Experiment failed

I tried the experimental Makibox hotend upgrade Jaywward made for me.
Without a fan it didn't work out.
I'll have to try with a fan next.

I'm getting more and more frustrated with the shortcommings of the Makibox. :(

Makibox: E3D hotend installed

The modification

I gave up waiting for the experimental Makibox hotend upgrade.
So as planned, I finally got my new E3d hotend.
Last weekend, during Easterhegg someone 3d printed me a mount for it.
I pretty much followed these instructions.
Except that I made a different modification to the Z endstop, that can be seen below.
I wanted my endstop to be adjustable. (See the photo below)

Endstops

 If you have the PrintRboard (first generation Makibox machines), you need to swap some cables after the firmware update:

From the top down the end-stops are:
* e-stop (move Y endstop cable here on the PrintRboard)
* z endstop
* y endstop (remove this cable)
* x endstop

Results

The E3D version 5 bowden 1.75mm hotend works great!
The Airtripper versioon 3 BSP extruder works great!
The hotend mounting has about 2mm of play in Y.
I'll replace it with a modified version that uses LM4UU linear ball bearings as soon as the bearings get here.
The final line is: I CAN 3D PRINT AGAIN!!!!! :)

#

Makibox - the next steps

The default hotend of the Makibox is ...crappy.
The thermal barrier is not enough to print anything larger then a test-cube in ABS or PLA. Even with no retraction at all, the filament above the heater block expands and stalls even the strongest extruder after 30 inutes of printing. (Using the supplied Makible filament and higher temperature settings. With Makibox-supplied default settings it's much worse.)

I already have a stronger and spring-loaded extruder and a thinner bowden tube. They help but alone they don't solve the issue. They just postpone the failure.

I'm currently waiting for a modification from a forum user in the US that adds a cooling block to the existing hotend. The modiciation is as simple as screwing it on and mounting a fan.

In parallel I already have an E3D hotend version 5.
During Easterhegg I'll try to find someone to print me a mount (or another mount for LM4UU linear ball bearings) for that and follow the instruction of user my_makibox to install it.
If not, that mount looks simple enough that maybe I can CNC mill it out of a piece of wood.
(Having E3D print a mount for me was not avaliable when I ordered my hotend.)
Not that is does require a firmware update because it has a different thermistor.
my_makibox supplied a compiled firmware here .

CNC6040 updates

Just to give everyon an update:
This weekend I made a few modification to my larger CNC.

The new E-Stop button got it's cable properly mounted to the wooden case I build.
Just below the thick glass front.

Proper sockets for 3 end-stops have been added. The original end-stops I got where too small to fit mechanically but bigger ones where in stock this weekend. They have not been installed yet.
I'll install them together with bellows to protect the Y axis from dirt and shavings.

The probe input didn't want to work when using 5V from one of the Enable-outputs of the PLCM-B1 breakout board. I added a separate 5V supply just for the tool height probe and it works now.
Here is the answer from Purelogic regarding this issue:

  Hello Marcus,

  Thank you very much for your notice.
You are right that you need another power supply for external sensors.
PLCM-B1 has too many inputs and we could not place another on-board power supply which could power all inputs. (Of cause we could make it, but will be too expensive and large).
  Small on-board power supply with limited current (for ex. enough for 5 inputs only) can cause more problems because not all users read a manual carefully and they can easily overload this power supply. Nevertheless this way seems most right for me now.

  We will consider your notice in feature. Thank you very much.

Oleg Gladyshev,
Purelogic R&D, Russia. 

The earth cable of the spindle VFD got ripped out. I repaired it and secured it somewhat better.

The power sockets for all parts of the CNC are now permanently screwed onto the frame and can no longer fall off due to the drag of the heavy cables.

My cheap MACH3 remote is still acting up. The jog buttons get stuck and the machine just keeps moving.
I replaced the keyboard with the flaky USB port and the constant USB attach/detach cycles no longer mess up the communication of MACH3 via Ethernet to the PLCM-E3p+B1 boards.


For the smaller TravelCNC I managed to drill an XL timing belt pulley from 5mm D-shaped to 8mm round shafts. It shall replace the 3D printed one I made a while ago because that one developed some serious backlash after 6 month of usage.

I will give a small workshop on CNC machining for people who have used only 3D printers during Eaterhegg next weekend.

Accidentally deleted FreeCAD development VM :(

I just accidentally deleted my FreeCAD development VM. :/
Now I need to download my empty VM again, checkout my own GitHub repository, add the upstreams of the other developers, the main upstream and then continue developing.

Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 25fps endurance test

Setup

25fps, 180° shutter, ISO800
2x Sandisk Extreme Pro 64GB
USRobotics dual UHS-1 USB card reader
iMac
manual lens, drawing no power for autofocus or optical stabilisation.
focus peaking ON

Test 1 raw

  20min 3 seconds of raw footage.

Test 2 raw

BMPCC stops at 19min45sec with 48% battery having filled up the 64GB card.
However it starts blinking a "card full" message after about 15min of recording.
29649 frames
Resolve reports just: 19min 45sec
40minutes to transfer footage to iMac
 => you can't run on 2 cards, dumping one while the other is being recorded to.
59.538.769.788 Byte (59,59 GB on disk)
29.649 frames
3min 33sec to erase all files on the SD-card

With the remaining 48% battery
19 minutes 45 seconds (exactly like before down to the second) onto another SD card.
After 15min 11 seconds the "card full" message starts to blink.
2% battery left
transfer to PC: 42min
59.370.355.068 Byte (59,44 GB on disk)
29.594 frames
Resolve reports: 19min 43sec


With remaining 2% battery left, the camera nearly instantly shuts down in an attempts to record some more.

Test 3 ProRes

39min 43 seconds of ProRes before the battery and not the SD-card ran out.
There was enough space for another 4minutes 52 seconds

CNC6040 upgrade

I finally found the time to finish the upgrade of my large YOOCNC 6040 from the USB control board (that was already a huge improvement and now works in my smaller TravelCNC) to the russian PLCM-E3 and it's huge breakout board PLCM-B1.

The 4 existing axis all work fine now, both E-Stops (on control box and on the machine) work as does the tool-height-probe input and I have the ability to upgrade to 5 (and even 6) axis later.
I actually want to do that when my "SimpleMultiAxisCAM" is finished.

The dozens of inputs and the 6x 250V 6A relays are not used yet.
I'll connect the 2 E-Stop buttons and the Probe input later.
The relays will probably be used to control the water pump for the spindle cooling water and the compressor for my existing mist-cooling for metal working.

6 axis,
15 inputs,
16 outputs,
6x 250V 6A relays,
controlled via Ethernet and with proper optocouplers and galvanic isolation.
I'll not use the PWM feature as my spindle is controlled via RS485.
28 leds for all axis and inputs can e wired to the front of the enclorure.
...what an upgrade.
BTW: That breakout board is HUGE.

I also found the reson for the "stuck axis" and the "connection lost" issues.
The stuck axis seems to be a fault in the chinese MACH3 remote control and the "connection lost" a faulty USB keyboard that detaches and reattaches from USB and messes up the system for half a second each time.

Makibox Hotend and power improvements - Version 2

This is my second attempt to fix the issues of the Makibox hotend.
This time In added a number of large and small M4 washers and placed my fan deeper.

Also: Powering the fan and Raspberry Pi from the same 12V supply seems to cause random crashes of the Makibox firmware. Particularly when it's supposed to start heating the hotend. I have gone back to powering the Raspberry Pi via a second power supply and am observing the situation to confirm this as the cause.
Result: It still crashes. Something else must be at fault. Searching...

Results:
The washers are perfectly cool.
The PID control has a hard time reaching target-temperature and usually stays 5°C below what the hot-end should be at. I will need to change the PID settings or block air flow from cooling the hot zone instead of just the washers and shaft.
The bed needed to be leveled again because the length of the hot-end changed a bit.

The TEST PRINT FAILED AGAIN with the same filament stalls as all the others.
At the time of failing the washers where perfectly cool.

Second attempt:
I changed the target temperature to 218°C.
This is a temperature that worked well before and has less mechanical resistance because of lower viscosity.

FAILED


Third attempt:
I changed the target temperature to 190°C.

FAILED

Makibox Hotend and power improvements

After switching to the AirTripper V3 BSP extruder, I wanted to improve the hotend to finally get reliable printing...

But the first thing that happened was, that the BSP connector of my extruder ...fell out.
I did add a small heat sink and a 12V fan to the top of the hotend.
Since I cannot prevent heat from creeping up from the hot zone to the parts of the hotend that are supposed to stay cool. the intention is to cool the upper parts and dissipate as much of that heat as possible.

