally used for display and sd-card reader can be used for different things, you just need to change their function in Marlin. I don't know if some Arduino pins are left unused with those boards, never had that in depth look at the datasheets...
I think Prusa is using some unused limit switch pins to read fan speed in MK2.5 upgrade for example.

----------


## AutoWiz

> I was assuming that by having a separate arduino board I'd be able to access the unused GPIO pins.  Does the MKS Gen L board still give easy access to these pins then?
> 
> I'm actually struggling to find detailed information on any of these boards.


All boards have these pins. you just have to find them. MakerBase is a big name in 3d printers and finding a data sheet for these controllers is actually pretty easy. either from google or bing or the search engine of your choice. But since you said you are struggling to find info, I did this google search for you. Here is the first thing that came up in my search:  http://www.robotrebels.org/index.php?topic=769.0

----------


## curious aardvark

Often the best information is on the ebay listings. Most have a lot of info is you scroll down. also there is a weirdly name website that has  a LOT of information. 
And nope - I haven't bookmarked it on this machine - must be on the house pc. I'll post it next time I use that one. 

All the boards I have and have played with have a whole bunch of unlabelled pins that i have absolutely no idea what they do. 
Not sure how you add extra extruders. Only board I have that has labelled second extruder sockets are the mighty boards on the rep clones.
The fact that these particular i3's use two z axis motors probably doesn't help :-)

But like I said saw a bunch of hi-end boards at tct that are trying to horn in on the duet's market.
Didn't really register who wa smaking or selling as they're way out of my budget.

The mks sbase is a lot bigger physically than the mks base 15. 
Right the base 1.5 has 2 extruder sockets - but only one z axis socket. 
Presumably you can use an extruder socket for a z axis. 
It also has 12 pins whose usage I have absolutely no clue and could never find any details on. 
Right I'll dig out the sbase.
Well that has the same labelled layout and about 40 unlabelled pins some in ranks of 4 some in sets of 6 - i have no idea what they are for. 
The sbase also have upgraded components all round. It wasn't that pricey - but worth the money i think. 
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Smoothiew...AAAOSwpQpbTteh

Dunno what stepper drivers it has - but they are hardwired. So not exchangeable. 

But definitely recommend smoothieware. Particularly if you plan on adding extra heads in the future.

That's the chap :-)

Just discivered a thing called Marlin configurator - looks like more fun than mucking about with arduino ide: https://github.com/akaJes/marlin-config/releases

----------


## curious aardvark

double checked board and it's got the atmega 1280 chip - so I'm going to do this: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2284225
fingers crossed lol

Weeellllll. 
The printer is currently configured at 250000 baud rate. The highest ide will go is 115200. 
So that's not working at all. 
Can't change baud rate unless I can get ide to talk to the printer, which it apparently won't do until I've updated it and changed the baudrate. 
Is everyone sure microsoft didn't have a hand in writing this ide stuff ??

Currently trying to do it through the marlin configurator.

Nope that don't work either :-(


**** 

currently using ide 1.85. 
managed to set correct baud, and processor. Loaded the modified firmware.
Just compiled it and now about to see how easy it is to brick a printer........

Apparently not that easy. 
Didn't work: avrdude: stk500_recv(): programmer is not responding
avrdude: stk500_getsync() attempt 10 of 10: not in sync: resp=0x93

Well that looks like it's probably an 250000 baudrate issue. 
okay think i need to get the printer closer to the pc and use a shorter usb cable. 
lol it'll have to sit on the knp - wonder what sort of babies they'd make :-)

Nope that didn't work either. 
Marlin is really starting to piss me off.

well looks like arduino ide is somehow the culprit. 
Just compiled and tried a repetier upload. That won't upload either. 
The ide serial monitor shows the printer is talking to the ide software. 
Just won't upload any firmware.

----------


## curious aardvark

why is this stuff so bloody complicated. 
The annoying thing is I can't start using the machine until I can change the configuration. Well I could print a couple 10 and 20mm cubes. measure it and work out the percentage it's printing too small and then resize each print to that degree. 
But that would mean I'm still stuck with the acreen and baud rate and as it's on an extended usb cable, it really doesn't like that high a baud rate. 
I could move it nearer, but since i switched to flashprint, I'm now using the klic-n-print a lot more _(it just works and I never got simplify 3d to work with it properly )_ and want to get into some exotic dual filament printing. So that's stayiong where it is and the i3 will have to live with the long cable. 

Plus I'd rather use the better screen with the full size sd card onboard anyway - since I've got it and it doesn't count towards the budget :-)  
Plus IT's already attached to a mount and ready to be scrwed to the frame :-) 

So far nothing has been able to either talk to the board or if it can talk, won't update firmware. 

Last thing I saw was a chap who used the latest ide and marlin firmware and just swapped out the configuration.h and added some acceleration settings. 
I'll try that today - assuming I can find the post again lol. 
If that doesn't work - I'm currently out of options. 
Given that my backup board doesn't have 2 z axis motor sockets, not sure how you go about re-purposing the second extruder socket (can't remember if it had one or not now lol). 
I suspect that'll be pretty heavily covered in various places online.

So to sum up the: cheapest 3d printer on ebay experience so far. 

Nice hardware, shame about the 'brain'.

 It is weird that a company would deliberately release a machine with incorrect settings in the firmware. 
I presume the boards are mass pre-programmed on the production line, so ctc probably don't have the software to change the configuration.  Given that it wouldn't cost them anything to release it - and not releasing it is doing them harm, I dunno, just seems bizarre.
I do sometimes wonder about the marketing side of these chinese companies. 

Right, lets see what marlin 2.0 will do for us !

----------


## curious aardvark

Did i already mention how much I dislike arduino ide ? 
The only place I've found to set the baudrate is: tools, serial monitor. Where i set it to 250000 and it seems to work fine. 
However when i come to upload I get this in the error message:



> C:\Program Files\Arduino\hardware\tools\avr/bin/avrdude -CC:\Program Files\Arduino\hardware\tools\avr/etc/avrdude.conf -v -patmega1280 -carduino -*PCOM2 -b57600* -D -Uflash:w:C:\Users\Alex\AppData\Local\Temp\arduino_  build_722464/Marlin.ino.hex:i 
> 
>     System wide configuration file is "C:\Program Files\Arduino\hardware\tools\avr/etc/avrdude.conf"
> 
>          Using Port                    : COM2
>          Using Programmer              : arduino
>          Overriding Baud Rate          : 57600
> avrdude: stk500_recv(): programmer is not responding


And as far as I can see that's the reason it won't upload.
Had a look at avrdude.conf and it says: don't edit this file as it will be overwritten next time you compile.

Which would suggest that something, somewhere is telling it the baud rate is 57600. 
AAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH !

