Newb in building 3D printer here.


I completely understand that you may want to say "just google it." I know this, I have been doing this. The problem is I know nothing about what I am doing so I don't know what to google exactly.


Now that THAT is out of the way....


I joined a project that is working on building our own printer that we plan on taking to market and selling. I have no experience with 3D printing other than a solidworks class years ago which we printed out our design for our final. I was brought on with them knowing I have limited experience in 3D printing, they just needed someone to handle the programming of the printer (I am fairly proficient at programming), and they would handle everything else. I have worked with microcontrollers, PLCs, stepper motors, labview, etc.


As I understand from the following link, the slicer program like simplify3d takes the model and generates gcode. After that, we have to take the gcode, get it on the microcontroller/board in the form of "embedded" software, then physically get the stepper motors/heaters/etc to follow the gcode. Please correct me if I am wrong. https://www.quora.com/What-programming-language-is-used-to-write-3D-Printing-software



Questions:



  1. After as much research as I can with my knowledge, it looks like the RUMBA board is what we need. I read that this is open source so selling should be okay right?


  2. According to our last project meeting, I will be provided the gcode from the rest of the team and my responsibility rests in taking the gcode and getting the printer to follow it to print the model. What are some resources I could do that teaches me to go from gcode to the "embedded" software as described in the link provided above?


I am sure I'll think of more questions later, but this is a start.


Thank you in advance.