Heated tank to mitigate surface tension?

[rylangrayston]

I was thinking of using a peristaltic pump to control liquid height, rather than the drip. That also means that I can raise and lower the water level at will. So my thought was to run cycles where I raise the level, let the resin relax and then lower the level for exposure.

So heights might be like:
1 - expose,
5 - relax,
2 - expose,
6 - relax,
3 - expose
...

It will take longer to print, but because I fully control exposure time I should be able to get solid prints with very thin layers. Also, assuming the resin will coat the object sufficiently on the exposure step, I might be able to subtract some additional fraction of resin height in the fluid to get even better control.

Has anyone at peachy tried that yet?

I am in for two printers, so I was also thinking of using them together to speed up exposure and get double coverage.

Since the code is open, theses things should be possible to test when I get my printer, though the first one eliminates the worry about surface tension, I think.

Mostly because we havent figured out a way that we can do this for with in the 100 dollar price point we have not tested this enough to really have an opinion on how well it can work. I have built more expensive printers that can do this but Ive barely used them with a feature like you suggest above.

I highly encourage pump hacks! like Slatye says some layers take longer than others, but the dripper wont slow down for those layers, so you have to drip at a rate that gives your longest layer time to print.

[cephdon]

Yeah. Stepper pumps are a bit more. However, I was thinking that it could be possible to use a stepper like this for $5:
https://www.adafruit.com/products/858

There are chips to control it, as you know, but for simplicity one could use this for an additional $5:
https://www.adafruit.com/products/2448

The pump head is the most expensive, but there are ways to do it cheaply to keep costs down. Like:
http://m.instructables.com/id/Inexpe...istaltic-pump/

And:
http://blogs.rsc.org/chipsandtips/20...istaltic-pump/

It seems like it wouldn't take more than $10 to $15 more in single quantities and less if you build your own drivers.

Not that I am advocating it for initial release. ;-) Maybe after we get our printers some of us can figure out the cheapest way to make that happen so that others can make use of it.

On a side note, one other thing I considered was the idea of viewing water level as a linear servo.
In this view, a small dc peristaltic pump is the motor. A variable resistor water level sensor is used to detect position like: https://www.adafruit.com/products/464

Then a cheap servo can be sacrificed and used to control water level by having the electronics drive the pump based on the water level feedback.

To bring this back on topic, controlling water level is going to be my way to avoid issues with surface tension, and these are the ways I was thinking of doing it.