----------


## spegelius

Hmm, I don't think that's the problem, I have multiple boards that use either 250000 or 115200 bauds and Arduino programs the fine, no need to change baudrates. I'd check the board for bootloader; if it doesn't have one, the upload won't work that way. Instructions for uploading without bootloader: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZVTYpHnpIw

----------


## curious aardvark

Hmm, that looks bloody complicated. Plus apparently these boards have been programmed with ide. 

How on earth do you 'check for a boot loader' ? 

This is what it tells the computer when it's hooked up: 
ctc firmware1.jpg

Is there anything to suggest whether or not it's got a bootloader ?

----------


## spegelius

That output is from the actual firmware which I think doesn't know or care about bootloader. Can't remember if the boards with a bootloader print anything else during boot...
 Haven't had any bootloader-less boards so can't be sure, but the way to check if there is a bootloader actually is to try to upload the firmware using the USB connection; it it uploads, you have bootloader. If not, no bootloader. And if no bootloader, you need the thingamajig USBtinyISP to program the board.

Alternative for modifying the firmware is to use gcode-commands to change settings using the USB-connection. Pronterface is good for this, as is Octoprint. Haven't used S3D or other USB interfaces. Octoprint even supports Marlin EEPROM editing with a plugin. If the board has EEPROM enabled, you should be able to save the settings with M500-command. If not, you need to issue the commands every time printer is started.
You can change axis steps with M92-command https://www.reprap.org/wiki/G-code#M...steps_per_unit. From your firmware output it seems that current settings are X78.74, Y78.74m Z2560 and E105. So modify the M92 line for correct steps, they should be active immediately.

----------


## curious aardvark

many thanks - I'll give that a try :-) 

Just spent a couple of hours tracking down the correct version of replicaotrg to calibrate the nozzles on the klic-n-print. 

even if it doesn't stick permamently - I can always put the axis change script in the simplify3d start-up script for the printer.

----------


## AutoWiz

Hey CA, i have learned a stupid little emotional problem that arduino seems to have. While i do not understand the why, It is well documented if you just search around for it. If you open your arduino file by double clicking on the file itself, then there is a good chance it will not write to the board. However, if you just open the arduino ide first. and then open the file from the arduino environment suddenly things work and write. Wierd problem but very simple fix. I'm not sure if that is what you are describing or not.

----------


## curious aardvark

I've only ever opened ide first and then the 'marlin.ino' file.
So I'ts probably not that. 

Currently waiting for some 3mm lock-nuts (?1.44 for 50 inc deliver from uk - mad) I'll incorporate them into good grip wheelie things_ (lol must be a proper word for a notched edge wheel)_. That will make bed levelling both easier and hopefully - why I'm going with lock nuts - longer lasting. 

I did comtemplate drilling the bed holes to 4mm as I already have 4mm lock nuts. But I don't have appropriate length 4mm bolts - so is cheaper and easier to just buy the locknuts and avoid drilling right on the edge of the plate. 

Now I've read that some people have had success uploading firmware with the board just plugged into the usb. I did try removing the 12volt power wires - but no joy just on usb. 
So I think I'll unplug everything and try it like that. 
All the other boards I have, work fine just on usb - obviously you can't run motors. But with just the board plugged into just the usb - they usually fire up. 

So that's probably next, on the firmware saga.
As I've got the bed to bits anway.

On another topic entirely. Picked up a couple of tubes of dimafix at tct this year.
It's some clear liquid in a plastic tube with a dabber type top. 
So I put 3 layers on the klic-n-print. 
No noticeable drop in liquid level in the tube. 
So far did about 5, largish prints - 4 in the same place. second nozzle was causing issues on the overhang curl, so the last one - which worked was rotated. 

Got the first layer speed up to 40mms. THis is a 120mm long print. No sign of warping. 
Printed at 65c and once bed had cooled prints came off easily. 

No sign of wear. 
Have to say I'm very impressed with the stuff. 
Hot end on delta is currently under repair. Struggling to get the teflon tube exactly right length and placement.  So klic-n-prit is currently the main machine lol
The dimafix stuff, almost gets it up to the same print speed as the delta. 
Interested to see how it lasts. But so far - seriously impressed.

----------


## curious aardvark

Okay so here's the thing. 
Just a bit of general advice :-) 

If you are trying to get a filament feed tube out of one of those weird tube holder things.
The things at the bottom of the pic: 

DO NOT GRIP THE TUBE WITH PLIERS ! 
Particularly if you're using 1.75mm filament and the tube has internal diameter of 2mm. 
Finally tracked the issue with the delta down to this. Basically I've buggered the internal diameter of the tube and the extruder can no longer push filament past where I used the pliers. 
The hotend and nozzle side of things is absolutely fine. 
New tube arriving today. And some spare connector doodads as I can't get the old tube out of them any more. Not even with pliers :-) 

So tuesday's lesson is: 
Never assume, you know FOR CERTAIN, what the problem is :-)

----------


## curious aardvark

locking nuts and some 30mm fans arrived today - killed the wiring on the delta heatbreak fan with all the fiddling about. 

So thinking I might just adapt the delta cooling duct for the ctc, instead of trying to figure out how the hell you attach a turbofan to anything :-)
Not sure they could have made those things any more awkward to work with if they'd tried.

----------


## curious aardvark

right - things have been going on in the background. 
I'm pretty much resigned to the crappy screen and firmware. If I use sd cards and the odd short usb print and use simplify3d to do all the controlling - I can pretty much ignore the screen and horrible buttons.  

I've changed the levelling wingnuts for proper knobs that incorporate locknuts.
Added my own design cooling fan bracket.
 I've added frame brackets and bolted the thing to a 5mm aluminium plate - this turns a slightly iffy frame, where the central frame isn't reliably attached to the bed frame, into a rock solid one that should hold calibration almost indefinitely. 
I've made an adaptor that holds the bed belt properly level. Before it never reached the holder slot in the frame and was a bit twisty. 
I've added a filament holder to the top.
Also added an sd card extender that turns the board's microsd socket into a full sd slot on a long cable. 
Just levelled it - once i know it's printing fine and I've got the basic settings working I'll start messing about with the sizing g-code.

currently printing an articulated slug via usb. 
Been making a lot of these as they are totally brilliant ! https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2818955

I've been making them in shiny black, the one on the ctc will be an albino slug. Just hope the rest don't pick on him. 
running it at the same speed as my delta for quality comparison purposes. 

looking good so far. 
I'll go find my phone and take some pics.

http://slinging.org/forum/yabbfiles/...-ctci3prob.mp4

----------


## curious aardvark

Right I'll add pics in a bit. 
Currently printing an articulated dragonfly at 100mm/s. Looking really good. 

So a complete list of the things I've done to this printer. All added parts have been designed from scratch by me and I will put up a thingiverse thread with all the files when I've sorted the gcode, step changes and incorporated it all into a simplify3d profile. 