While connecting the 12V for the fan, I also connected power for the camera-equipped Raspberry Pi that lives inside the Makibox.
Beware that you need a gas powered or very strong electric soldering iron to solder anything to this PCB. It dissipates all the heat you put into it before the solder has any chance to melt.

test:
I'm currently testing the setup.
The hotend is staying at 235°C for an hour and I'm touching the upper part to feel for any warmth every now and then.
I already know that the "L" shaped heat spreader does get warm to the touch during long running print jobs before friction due to expanding filament above the hot zone ruins the print as even the strongest extruder cannot push hard enough to overcome this.
results:
The "L" shape stays cool while the threaded part and the M4 nut at the top of the threaded part of the Makibox hotend is too hot to touch.
The TEST PRINT FAILED AGAIN with the same filament stalls as all the others.
Either this isn't the issue at all or I need a way to cool the threaded filament tube above the hot zone.


>>> Part II

Weekend update

Just a quick update on what happened recently.

large CNC:
I'm still waiting for my PLCM-B1 Breakout-Board to fix some electrical noise issues due to not having opto-couplers at the moment.

TravelCNC:
I'm bringing some wires and small parts to change the wiring to use new stepper drivers.
The original, chinese ones where rated far above what they could survive. (advertised as 50V, used at 48V, rated at 45V absolute maximum)

Blackmagic Pocket camera:
I got my Pocket Speed  Booster (0.58x, +1,33 stops) and 50mm f1.4 as well as 30mm f1.4 lenses.
I did find a used Sigma 18-35mm F1,8 DC HSM but it was no longer for sale a day after.
I'll soon make a comparison of
50mm f1.4 +SB
30mm f1.4 + SB
25mm f0.95 Voightländer
17.5mm f0.95 Voightländer
25mm f1.4 Leica
12-35 f2.8 Panasonic
CCTV f1.4 C-mount lenses for 2/3" sensors

4 axis CAM for FreeCAD:
I'm stuck. My plugin compiles but there's no .so file being generated.
Aparently I don't understand enough about cmake.

Makibox A6 HT:
I'm bringing some parts to add a passiv cooler and a cooling fan to the cool part of the hotend.
After exchanging the extruder this seems to be the root cause.

Using an AirTripper extruder on the Makibox A6

 Because of frequent filament stalls on my Makibox A6 HT, I'm currently upgrading to a different hotend that (hopefully) can transfer more force onto the filament. That should allow it to overcome added resistance in the hotend due to heating and thus expanding filament. That in turn would make the printer more reliable.

The extruder I set my eyes on the is the Airtripper V3 BSP. 

 

Problem 1

The stock drive gear is 9.5mm away from where the filament would be with the Aitripper V3.

Solution: Get an MK7 Drive Gear Pulley (for 1.75mm filament).
It came out the best for this purpose in a nice test.
Don't install the MK7 just yet! Read to the end first!

Problem 2 

The BSP Air Tripper has a thinner bowden tube.

Solution: Cut an M4 thread into the end of the tube, place an M4 nut on it.
Now it will be compatible with the Makibox hot-end.

 

Problem 3


The shaft is too short to hold the MK7 drive gear in reverse.
Also the hole in the MK7 is tappered, so you cannot even insert the shaft into the other end and need excessive force to push it on the right way.

Obviously spacers of 4.5mm for the stepper motor are needed.
You need to print this space before installing the MK7 because you can't get it off anymore.
You need an allen key of 1.4mm diameter for the grub screw.
Also the long screws need to be 11mm longer (6mm for the acrylic, 5mm for the spacers).
Thus M3x41mm or M3 threaded rod is needed.

Solution: M3 threaded rod, 4x2 M3 nuts as spacer, 4x M3 nut for mounting

Problem 4

Let's mount everything up!
The Makibox has only 3 mounting holes.
The Airtripper only needs 3 bolts.
...different 3 bolts then the ones we have holes for.

Solution: an M4 nut can mount your extruder on top of the Makibox through one of the air cooling slits.

Problem 5

So let's do a dry-run first!
You can't push the filament through.
The exit-hole and the center of the BSP connector are not aligned and the filament hits the wal of it's hole with no way of manual intervention. Force can't overcome this issue.

The photo shows the abolute maximum how far you can insert the filament.
Solution: none yet. You may get it to push through with excessive force and trying serveral dozen times.

Note 6

The new drive gear is larger.  You need to multiply a factor of 0.57 to the amount of filament to transport in your slicer settings.

