3D Printer

[devino246]

Anyone know someone who's built one or thought of building one? I'm intrigued. It would be great to be able to build components for electronics projects and the like. There are quite a few open sources available. The one that caught my eye was the Reprap. Great, like I needed another project

So, own one? Used one? Seen one in action? Know someone with one? I'm thinking a RepStrap might be a fun project.

 

[itsid]

I own a reprap darwin a self made repstrap (still unfinished) and a prusa mendel, so yes
Basically it's just as easy as Lego to build the latter, just find the printed parts on ebay and add some rods, nuts and bolts.
It was easier than fixing my mk1 extruder on the darwin.
I run mine on the sanguinololu, never had a failure yet.

it (mine) cannot compete with the makerbot (an offspring of the reprap project) but if you buy a mark8 extruder and 1.75 filament it'll get very close.

'sid

 

[devino246]

Very cool! I may have to pick your brain when I get to planning.

 

[itsid]

Be welcome!
Jay Gould has one too, so I think at least one of us knows the answer to your questions

'sid

 

[devino246]

What sort of microcontrollers did you use? I bought an Arduino last winter and played around with the ATMega328 a good bit. I just use the Arduino board for programming now.

 

[itsid]

The darwin ran on an arduino (with stepper drivers v1.2 iirc - uhm.. can't remember the firmware, will check tomorrow it's in some box on some shelf)
But it was a tight fit,
so the Mendel got the sanguinololu http://reprap.org/wiki/Sanguinololu (based on you'd never guess a sanguino [ATmega644P] board)

The nice part was that I had those Pololu 4988 drivers on the repstrap and now, because it most likely will never come alive, I have backup stepper drivers just in case one catches fire or something

'sid

 

[xXPhasemanXx]

Couldn't you build a 3d printer once you get your hands on one All you would have to do is order the rest of the parts that can't be built with one. Then sell it real cheap.

 

[itsid]

thats why its replicating rapidprototyper, yes.
Unfortunately there are still a number of parts that are not available in common hardware stores.
ptfe or peek heat insulator, printer nozzles, timing belt,
but you can get all that easily on the internet.
I think I paid little over $500 (380 €) for the complete prusa mendel inkl a heat bed and the sanguinololu.

'sid

 

[xXPhasemanXx]

Yeah thats much cheaper than buying one off the factory line.

 

[devino246]

I think I'm going to buy a couple stepper motors and drivers to play around with first, then get to building a frame. I'm much more of a hardware guy; I've got a lot of reading up on software to do.

 

[itsid]

before you buy drivers and motors, make sure to get the right ones.
I suggest these:
http://www.pololu.com/catalog/product/1182
http://www.pololu.com/catalog/product/1200
or other matching nema 17 motors with a torque of at least 13.7 N·cm (19.4 oz·in)
Those are used for the medel with most electronics as of now
check http://reprap.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Electronics for a quick overview.

This way your playing around with the actual motors and drivers that will end up in the printer.

'sid