1) added on/off switch to power cable
2) made a better mount for the y-axis end stop.
3) replaced wingnut bed adjusters with plastic knobs and locking nuts
4) made a focussed cooling duct that attached with 2x 3mm bolts.  I use focussed ducts as you can get away with a smaller, lighter fan with no loss in cooling power.
5) added top mounted filament spool holder.
6) added some caps to the top of z-axis screws. current ones are temporary till I can be bothered to make something better :-) 
7) made front and rear frame brackets for bolting the printer to a rigid base. I used 5mm aluminium, 8 or 10mm plywood would work just as well. 
8) added an adaptor to keep the y axis belt straight. As it came the front holder did not reach the socket in the frame and was a bit twisty. 
9) modified the extruder with ptfe tubing to eliminate feed gaps and make it ready for flexible filament.
10) added big rubber feet to the aluminium baseplate. 
11) glued z-axis endstop with some blue light cured resin. Once you get the z-stop where you like it, without fixing of some kind it will NOT stay put by itself, the nuts just work loose. I guess I could have dismantled it and added a couple locking nuts. Glue was easier :-) 
12) Added print surface from lankeda (no idea what it actually is) and then added a layer of dimafix and magigoo (seems to work well) to that - both were free from the TCT show last year. 

All items - where possible - are attached with locking nuts. 

All electronics and mechanicals are original. Apart from the y axis-endstop holder - I haven't replaced any original parts - just added bits i felt were missing.

y-endstop holder.
y-endstopholder_571x600.jpg

cooling duct
cooling nozzle1_800x495.jpg
cooling nozzle2_331x600.jpg

Front brackets and belt straightener
basebrackets and beltstraightener_800x289.jpg

Filament holder
filamentholder2_519x600.jpg

----------


## curious aardvark

Complete printer and Dragonfly print :-)
complete printer_346x600.jpg
articulated butterfly_800x525.jpg
closeupdfly.jpg

As you can see from the dragonfly - no stringing or print issues of any kind visible. It came off the bed easily and all the articulated joints are clean and loose. 
Colour me impressed :-)

Just need to sort the sizing issue and I reckon I've got a really nice printer. 
It's been a fair bit of work, but at the end of the day I have to say, that if you pick the right base model and have some idea what you are about - then YES you can get a decent printer for under a hundred quid. 

The dragonfly was printed at 210c, 65c bed, 100mm/s, 0.2mm layer height. 
Current retraction settings: 2.5mm at 50mm/s.
First layer went down at 30mm/s - considering the complexity of the wings, pretty impressive !
Oh yeah also printed the first layer at 200% - so 0.4mm.

One thing I did notice - the bed and extruder temps were nailed on. No fluctuation in the bed temp whatsoever and very little in the extruder. 
At least as good as the delta. 
It takes a while to get to temp, but hey - who cares, lol

At an hour, it was the longest print I've done with the printer so far. The shorter usb cable appears to have fixed the issue where it used to reset in the middle of a print. I actually haven't used the sdcard extender yet. The board registers it as being there - so don't envisage any issues. 

Things left to do. 
Finish up starting gcode and get dimensions accurate.  Hoping that will be relative quick job this afternoon :-)
Flexible Cable holder, to keep the extruder cabling neat and out of the way. No rush, cabling seems to move okay with no obvious issues at the moment. 
Possibly redesign fan duct to attach to front of extruder, rather than the side - as at maximum y-axis it catches on the back right bolt head. 
Discovered that when levelling the bed.

----------


## curious aardvark

final step settings were: X82 Y80 

Every time I ttempted to change the Z axis settings everything went terrible. But as it seems to be spot on anyway - not an issue :-)

So I've just started my first serious print. A 2 part mould that will take over 4 hours. 
Running from the sdcard. 
Sizing is very important for these, so it'll either be a success or a waste of 120gms of pla :-)
Running slightly faster than I run the same thing on the delta - but as the delta has an 0.5mm nozzle and this one the bog-standard 0.4 - about the same length print. 

Which is still pretty impressive :-)

It's also pretty quiet. 
Doesn't sing like the delta and rep clones do, kind of a shame, I like the R2D2 noises.

Could that be down to the stepper driver ? 
No clue what this is using - cheap ones I would imagine.

----------


## Roberts_Clif

> Complete printer and Dragonfly print :-)



Where did you get the articulating Dragonfly

----------


## hutchouk

Thanks for the update.

I've been tinkering with mine too, it's running well, but not as well as yours.  Can't believe you printed the dragonfly at 100mm per second and it's come out great!

I set both my x and y axis at 80 steps per mm and have accurate results.  Since the belt pulleys on each axis are the same, in theory the steps per mm should also be the same.  Have you checked your pulleys to see if there's a bit of crud on them or if one is slightly deformed?

What thermistor did you specify in the marlin config?  I'm not convinced I'm using the correct one.

How did you modify the extruder for flexible filament?  Did you just put some ptfe in that small gap between the extruder and the hot end mount?

I've got more tinkering to do over the next few months and I'll post an update of what I've added.  So far I've added: 
- reprap discount screen + ramps 1.6 board (a ball ache to change and re-configure, but worth it to get rid of that horrid lcd)
- Replaced threaded rods with T8 leadscrews + flexi couplers (seems to run smoother, but hasn't really made a noticeable improvement)
- PTFE tubing
- A cheap TE917 build plate (the PLA adheres brilliantly but it's a bogger to remove the print)
- Added an extruder fan (this probably made the biggest difference to the print quality)

I did try to upgrade the extruder to enable me to use 2.85mm filament since I have 2 rolls of the stuff.  I eventually realised it's not worth the hassle.

Still to do:
- Fix the whole thing to a slab of 18mm MDF (to give the frame more rigidity and to make it easy to move the printer without having to calibrate)
- Add power switch
- Add cooling fan duct
- Add bed levelling sensor
- Build solid hood (for covering the printer while stored and to ventilate abs printing)

----------


## curious aardvark

use 10mm plywood. lighter and cheaper than thick mdf. Also holds screws better. 
I just used aluminium because I do the tech support for a local aluminium engineering firm and they usually owe me for remote support :-) 
So technically it's free. 

power switch: https://www.amazon.co.uk/ROCKER-TORP...gateway&sr=8-6

I'll upload my fan duct file sif you want them. You just have to be careful of the back right bed bolt. 
Eventually I'll make a better one that fits on the side of the extruder carriage. 

Bed level sensor - why ? 
Once the frame is fixed down and you've put some locking nuts on the levelling bolts. it should not go out of true.  They've actually used pretty decent aluminium beds. 

As all my parts are original :-) 
I have not been able to do anything with the firmware. I'm just ignoring it.  Apart from using the screen for running from an sd card - I do everything else from simplify 3d. 
If I could change the firmware - marlin is the last thing I'd use :-) Repetier, like my delta has would probably be my first choice.
Yeah the steps thing did surprise me,  but it does seem to be printing dimensionally accurate now. 
I'll have  a look at the x-axis and see what's going on there as that's the one on 82 steps. 