• Google+ posting
• Makibox forum posting

3d printable quick relase - spring loaded

It's done!
I managed to design a quick release adapter.
It uses a cloth peg spring for the arm and has a second spring (from ballpoint pens) to keep the arm open until you push down with your camera to lock it in place without touching the lever.

Makibox A6 HT - reliable Slic3r settings?

I may have found reliable setting for the default extruder of the Makibox A6 HT!

It finished several prints from 5 minutes to more then 3 hours without any manual intervention.
Something I haven't seen since I own this printer!
There is some grinding and blockage but only every 1-2 days and for obvious reasons (plastic blobs accumulating in the parking position,...)

Mechanics

Do all the tuning steps. Especially check the stepper motor reference voltages.
Make sure the X and Y axis and the hot end are loose enough to slide without any unusual sounds and nearly no force at all.
Make sure the springy plastic wheel in your extruder can rotate. If not, use a round file to widen the axis holes slightly. I filed a small filament-shaped grove into the surface of the wheel to reduce pressure to the filament.
Oil the trapezoidal rods of X and Y axis, the smooth rods and also the 4 plastic axes of the filament reel holder in the back.
Insert the filament spool into the back of the machine

Make sure the machine is cool (hotend less then 60°C) before you start printing.
Make sure the outside of your nozzle is clean. (Don't care for the hole.)
Always retract the filament until it is completely outside the hot end after printing.
Before starting to actualy print, manually insert the filament until it has overcome the barrier between bowden tube and the actual hot end (there's a slight change in resistance and a noise), then slooooowly go further until you feel the resistance of the plastic hitting the bottom of the extruder.

Basic settings

I started with the default Slic3r profile "A6 General (HT PLA) v0.3" from Makibox.
Then I did the following modifications:

Printer Settings

1. Leave layer height at 0.2mm
2. Leave the first layer height at 150%
3. Speed: Reduce External Perimeter and Perimeter speed to 20mm/s
4. Advanced: Extrusion width of First Layer: 200% 

The first layer needs to stick. So we push out twice as muchfilament as needed, to make sure it does.
The slow perimeters help making round holes round instead of D-shaped.

Filament Settings

1. Increase PLA temperature from 193°C to 218°C
   
2. Leave printer bed temperature at 60°C 

The increased temperature lowers viscosity and thus the force required by the extruder.
Thus reducing filament stalls due to the extruder grinding.
It also makes the first layer stick much better.

Printer Settings

1.  Reduce retraction speed from 70mm/s to 25mm/s
   
2. Reduce the retraction from 4mm to 2mm.
3. Increase "minimum travel after retraction" from 2mm to 4mm (At least twice the retraction.)

 Together with the increased temperature this seems to prevent filament stalls due to the extruder grinding.

CAM in FreeCAD progress

I'm making very slow process on porting SimpleMultiAxisCAM to the unfinished FreeCAD CAM2 module. I'm slowly getting a good understanding of how everything works but there are a lot of parts in the CAM module and Geometry classes that I still need to understand. Currently I'm working on it every thursday, when the local hackerspace meets. See here for my plan and status.

More 3d printed camera equipment

I'm finally back to 3d printing and it feels good!

That $300 Makibox is so much more reliable then my old $1225 Thing-O-Matic (notice how the press release says "reliable" and "fully automatic"? My Ass!)!
The Makibox does have filament stalls and sometimes prints are slanted but nowhere near the issues I have with the Makerbot Industries ToM.

So here are the latest things I have designed and made:


A Zoom H6 version of my old Zoom H4n remote control grip for camera rigs....



3d printable quick release plates (including a printed, custom bolt).
Adjusted to be able to still open the battery compartment on the GH2 and GH1 cameras.




I'm currently working on a 3d printed quick release adapter using common cloth peg springs and ballpoint pen springs, new shoulder rig parts and a GoPro version of this quick release plate.

3d printed quick release plates

Actually I finished these on thursday but I wanted to publish them only after I checked them with every tripod and quick release adapter I had.

The nice thing is, that this also fits the Calumet adapters (different edges) and that the cutom bolt is also 3d printed (with a slight rapper to make using a thread-cutter after printing easy).

Of cause everything is parametric, so you can choose between 1/4-20 and 3/8-16 and any depth for the bolt.

I'm currently working on designing the quick release adapter too and to make custom versions of this one (e.g. with a GoPro socket on top, a hot-shoe, a 15mm tails mount or a microphone mount.)

