Tronxy x5s - Bootlaoder flashing and main board and heat bed upgrade recommendations

Hi there,

I'm semi-new to 3D Printing and have so far only used the Anet v1.0 Main Board.

I have just bought a Tronxy x5s which i plan to put together soon but when i went to get the files for flashing Marlin to it i found that it doesn't have a boot loader and requires other hardware to flash it the first time. This is mostly fine but i can't find any clear information on exactly what hardware i need to do this and a full step by step guide with such hardware.

If anyone can provide links to the exact hardware required to be compatible with flashing this board and guide me through the steps it would be greatly appreciated.


I plan to (Hopefully) replace the main board entirely at some point in the near future. I have no idea about main boards for 3D printers. Can anyone recommend to me a good quality main board which has a boot loader pre-installed and is compatible with Marlin please?

I also want to upgrade the heat bed by sticking one of those orange silicone heat mats to the bottom of it and then cover that with insulation. The largest i can find at a decent price is 300x300 but the tronxy x5s build plate is 330x330. will the 300x300 mat be ok for this job?

I would post a reference link to the mat and insulation i plan to purchase for this from Amazon, but unfortunately i only just registered and have to have made 3 posts before i can post links.

Thanks in advance to any help provided in this matter.

~Jess~

lol spammer - he's gone :-)

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I plan to (Hopefully) replace the main board entirely at some point in the near future. I have no idea about main boards for 3D printers

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So why do you want to replace a board you have yet to even try ?

An awful lot of issues we get round here are precisely that - people chopping and changing the electronics on printers with no actual rhyme or reason behind it.

Build it, try it - if it doesn't work - THEN maybe think about changing things.

Why would you want to upload marlin to a board you haven't even used ?

What firmware does it have at the moment ?
For me marlin is the worst out there. Repetier, sailfish, smoothieware - all hands down better. Easier to use with better control panel options.

a 300x300 should be fine.
does it not have a heated bed already ?

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Originally Posted by curious aardvark

lol spammer - he's gone :-)


So why do you want to replace a board you have yet to even try ?

An awful lot of issues we get round here are precisely that - people chopping and changing the electronics on printers with no actual rhyme or reason behind it.

Build it, try it - if it doesn't work - THEN maybe think about changing things.

Why would you want to upload marlin to a board you haven't even used ?

What firmware does it have at the moment ?
For me marlin is the worst out there. Repetier, sailfish, smoothieware - all hands down better. Easier to use with better control panel options.

a 300x300 should be fine.
does it not have a heated bed already ?

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Thanks for the reply, to answer your questions:

The board is cheap crap, it?s about the same as the anet v1.0 but doesn?t come with a boot loader so can?t be flashed without extra hardware.

It comes with an old version or Marlin, all the safety features are disabled. I won?t be using the printer at all until I can enable them.

I have had my Anet A6 for a couple of years now running the latest Marlin. I actually avoided updating it from its stock firmware for a loooing time... that is until the heated bed port melted and fused to the plate. Not going to risk it with the new printer and now I know Marlin and am very comfortable with editing and flashing it.

It does but it?s a 330x330 cheap Chinese piece of junk. It takes a long time to hear and doesn?t get to very high temperates, the thermistor is in the corner making it horribly inaccurate. And after the melting on the other printer meter I don?t trust anything drawing high current on these things.

Also, the heated bed is a PCB fused to an aluminium plate. I assume it?s ok to just stick the silicone heat mat and insulation straight to the PCB

Basically I bought this cheap kit on the sales over Christmas for just ?170. I did it due to the aluminium profile CoreXY frame. It was just meant as a base to be upgraded with better parts.

I have had many issues with the Cartesian format of the anet a6 and the awful acrylic frame and housings bending, cracking, shattering. I also wanted a build plate that didn?t move as this caused allot of my problems with print artifacts.

I have a Tronxy x5s, I have no problem getting the bed up to 110C it takes around 7-8 mins. I covered all the electrical connections going into the bed with electrical tap and then cover the bottom of the bed with Reflectix double walled insulation I had laying around. Other then using a crappy temp gun, I have not been able to test it to see if it has even heat dispersion really is.

As for controller board, if you want to go on the very cheap side get a ramps/arduino combo ~$35 on amazon. You will also need to getting a mosfit ~$7 for the bed, it pulls more amps then the ramps 1.4 board can handle. This will allow you to use a auto bed leveling prob without having to strip down marlin software to get it to fit like the stock board. Now that I said that, it is a 8bit board and Marlin 2.0 the latest release is the last 8bit version. I use marlin since it's what I know and have not seen a reason to change yet. I still have not ran into any problems with the system, but when I decide to upgrade the board later on I will use the parts for other projects.

Once you get your printer up and going the major problem you will have is getting the belts to have the same tension. I am lucky since its my second printer, I was able to print motor mounts to help thingiverse(thing:2720415). I would recommend spending some time on Thingiverse looking at the x5s section for easy fixes to design problems.