To help remove prints from sticky build plates you can increase the z-gap and also speed up the first layer speed. 
It's just a balance between adhesion, height and speed really. 
I also find that making the first layer 200% of the thickness really helps too - 150 if it's 0.3mm or above. 

To modify the extruder I added a piece of ptfe at the top that goes from where you stick the filament in to where it  meets the feed gear and one at the botton of the feed gear that goes to the top of the nozzle_ (or inside the nozzle, can't remember and I don't think I took any pictures of that particular operation)._ 
I'm going to try flexibles tonight :-) 
It should be able to print flexible pla at up to 50mm/s for rough prints. I've managed 40mm/s on the delta with some really stiff flexible pla. Flashforge I think. But as no bugger ever puts a makers stamp on the reels - who knows :-)

How did you add your extruder fan ? 

I did try to knock out a print in place fidget cube at 75mm/s. Given the ones I have that did work were printed at 40mm/s with a 0.25mm nozzle. I wasn't entirely surprised when it didn't work lol

The whole point of this was to spend as little on the machine as possible and keep all the original parts. 
Just changed the y axis endstop holder. can't remember why, I think I just didn't like the original. As I don't have it any more - I can't tell you what was wrong with it - just that something was :-) 

Tonight I need to wedge the fan cables in the socket as they keep coming off the board, and tidy the wires up so they don't get caught under the bed whenever I move it. 

But on the whole I am impressed. 
The dual z motors, direct drive extruder and dual side support rails for the bed - put it head and shoulders above the ender 3 - design wise.
I'd definitely recommend as a cheap 2nd printer. 

I should be getting a free sovol i3 direct drive for reviewing and promotional purposes in the future. 
That has the single centre rail bed support - so we'll see how stable it really is.

Given that I've seen a printer with a 600mm x 600mm printbed - that also uses the single central rail with sideways wheels, design. It can't possible be as bad as I think it is, or the bloody thing would never ever stay calibrated.

All my printers are currently running on all original parts: boards, pulleys, motors, hotends, etc. 
All are also on original firmware. 

When you read about people with printer problems - ender 3 aside - 90% of them have incounted the problemks after changing something. Often even before they've made a serious attempt to use the machine. 

Now I've either been very lucky with my current 5 printers, or the manufacturers are actually making working machines and people just don't give them a chance. 
Get a bed levellinjg issue ? Obviously you need a new board and some really expensive stepper motors. 
Can't get a glass shiny finish from wood filament ? well then clearly you need to change your extruder & hotend. 

Everywhere you look there are people using benchsaws to open icecream sandwich packets. 

Why did you change your z screws ? 
A little 3-in1- oil and a quick wipe would probably have had the same result. 

I think 3d printers seem to attract people who like tinkering for the sheer sake of it. That's not  a bad thing, but it doesn't mean the machines don't work as they are shipped - ender 3's aside ;-)
Also I probably have more patience, less money and a larger streak of stubbornness than most people :-) 
So throwing money at something is always my last resort.

----------


## curious aardvark

> Where did you get the articulating Dragonfly



where else - thingiverse: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3147969

Figured it was both a good test of retraction and accuracy, and i refuse  t print a benchy. That's a waste of plastic, this is something someone  would actually want. I think it's in the garden somewhere :-)

----------


## curious aardvark

500 years from now, archaelogists will be scratching their heads and coming up with all manner of outlandish theories on why there are entire mountains composed entirely of teeny tiny plastic boats !

Offerings to their gods maybe ? 
Assuming the primitive worshipped  a big boat as a god.

----------


## curious aardvark

Damn, printer just became an active crime scene !

crimescene_572x600.jpg

----------


## curious aardvark

right. Well I've made both x & Y 80 steps, seems a little better. 
My trolley token-onna-stick are the right size.
Did 6 in on go and they all look great and measure correctly.

So here's a real test of retraction and bed levellness: 
28 Trolley Tokens-onna-stick in one go - gulp !
28 trolley tokens.jpg

----------


## curious aardvark

Well she needs a name, after pulling this off last night:
keysonbed_800x521.jpg

Not a blob, or sign of any threads or stringing anywhere. 
That's a level bed ! 
size looks good - I'll try one this afternoon. If you hadn't already worked out they are for releasing trolleys without using a pound coin. 
Printed these at 100 - for selling custom ones to people I'll probably drop it to 75. 
They all released really easily too.
trolley-keys_711x600.jpg

So she needs a name and a nameplate. Hmmm, have to think about this :-) 
ctc 13 pro b - doesn't exactly trip off the tongue.

The white filament I've been using is Y&S pla. 
See, they DID put a manufacturers sticker on the reel :-)

I mean i have no idea where I gt it from, but at least i know what it is. 

Currently testing flexibles. Just printed at 40mm/s with ome flexible pla. 
Currently doing some flexismart black rubber at 30mm/s - I can just about use it on the delta at 10mm/s - so this is pretty good. 

I'm going to try filaflex next - had the roll for years, nothing has - so far - beenable to print with it. It's like wet spaghetti, the floppiest filament I've ever come across.

*** 

One of the things I like about flexible filaments is that you don't need to heat the bed and you can run the first layer at 100%. Which, given how much slower the speed is than normal pla - makes up somewhat for the low print speed. 

Well hot diggity - this extruder eats fialflex like a hyena with a dead zebra :-)

Just need to get my settings right and I reckon she'll print with anything !

*** 
think I've finally got the settings for filaflex down. 
They say: 210-230c
I say: 255 minimum :-) 

add in 120% extrusion and you can print it at 30mm/s 
Have to admit I am impressed with how a couple bits of ptfe tubing turn what is a really basic, no spring tension extruder into the best one in my workshop.

----------


## curious aardvark

first decent filaflex print - ran it at 255 and 25mm/s.
I'll probably drop that to 20 for subsequent prints. 
There are a few small areas where it hasn't melded ijnto a solid sheet of rubber, slowing it down slightly should fix that.

What did surprise me is the lack of stringing. 
The final print is as clean as you'd expect from pla. Which does surprise me. Retraction is on 2.5mm and 40mm/s, and definitely seem to work as well as for stiffer filaments.  That is surprising. 
The last part of this print is four cylinders with holes,  at the corners of a rectangle. So I would have expected a fair bit of stringing between them as it moved from one to the other - and there is none. 

People buying these printers and then immediately changing the extruder - are really missing out.

----------


## curious aardvark

Just made a couple of articulated slugs from wood filament - The internal hinges were just as loose as all the pla ones. Wasn't really expecting that.
We now have magnetic, climbing slugs - no fridge is safe !

woodenslug1_717x600.jpg

woodslug-climb_800x448.jpg
woodslug-magnets_254x600.jpg

Not sure what a gang of slugs is called - I'm calling mine: A Horde Of Slugs !
They are coming for YOU !