My design sold on Shapeways...but not by me

Aparently some user named "Next Copter" has copied one of my designs.
Version 2 of my GoPro to NERF rail connector including all photos to shapeways.
I'm publishing this design as Creative Commons CC-BY-NC-SA,
that means NON COMMERCIAL
that means ATTRIBUTION
that means SHARE ALIKE
that means the design, I didn't license the photos at all.

I have already contacted the Shapways abuse department and am waiting for the legal identity of the offender and how many he did sell there.
Then I'll decide about further steps. Update: Shapeways informed me that another copy by a user named "Svenstead" has appeared.

Using OctoPi with Slic3r instead of cura

I installed OctoPi onto a Raspberry Pi embedded in my Makibox A6 HT 3d printer.
The development brance allows experimental slicing on the Raspi.
However it only allows to select a cura executable and config-file.
So here are the steps to do the same with Slic3r:

ssh pi@octopi.local
raspberry

git clone https://github.com/hendricksonrw/OctoPrint/tree/cura-integration

wget http://makibox.com/tl_files/support/slic3r_configs/slic3r_configs.zip
unzip  slic3r_configs.zip
cp slicer_config/A6\ General\ \(HT\ PLA\)\ v0.3.ini slicer_default.ini 

git clone git://github.com/alexrj/Slic3r cd Slic3R
sudo perl Build.PL #this will take a LONG time and 1 or 2 tests may fail

vi cura_dummy

#!/bin/bash
# ['/home/pi/Cura-13.01-linux/Cura', '-i', '/home/pi/cura_profile.ini', '-s', '/home/pi/.octoprint/uploads/Spritzen-Brett.stl', '-o', '/home/pi/.octoprint/uploads/Spritzen-Brett.gcode']

echo ----
echo ./slic3r.pl –load $2 -output $6 $4
echo ----
./slic3r.pl -load $2 -output $6 $4

:x
chmod a+x cura_dummy

Then enter
"path to cura" = "/home/pi/Slic3r/cura_dummy"
"path to cura config" = "/home/pi/slicer_default.ini"

FreeCAD development VM

It took me an entire afternoon to set up a development environment for FreeCAD.
...so I'm publishing the ready made environment including kdevelop as a virtual machine.

For use with VirtualBox but the HDD is compatible with qemu.
Username=Password=freecad

download here

• FreeCAD developer hub
• FreeCAD developer forum

The best option to extend the disk space is to add a second, virtual disk and mount it as /home/freecad/source or similar.

If there are issues where a (X)_python3.3.cmake file cannot be found, it may be required to change "python3.3" to "python2.7" via sudo in the respective (X).cmake file.

Developing a CAM for FreeCAD

This posting is just a list of links and notes for myself on how to get started contributing to the CAM project in FreeCAD.

Why?

Ultimately my aim is to integrate my SimpleMultiAxisCAM code for 4 and 5 axis CNC machining as a TPG (tool path generator) that post-processes the toolpath generated by another TPG. It shall add the inverse kinematic needed to use the 4th and 5th axis to follow the surface normal. Where that is not possible due to the tool or collet colliding with another point of the part or the machine, it shall try to follow the surface normal as close as possible.

CAM2 notes:

 'Tool Path Generator' (TPG) include a 'Geometry' setting.
   This 'Geometry' setting includes a list of object names from the current file.
 cam::Paths accepts these geometry names
   looks for those that are based on the Part::Feature class (and hence have a TopoDS_Shape reference).

cam::Paths
   recursively iterates through the TopoDS_Shape objects until it finds the TopoDS_Edge objects.
It assembles these edges into lists of contiguous edges based on their endpoints.
The Cam::Path class does also allow Cam::Point objects to be contained so that point-based operations such as drilling, tapping, counterbore, boring etc.

Cam::ContiguousPath
   Stored these contiguous edges.

TopoDS_Edge
   represents a single 'curve' (i.e. line, arc, or spline, bezier curve).

Links:

• FreeCAD CAM-module sources (/src/Mod/Cam2/) 
• Very active personal git clone of  David Nicholls
• My personal git clone
• FreeCAD CAM project Wiki page
• Design document for CAM2 module
• FreeCAD developer hub
• FreeCAD developer forum
• My SimpleMultiAxisCAM to integrate as a TPG

For new developers:

• sticky post 
• Developers Help postings by mrlukeparry
1. 2012:
2. CAM2 module introduction  
3. CAM2 parts of the module
4. How features and GUI work in FreeCAD
5. Integration of the libarea-clipper CAM library
6. first GUI code
7. 2013:
8. ...
9. 2014:
10. ...