BL Touch and Makerfarm.

[BLKKROW]

Has anyone purchased and used BL Touch for Mesh Leveling? I want to know your experiences.

[Roxy]

I've now got a VERY nice printer with a big bed. It has a BLTouch probe. I'm getting all geared up to bring up the devel_UBL branch of Marlin on it. I'm going to be using it as the development platform for devel_ubl going forward.

(It is more likely than not you don't know what that is.... This branch is going to bring all flavors of Auto Bed Leveling to all types of printers. Right now we are still missing the n x n Grid based. But it doesn't matter. What is there works so well, it doesn't matter. And the foundation of the system is a High Resolution Mesh leveling scheme.)

I'm not overly impressed with the 'Repeatability' of the BLTouch probe. But it is plenty accurate to bring up the UBL branch if you so desire. And really... the work EPatel did to create the Mesh Bed Leveling technology is impressive. I left as much of it in place at the lower levels of the code as possible (just out of respect for his efforts). But if you are thinking you might want to check out Mesh Bed Leveling.... For sure you want to bring up the UBL Marlin branch!

[BLKKROW]

I've now got a VERY nice printer with a big bed. It has a BLTouch probe. I'm getting all geared up to bring up the devel_UBL branch of Marlin on it. I'm going to be using it as the development platform for devel_ubl going forward.

(It is more likely than not you don't know what that is.... This branch is going to bring all flavors of Auto Bed Leveling to all types of printers. Right now we are still missing the n x n Grid based. But it doesn't matter. What is there works so well, it doesn't matter. And the foundation of the system is a High Resolution Mesh leveling scheme.)

I'm not overly impressed with the 'Repeatability' of the BLTouch probe. But it is plenty accurate to bring up the UBL branch if you so desire. And really... the work EPatel did to create the Mesh Bed Leveling technology is impressive. I left as much of it in place at the lower levels of the code as possible (just out of respect for his efforts). But if you are thinking you might want to check out Mesh Bed Leveling.... For sure you want to bring up the UBL Marlin branch!

Thanks for the reply.

I am just trying to see if it better to use the BL Touch or a servo/arm combination. Also, I try to not reference ABL because you technically are not leveling the bed. You are changing the Z height throughout the print.

[Roxy]

Thanks for the reply.
I am just trying to see if it better to use the BL Touch or a servo/arm combination.

There are some people getting good results with BLTouch probes. My impression is a lot of people are having trouble with them. If you are trying to make the decision whether to do a BLTouch or a Servo with a probe leg... My recommendation is go with the servo and probe leg.

Also, I try to not reference ABL because you technically are not leveling the bed. You are changing the Z height throughout the print.

Yes. That is true. It is one of those things where in hindsight it should have been called something else.

[uncle_bob]

As I go digging on the various dark corners of the internet, the BL Touch seems to get a *lot* of attention in terms of setting up the firmware. There are reams and reams of yack about this or that setting in this or that sub-sub-sub version of Marlin or some other firmware flavor. I see very little information on tuning the probe it's self. There also seem to be a number of pretty shaky looking mounts out there. Based on servo arm stuff, any mount that is not 100% stable will have issues. The next issue is information in general about just how far from the hot end *any* bed level probe can be. Closer is obviously better. I'd bet that one axis is more important than the other on this printer and less important on another printer design.

No, none of that is really news. It does explain to some degree why we all seem to be a bit confused about just how well this gizmo does or does not perform ....

Truth in lending: Yes, I have one on order. I'm on my 2,873 version of the extruder and mount. Only about 10% of those have made it to the "print it and see" stage .... at least that's the way it feels right now.

Bob

[Roxy]

As I go digging on the various dark corners of the internet, the BL Touch seems to get a *lot* of attention in terms of setting up the firmware. There are reams and reams of yack about this or that setting in this or that sub-sub-sub version of Marlin or some other firmware flavor.

Bob, if you load up the RC-8 (Release Candidate #8) of Marlin, there is an easy to configure BLTouch option. You pretty much just tell it you have a BLTouch, and give it the correct Offsets from the nozzle and you are done.

https://github.com/MarlinFirmware/Marlin/tree/RCBugFix

[uncle_bob]

Bob, if you load up the RC-8 (Release Candidate #8) of Marlin, there is an easy to configure BLTouch option. You pretty much just tell it you have a BLTouch, and give it the correct Offsets from the nozzle and you are done.

https://github.com/MarlinFirmware/Marlin/tree/RCBugFix

Since RC-8 is a few days(?) old, what's been posted over the last 12 months has been struggling with a variety of RC-X issues as well as basic "this is my first bed level" stuff. Hopefully the word will get out on RC-8 since it does indeed take care of roughly 95% of the stuff that has been posted with about three lines to modify.

Bob

[Roxy]

And incidentally... RC-8 should be almost equivalent to RCBugFix. At this point in time, it probably doesn't matter which one you decide to try. But the RCBugFix branch should evolve into the 'Stable' branch if we don't find too many new bugs.

[uncle_bob]

And incidentally... RC-8 should be almost equivalent to RCBugFix. At this point in time, it probably doesn't matter which one you decide to try. But the RCBugFix branch should evolve into the 'Stable' branch if we don't find too many new bugs.

Hi

Will I find a stable release under the Christmas tree?

Bob

[Roxy]

I believe so... But I don't know the answer for sure. It mostly depends on how well RC-8 goes.