Tuesday, September 27, 2011
A few extruder experiments.
Once I get the extruder up and running I think I am going to try some new materials. I'd like to see if it can run hot enough to use UP filament. I'd also like to see if there are any new plastics that become useable at the new higher temeratures. There is also some stuff I want to do with color. I want to try interleaving by layer. I would create a plane that is as thick as the layer height of my printer and as long/wide as the xy build area. Then I just stack those with the same amount of distance between them (my layer height again). I difference that from the object I want to print. I save the resulting stl as something else. Then I open the original again. Do a boolean intersect with map stacked planes and save that stl. Then I just line up the two stls that I created. This would allow printing an object with alternating colored layers. With a small enough layer height we may be able to blend the two colors in the same way the pointillist paintings blend together to make a picture.
Makerbot Dual Extruder
So I am on the home stretch of my dual extruder upgrade. I ran into a few small snags. I forgot to order an extra extruder controller (duh) Luckily Dr. Glass of Freeside Atlanta was able to loan me one till I get mine from Makerbot. There was also only one e-stop port on the motherboard so I had to hack a cable to plug the 2 safety relays into it. Then I realized that I didn't have enough molex connectors so I had to cut off one of the sata power plugs and rewire it as an old school molex connector. SOOO I'm finally done with the hardware and wiring. Now I just need to tweak my REF values on the stepper controllers for the new extruders and install the new software.( Which means teaching myself github finally and compiling the latest experimental build for Rep G and maybe doing the same for the firmware too) This is going to be a treat because I am also forcing myself to learn how to use PLA at the same time so adventures are soon to abound...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