----------


## klimbo

> so that went fairly well.though for some weird reason s3d just kept moving the head to the same 3 spots. centre, middle left and back left. But then I spotted a fairly serious issue with the extruder setup. Between the extruder and the heating arrangement and the nozzle is an aluminium block. It's what you puch the bolts through to hold the mottor and extruder in place. Between the bottom of the extruder and the top of the metal block there is about a 5 mm gap. I guess whoever drilled the block drilled the extruder mounting holes in the wrong place. Not something you'd notice untill you load flexible filament and watch it come out sideways :-) So that need sorting today. Also need to start designing Bluestacks Kodi Lucky Patcher a top mounted filament holder.


yes that's it myself I thought the same thingthe mistake is that the one who pierced the block drilled the extruder's mounting holes in the wrong place unfortunately

----------


## curious aardvark

An dthat's why you need to use some ptfe tubing to remove th gaps. Once you do that, it's a brilliant little extruder :-)

----------


## curious aardvark

A couple of years ago at the tct show, innofill were giving away 300gm rolls of their abs fusion plus. I think dave and I got a couple each - I know it's abs, but it was FREE !
So Ive got a few. 

Figured i'd give it a go. 

Says on the roll 240-260c and 110c bed. 
To start with new filament I always go straight down the middle for the first print -  250 in this case. 
Also given how good this bed surface currently is I also kept it at 65c. 

printed a couple of trolley keys at 75mm/s. 

Printed great. smell wasn't too bad, no obvious shrinkage that I could measure. 
But the layer adhesion was bloody awful. 
I know you should print abs slower than pla - but I'm relatively impatient where this kind of thing is concerned.

So when i try it again I'll try 260c. 
Other than that they bent more easily and broke with less effort than a pla one would. 
So I'm still not an abs fan - but we can add another arrow to her quiver (still not thought of a name)

One thing I have noticed, this extruder doesn't seem at all bothered by running fairly hot for long periods. 
Most budget printers don't recommend running above 240 at all, let alone for any considerable period of time. 
When i was mucking about with the filaflex I had it running at 255 for about 5 hours, with no issues. 
I also left it at temp between prints.
Once the temps are set on this machine, they stay nailed. 

The x and y dimensions are still not exactly the same. But they're close enough for me not to worry about it.
She very nerly pulled off a print in place iris box the other day as well.

It's almost there - just a little too stiff to turn. But better than anything but the delta has so far managed.

----------


## curious aardvark

right, decided to sort the steps and dimensionalty.

Basically printed  a bunch of 20x10x3 oblongs and reduced the steps by 0.5 until sizes were pretty much bang on. 

so I've ended up with: x=80.5,  y=78.5

I can't see any issues with the belts or bearing thingies. Not a clue why they aren't both the same. 

Just printed a 20x40x3 - all three are within a couple hundredths of a mm. That's pretty much as good as I reckon I'll get :-)
weird - but accurate :-)

****

Right now that's done. Curious to see just how fast I can print a 20x40x3 lump. 
gonna try 150mm/s first :-)
Reckon the limit will be the extruder. Without spring loading, there has to be a limit to how fast it can push filament.

Well the interesting thing is that simplify3d seems to max out at 200. no difference between 200 & 250. 
top surface of the cube was a bit rough at 150, 
Oh yeah printing at 0.3mm layers too :-)

Yep, basically no matter what silly speed I put in - s3d obviously has some kind of built in limit. 

But hey, she'll print as fast as a mk3 prusa that costs 8x more :-)
And the blocks printed at silly speed are the exact same size as the ones printed slower. 

All you need to do is slow it down for the solid top layers and you're laughing :-)

----------


## curious aardvark

Okay, I still have one issue. 
vertical layer lines. They're pretty obvious and consistent. 
I'm guessing this is down to the z-steps/motor/screws not moving in completely consistent heights. 
Given that the final height of the object is about as accurate as you can get, and the x & y dimensions are now also accurate. 
Why am I getting these lines ? I'll pop pics up later. 

I believe my gantry is level. It doesn't make any noise other than motor whirring when I move it up and down. Which i believe it would if it weren't level. 
Also I can't see how that would make these lines anyway as they are consisten through the model, not just on one side or the other and the height is even and accurate on both sides.

This is my first I3 - and it's not an issue I've seen on any of my other machines or can remember cropping up on the forum. So currently kind of stumped. 
Hopefully pictures will help someone go:_ 'Ah ha, I know what that is !'_
:-)

----------


## Roberts_Clif

When I got lines like it was because of the lead-screw coupler.
I order for this too be what is happening you would have to have a 1.25 - 2mm pitch lead-screw.

Lead screws 3.jpg

From left to right T8-8  4 start lead screw 8mm pitch turned one revolution.
Center is a T8-2 single start lead screw 2mm pitch turned one revolution.
Far Left is a standard 8mm all thread  used as a start lead screw 1.25mm pitch turned one revolution.

If you are using something like the two on the right then it could be that the lead-screw is not centered in the coupler.
I have to do this with my couplers wrap a single layer of tape around the lead-screw the press it into the coupler.
This allowed my lead-screw to turn truer, I also had a coupler that was sprung and wobbled this too required replacing with new coupler.

Now my Z-striping no longer exists. Hope this information helps you.

----------


## curious aardvark

okay, yep not sure about the revolutions. but I am still just using the plastic tubing, which is not perfectly centred on the spindle of the motor. 

That makes sense. So basically need a better way to connect the screws to the motors. 
Cool - cheers :-)

So this is what I need ? 
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Samje-Coupl...ateway&sr=8-21

And probably these as well:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/KFL08-Align...ateway&sr=8-33

----------


## curious aardvark

If I get both from china, it'll be about 8 quid. Which just about keeps me under the 100 pound mark. And that should be the final mods :-)

6.77 pounds with postage. 
It'll take 2-3 weeks, but there's no rush. Ordered 2 5-8mm couplers and 2 of the bearings I can just screw to the top of the frame. 
Hopefully that should finish the machine off.

----------


## hutchouk

These are the couplers I used, currently at 69p each:

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/3281...27424c4dsjGCaf

I bought a pair of 5x8mm since I changed the lead screws.  If your keeping the stock threaded rods, you'll need the 5x5mm ones.  They should absorb some more of the wobble, but I've heard that these can stretch and knacker if misused, so it may be worth getting a few spares too.  

I also discovered that many other users recommend spider couplers, which are more expensive but don't stretch or damage whilst still adsorbing a bit of the wobble..  These are ?5.54 for two including postage, so I'm trying out the cheaper ones first.
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32888355543.html

The lead screws I bought where these (300mm with nut) at ?2.26 each:
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/3295...27424c4dBLyWKQ

I changed both at the same time (rookie mistake I know) and have seen an improvement.  I may of got the same improvement by merely changing the couplers, but who knows!