I would also change out the stock print head, to a E3d or an equivalent but I wouldn't go with a knockoff here. I went with a water cooled E3d chimera, one nozzle will be dedicated to dis-solvable support material. I wanted to have the ability to set different temps on each nozzle. I plan on going to duel E3d Volcano in the future. I went with water cooling since I am planning on making a actively heated chamber around the build area to keep it around 70-90C for ABS and to get into more exotic filaments.

I hope this helps, but without knowing your expectation and what you want out of your printer its hard to guide you in the right direction.

One moment, there is an incoming response. sorry for the late reply and thanks for posting :)

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Originally Posted by Rvamaker

I have a Tronxy x5s, I have no problem getting the bed up to 110C it takes around 7-8 mins. I covered all the electrical connections going into the bed with electrical tap and then cover the bottom of the bed with Reflectix double walled insulation I had laying around. Other then using a crappy temp gun, I have not been able to test it to see if it has even heat dispersion really is. As for controller board, if you want to go on the very cheap side get a ramps/arduino combo ~$35 on amazon. You will also need to getting a mosfit ~$7 for the bed, it pulls more amps then the ramps 1.4 board can handle. This will allow you to use a auto bed leveling prob without having to strip down marlin software to get it to fit like the stock board. Now that I said that, it is a 8bit board and Marlin 2.0 the latest release is the last 8bit version. I use marlin since it's what I know and have not seen a reason to change yet. I still have not ran into any problems with the system, but when I decide to upgrade the board later on I will use the parts for other projects.Once you get your printer up and going the major problem you will have is getting the belts to have the same tension. I am lucky since its my second printer, I was able to print motor mounts to help thingiverse(thing:2720415). I would recommend spending some time on Thingiverse looking at the x5s section for easy fixes to design problems. I would also change out the stock print head, to a E3d or an equivalent but I wouldn't go with a knockoff here. I went with a water cooled E3d chimera, one nozzle will be dedicated to dis-solvable support material. I wanted to have the ability to set different temps on each nozzle. I plan on going to duel E3d Volcano in the future. I went with water cooling since I am planning on making a actively heated chamber around the build area to keep it around 70-90C for ABS and to get into more exotic filaments.I hope this helps, but without knowing your expectation and what you want out of your printer its hard to guide you in the right direction.

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Currently i have an Anet A6 that i have modded allot and is printing.... decently. it used to print near on perfectly but over time the horrible cheap acrylic frame has bend and cracked in places causing horrible inaccuracies, hence my upgrading to the Tronxy x5s.7-8min heatup time is far to long for me. My Anet heats up to 60 within a space of 1-2mins depending on ambient room temperature. And whilst it might not be necessary right now, i want the ability to get as high a temperature as possible for options to use any filament that i may try in the future.Ontop of that, i really do not trust these cheap chinese boards at all and never intended to use it's stock heating element. Only asking if the 300x300 with insulation will be good enough due to the 330x330 one is about 3x more expensive which is just ridiculous (Atleast of the ones i was able to find).As for the mainboard. Someone on another forum reccomended me this:https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/...XRNB3K3&psc=1I very much like the look of it, i plan to try it with these DRV8825 stepper drivers:https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/...1JW&psc=1Price is not so much a concern though and if you can recommend a better marlin compatible board i would definitely like to hear your suggestions. I do like the option of being able to change drivers though for sure.I currently have an e3d v6 on my Anet and plan to upgrade my Tronxy to one also. I'd love to have a way of using multiple colours / materials, however i really do not want to use multiple hotends for this and am going to wait for 3 in 1 out systems to get a bit better. i like the looks of the diamond tip ones for this but since the body is also the nozzle it is no good as i want to use my hardened steel nozzles and plan to get a full set of Nozzle X's after everything is up and running properly.Have already printed some of the mods ready for when it's built. still need to do the belt alignment and tensioner mod though (I am going to be designing my own as i have not found any on thingiverse that i fully like). And i still need to print the X and Y motor brackets and ill probably print replacement gantry plates at some point as i don't like any of the acrylic crap.I plan t o get these v2 mosfets:https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/...I2AQIQH&psc=1I use one already on heatbed for my Anet and will have 1 on the tronxy's heatbed as well as 1 for it's hotend.I agree with you on the Marlin front. i find it works great as it is and i like the configuration and control of it so i have no need to change and am comfortable using it now after customising it allot already on m Anet.Only thing im worried about in terms of firmware is making sure the board can store all the features i want, main ones being of course enabling the safety features but i plan to use bed mesh leveling with an inductive sensor in the future and will likely use 12 points since the bed is so big. I've seen some boards run out of space when enabling mesh leveling though.I might make an enclosure for mine at some point in the future but im very undecided on this. It depends on if i come across a filament that i really need it for. Right now all i use is PLA but once i have made my custom dry box with a spool holder inside that can feed out i will be using m PETG. I will never use ABS.My use case. That's a hard one to answer. I print allot of random little models that just look nice, but i also print some more mechanical things too (I'm in the process of designing my own mini generator).I do specifically want to print very high detailed miniatures though which i will be using a .15 hardened steel / Nozzle X for at 50 micron resolution.

Sorry for the 0% formatting but for some reason as soon as i post or save an edit it removes all the formatting i put in so i have given up trying to fix it -.-