I still get a little bit of wobble on the left hand z axis which i still need to investigate.  This could be down to one of the cheap couplers being off centre.  However, I also notice the left hand linear bearing is a little bit loose in it's bracket, which allows the lead screw wobble to affect the print.  I'll probably try to fix this by padding or clamping the bearing in place a little better.

I also read on a couple of sites that holding the leadscrew in place at the top with bearings can exagerate the wobble, so it may be worth holding off on those flange bearings.

----------


## Roberts_Clif

Alignment is the key, I tried a solid coupler that I 3D Printed it was the worst coupler that I had ever used.

s-l1600.jpg

I use these couplers, though they can get stretched out of shape an cause this same issue.

My 3D Printer was working great though it needed to be disassembled, while it was disassembled somehow the couplers got sprung.
Thinking nothing about it re-assembled only to find that it was giving me this Z-Axis stripping.

2mm Layer Shifting.jpg
left was 3D Printed using a new coupler the Right was 3D Printed with sprung coupler. 
Using a T8 single start lead-screw 2mm per turn rise (pitch).
You can measure the stripes at 2mm

----------


## curious aardvark

measured the screw rods they are 8mm and the stepper shaft is 5mm - so why would I need a 5mm=5mm coupler ?

Yeah aliexpress doesn't let you pay via paypal and I'm not giving my credit card details to the chinese :-) 
 how can an aluminium coupler stretch ? 
I must be missing something here.

Printing some - now that' a good idea, I would have thought. 

So aren't the couplers I ordered solid ?

As far as the flange bearings go. I wasn't planning on screwing the grub screws in, just going to use them to stop the screw wobbling at the top.  Keep meaning to make some, but as the mini delta is currently giving me problems, don't have anything else with a fine enough nozzle to do a decent job.

----------


## curious aardvark

Figured I'd have a go at making some solid couplers anyway :-)

The side holes are 3mm. print it at .32 layer height and they will be deformed enough to give a really tight grip. Shouldn't need a nut inserted.

Figure it's worth a try :-)

----------


## curious aardvark

Ah, I see the ends of the threads are thinner than the rest. 
lol, one of these days I'll measure things before ordering. 
right cancel the 5-8 and order the 5-5 :-)

Aso change the plastic couplers too lol

----------


## hutchouk

If you're unable to cancel the 5x8mm couplers you can just turn the existing lead screws upside down.

----------


## curious aardvark

no problem cancelling. 
claims they post in 2 days and I cancelled in about 10 minutes :-)

Then got 4 5-5 couplers these:  https://3dprintboard.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=13158&d=1561725614&thu  mb=1

----------


## curious aardvark

just fitted.  

Can't see any obvious difference, they look smarter - but no change in wobble when you move the z-axis up and down. 

Is there a specific way to level the gantry ? 
I levelled with paper, then re-calibrated the bed. 

I mean it _loo_ks level. but I have no actual way of telling. 
Definitely need somethign at the top to keep the screws centred. 
currently making a basic cable guide.

----------


## curious aardvark

cable guide is the arch. printed without supports.

Just made  abasic cap for the screw and stopped it from popping up with cable ties. 
We'll see how long they last, there's zero wobble when you move it up and down. So theoretically, things should have improved. 
currently printing a cap out on the ctc - the other two were on my delta. 
see if there's any difference in the z- banding. 

cap and guide_475x600.jpg

Couplers:
couplers_800x349.jpg

----------


## curious aardvark

Well, while the printer looks better, the vertical striping is a LOT worse !

In fact if you look at this, you'll that rather than just striping, it's formed an actual screw thread. 

zstriping_224x600.jpg

That should be a smooth surface, I have no clue what's causing this - thoughts ?

----------


## hutchouk

It's not an accurate method,but I used a set square to level my gantry.  I align one side on the bed then measure the gantry height on both sides.  But obviously if the bed is off, the levelling is going to be a bit off too.

----------


## curious aardvark

good idea. I reckon if I move it up and measure the distance between the rods and the bottom of the top frame, that should help. Obviously you need to level the bed after. 
In fact I'll do that now :-)

Well it was way off. But pretty sure that won't make any difference. 

When you move the y-gantry up and down, the whole extruder  mechanism visibly rocks back and forth. 
I'll see if I can video it. 

It's not related to how level the gantry is.  
And the screws don't wobble any more. Could it be some sort of misalignment between the smooth guide rods and the screws ?

----------


## tiger.darknet79

so interested

----------


## hutchouk

That threading is weird.

Are you easily able to wobble the gantry by hand?  If so, perhaps tightly wrapping cable ties around the linear bearings and the bracket might help to steady everything.  

The linear bearings on mine are perfectly snug with the guide rods, but the bearing itself seems to be a little lose in their bracket.

Actually I'll try this now on mine to see if it helps.

----------


## hutchouk

Scrap that idea.  There's no way of wrapping the cable ties round.

----------


## AutoWiz

You need to remove those grey printed pieces from the top of your leadscrews. You have precision linear rods for the z axis to follow. The lead screws should touch only at the stepper motor and at the x axis they are lifting. I cut mine to just below the frame. Install your spacers to set things up and get the leadscrews close to straight, sure. But take them out before you run the printer. And when you watch the leadscrew run out like it does, you should smile big and proud at the energy you are keeping away from your linear rods.

----------


## AutoWiz

Like this and it prints incredible..Because there are linear rods and there are leadscrews and leadscrews generally are not a thing of precision. Because they had a tool twisted all up and down the rod to cut the threads on it. So they need to be allowed to do their thing. clamp at the stepper, threaded through the axis and left out in the open.

----------


## mjf55

AutoWiz is helping with the z-wobble issue.  I just wanted to add the the flashing issue on the red anet board IS caused by the lack of a bootloader on the board.  There are youtube videos out how to flash the bootloader, then you can flash marlin ( or others ) using the arduino IDE.

----------


## curious aardvark

to be fair I run all the controls from simplify3d, and since I removed the usb cable extender, I stopped having connection issues. 
The only thing I use the onboard control panel for is running a print from the sd card. 
To be fair, it is the only thing you can practically use it for. 

If I could flash it, then marlin is the absolute last thing I would use. 
It is my only marlin printer and the only one where the firmware isn't worth the silicon it's written into. 
In what universe do you make a 3d printer firmware that won't even load filament from the control panel ? 

The other 4 firmwares are all excellent, and all different :-) 

Right, so remove the caps and let the screws wobble, but keep the couplers.

And yes, I think the extruder assembly can be wobbled by hand. 

I'll have to see why.

----------


## curious aardvark

After some judicious wobbling I have found the problem ! 
The bearings that run up and down the smooth guide rods are simply clipped into the plastric assembly. 
There is nothing holding them steady and they rock in the sockets.  Presumably they should have been secured by cable ties. 

So It looks like I'll need to remove the extruder assembly again and wither drill some holes for cable ties, or glue the buggers in.

Autowhiz, I noted you'd 3d printed your parts - got the stls anywhere ?

----------


## AutoWiz

What would you like? I have gone back a few pages and seen your z bearings do not look secured to the plastic. They are a different style than what I am using. If you look at the picture of mine on the last page you will see I have a bolt that goes through my plastic to hold them bearings tight in place. Those are official Geeetech X carriage parts downloaded and printed from thingiverse. I have them on my home made printer also. But because that frame mounts the z rods too close to the frame I had to mirror the images before slicing and then mount the x carriage backwards so those ends would fit on my frame..

----------


## AutoWiz

Also you should note the orientation of the filament spool. The other way is functional but far from preferable. And as you reach the top of your build height you might end up breaking some filaments. Which just blows at the end of a really long print that would see the max build height achieved. I have had such great results from each and every time I applied a second motor to an axis that I am thinking now about a printer with no idler pulleys. 2 stepper motors on opposing ends of each axis. This printer will use 7 stepper motors and 7 stepper motors drivers for 1 extruder. I think 10 if we want to use the MMU2.0 stuff which I very much do. Can you imagine a printer with 10 stepper drivers? Sounds far fetched, doesn't it? I think i'm gonna do it. For this effort I will just print another motor end for the x axis and replace the idler end with it. This is such an incredible hobby because there is so much freedom to just be creative here.

----------


## AutoWiz

Here is the thingiverse with the printed parts from geeetech for the i3. you can mirror them print them how you like put the motor on whichever side you like facing whichever way you like. These parts take a bolt and even without the bolt they hold the bearing all the way around: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:989245/files

----------


## curious aardvark

cheers - frame looks identical - so the parts should fit. 

I can see what you mean about the orientation of the filament spool.  that's a fairly easy fix, but can wait for the moment. 

Although if it were printing to height, then there wouldn't be an issue. At the moment I tend to put the z axis at the top at the end of a print and that does give a long length, but if it were printing and going up slowly, there wouldn't be a problem.  Plus I'd need to move the screen - which I can't be arsed to do :-)  

um, 7 - 10 stepper motors for a single extruder i3 ? 
why ?
Okay, re-read the post. So a motor at each end of a belt.  What benefits would that give ?
If the motor weren't perfectly in sync it would cause more hassle that you might save. You'd need to make sure that all the wires to the paired motors were identical lengths. Okay electricity passes pretty quickly through wire, but it's a measurable speed and you don't need much difference to effect a print. 
I guess if you had a very large printer, it would reduce strain on the belts and pulleys - but can't see any other reason.

----------


## AutoWiz

counting equal steps to 2 motors has been perfected since the first i3 printer came about. This is no problem. The benefits of this conversion will be speed and strength without artifacts in the print from heavy axes being slung back and forth, to and froe. It is the difference between pushing or pulling depending on which way you are going vs. pushing AND pulling in each direction. I ran 2 motors for my Y axis on my Black Widow printer with the big heavy 400x250 heatbed with 3mm borosilicate glass plate. It works amazing. no more skipped steps and I was able to raise the print speed as well. 2 motors on an axis directly translates into 2x holding torque on that axis.

Another great place for this conversion would be if you had a 12v printer and wanted to run the silent drivers in stealthchop. a second motor and driver on a given axis would go a long way towards correcting for the lost holding torque.

----------


## curious aardvark

well it's been a while. 
Main reason being the x-axis endstop has ceased to work, and the z-axis endstop is so frigging awkward to adjust, I've been waiting till I've got the incentive to sort things out properly.

So As the firmware is so bloody awful and the screen and buttons are barely functional - I'm going for a major_ (from my parsimonius point of view)_ upgrade. 
I'll make an easily adjustable z endstop, and change the board to an mks sbase 1.3 that's been hanging around my workshop for a couple of years. Also comes with a 3.2inch colour touchscreen with a full size sdcard slot. 
I've even got a wifi module for the screen - but that can be played with at a later date. For now I just need it properly functional.
I think the screen can do the whole restart after power outage bit as well.  

I've tracked down the smoothieware configuration file that lets you use the second extruder motor as a second z-motor. 
Looks like a few wires mirrored from the actual z acis connector and I should be good to go :-)

I've got to the point now where I need a larger print volume and this is the best candidate for the job. Plus it's actually faster than the delta, and hopefully with the new board and stepper controllers - should be as good a quality as well. 

More as I go. 

Now given that all parts were paid for a good while ago and were for an entirely different project - I'm not counting cost ;-)
Cheating - probably, but it's all about what it costs ME - not someone else :-)

I'm sticking with smoothieware - it's just so easy to adjust things on and the only marlin I've seen is the one already on this machine and it's just truly bloody awful. 

Updating smoothieware and the config  is as simple as putting the files on the sdcard and booting up. 
None of this messing around with horrible 3rd party software nonsense :-)

Plus the configuration file I found was already set up for my screen.

Right - off to try and work out what pins I need to mirror and work out how to do it :-)

----------


## curious aardvark

Also there is a network socket on the board which I can connect to the k40's server and put the printer on my workshops native wired network. 

Once all this is done - I'm curious to see how well the prusa slicer will drive the beast. Given that it is an actual prusa clone(ish) - well, considerably more of a clone than 90% of current i3 machines anyway :-)

----------


## curious aardvark

well I plugged everything in, and powered it up. 
No smoke ! - Result :-)

The dual z motors work - steps are clearly off, but they both turn together :-)

That said all the axis appear to be reversed. 
Endstops don't appear to have registered and axis home in the opposite direction to the stops. 
Hmmm. 

But the screen works. 
And nothing explided or caught fire. 
So I think it's mostly a case of working through the configuration file and seeing what's what :-)

----------


## curious aardvark

Tracked down the problems - for some reason it's not updating the config file. 
So it still thinks it's a delta. 

Tried all the stuff it says on the various wiki's. 

Just not updating settings. 

:-(

----------


## curious aardvark

I've given up on the mks sbase. 
Not sure if it's me or smoothieware, but it's either not updating the configuration file - or it's not reading it properly. 

So as I also have an unused mks Base 1.5 - I've decided to go with that and - at least to start with - marlin. 
I know I know. But I found this page: https://github.com/melvinchng/AnetA8_MKSBase1.5
And as far as I can see it's also a straight swap for the second  z-motor to the second extruder socket. 

From what I've read for a z-axis _(very slow speed, high torque)_ you either need to wire in serial - and after looking at a bunch of articles and diagrams, it still does not make any sense -  or use two stepper driver sockets.
The fact that creality actually make boards where the two z-sockets are hardwired in parallel, sharing the single driver chip - is enough for me to want to not do that :-)
It's clearly a cheap and nasty option ;-) 

And given that what i have is essentially an anet a8 clone and the exact same board and screen hardware -  this looks like a good option. 

Shame about the smoothieware - but it just does not do what it says it does. Newer firmware doesn't even load properly on the sbase board. 

We'll see :-)

At least this way I can hassle Autowhiz when marlin gives me hassle, lol

Oh yeah talking about cheap and nasty. Not only does the ctc board Not come with a bootloader, it is also missing the pins that you use to program it with an add on module. 
The chips must be installed preprogrammed, I guess that the fact they also use an atmega 128, is why they use such an old and nasty version of marlin. 

I actually wanted to use my cheaper lcd screen with the knob/button as the touch screen is a bit 'touchy'. It's pressure not conductace and has a tendency to activate the wrong button or two at once. 
But for the life of me i can not remember where I put it and I've spent a couple hours looking for it to no avail. 
If it turns up I can add it - hell it's already installed in a holder and mount - should make it easier to spot, right ? 
Yeah you'd think so lol

----------


## curious aardvark

Well, I don't think it's the boards. 
Both have different firmwares installed, both have the pre-heat temps at 200/65 and the screen shows exactly the same options and settings 180/50 for both. 

Somewhere down the line the screen is just not communicating with the board properly. 
I know it's communicating as you can sort of get the stepper motors to move. Albeit the wrong way.
So the baud rate is correct - hads to change from 250000 to the standard 112500 (or wahtever) as arduino ide simply doesn't ever give you and option for 250000. (on of the many reasons I hate it)

I've checked the config and firmware on the screen and as far as I can see it's what it should be. 
Board programmed first time without any hassle, so I know the settings went through okay there. 

At this stage all I can do is try and find the missing screen. I mean it's already installed on a mount it has to be in my workshop somewhere !

----------


## curious aardvark

Right - found my other screens. 
Turns out the new marlin firmware on the mks base 1.5 is actually set up for a reprap full colour smartgraphics, NOT the mks tft touch screen. Well that explains that, but not the smoothieware where the screen was defnitely set for the tft. 

So I happen to have the correct screen. plugged it in. 
Powers up but nothing show on the screen. 
This rings a vague bell from when i originally got the sbase board. 
It's a dead screen :-(

So now I'm looking for the mks tft screen library for marlin in the hopes I can get the touch screen going. Failing that I still have an unused  dirt basic 6 line lcd display I can use. 

I'm beginning to regret I ever started this in the first place lol

Still if I can ever get the machine working again it should be worth it :-)

----------


## curious aardvark

right then, As I really like repetier I thought - I'd see about setting up that instead of marlin. 

First thing - repetier has  a really cool online configuration setup. 
You basically work through a few pages of settings and then download either the full firmware with new config or just the config file. 
NICE !

It also specifically asks if you have 2 z axis motors and then asks which stepper you want to use for the second motor. Also NICE !

The only issue I have is that I was going to use my third (bog basic) screen. But it's DZ2004A-V1.2 and I have no idea which one I should pick from the list. Obviously nothing has that name - that would be far too easy !

So , for the moment I've stuck the reprap full graphics smart controller in - you never know it might work on repetier. 
Failing that - I'll see if I can find a way to use the mks tft touch screen or the real basic screen. 

Apart from that it was the easiest config I've ever setup. 
 Now to move the machine back over here and plug it in and see how the actual firmware upload goes !

----------


## curious aardvark

I'm not sure I've mentioned how much I dislike arduino ide ? 
So just in case that's slipped by you: AAAAARRRRGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That's better ;-)

I ran through the repetier config process, connect the board, load the repetier.ino file and - obviously - get an error. 

Apparently ide doesn't think that something in the sd card setup is right. 
I can't see anything wrong, and - obviously - it won't tell me exactly what it thinks is wrong, so it won't compile or upload the bloody firmware. 
sheesh. 
At that point I swore copiously and gave up for the night. 

I'm currently contemplating just giving up entirely and putting the thing back together with the original board and screen. 
I have now modified the z-axis endstop so that it's a simple bolt screwing through a nylon locking nut, which was the only physical issue I had with the machine. 
Once you screwed the bed nuts down so that the springs are really tight - it was almost impossible to adjust the end stop bolt as it used three nuts that you couldn't really get at. 

Now it's just a simple hexhead bolt that goes up and down without any hassle and won't move by itself.

----------


## xapkinstaller

Thanks for this  XAPK Installer

----------


## AutoWiz

> Right - found my other screens. Turns out the new marlin firmware on the mks base 1.5 is actually set up for a reprap full colour smartgraphics, NOT the mks tft touch screen. Well that explains that, but not the smoothieware where the screen was defnitely set for the tft.


We don't setup touchscreens in marlin. This is because they communicate over a serial connection. You know, like USB. We adjust the device to what the controller is doing. That is match the baud rate. And most tfts do not like 250000 and you need to set the mainboard to 115200 and then the tft set to that and enjoy the magic. They get 5v pwr, gnd, then get latched to rx and tx pins but not from the usb controller. And so these are more akin to setting up a usb device. The settings for the screens in marlin are for things that occupy the exp1 and 2 sockets. You know the ribbons of old. You can not connect rx to rx and tx to tx. these are recieve and transmit pins and need to cross each other. the mainboards recieve should be wired to the screens transmit. And vice versa. And a lot of these boards are limited in how many serial devices they will support at one time. THis is my problem with the MMU. It too connects to a serial connection and so I can not run the mmu with the touchscreen. And you will find poor or no actual functionality of your touchscreen when you are connected to usb because that serial connection gets prioritized. However, there are mainboards with better support for more serial devices. These include but are not limited to the SKR PRO, The BTT002, or the 11 axis GTR 1.0. Those are just the supporting options from one manufacturer.

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## AutoWiz

> I'm not sure I've mentioned how much I dislike arduino ide ? 
> So just in case that's slipped by you: AAAAARRRRGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
> 
> That's better ;-)
> 
> I ran through the repetier config process, connect the board, load the repetier.ino file and - obviously - get an error. 
> 
> Apparently ide doesn't think that something in the sd card setup is right. 
> I can't see anything wrong, and - obviously - it won't tell me exactly what it thinks is wrong, so it won't compile or upload the bloody firmware. 
> ...



I have noticed with arduino ide if I open arduino by double clicking on the file it is like certain libraries or things do not get loaded with it and it wont compile. However, if i load arduino ide by itself and then load the file within that I always find the joy. But on this side of 2.0 I use atom and dont use arduino anymore. Have you thought about trying to setup Marlin 2.0.5.3 ?

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## curious aardvark

well this is shelved for the moment - as it's 'spot' is now occupied by the sapphire pro. 

Until I fix a new shelf up for the ctc, it can sit ontop of the shelves and observe the working printers and learn :-)

Given the board I bought is 32 bit - I'll probably try smoothieware first. Just soo much easier to both setup and update.

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## capcut

very interesting. capcut

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## peterpro

I'm actually struggling to find detailed information on any of these boards. nox player xplayer

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## peterpro

Not sure if it's me or smoothieware, but it's either not updating the configuration file - or it's not reading it properly.
alight motion du recorder inshare apk

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