3D printer supplies

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peterwaller
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Re: 3D printer supplies

Post by peterwaller »

As predicted I just couldn't resist the temptation and so after about 10 hours work I now have this.
Image
I still have to set it up and work out how to get it to print in two material which is likely to take longer than assembling it.
Reading on the internet and chatting to Trevor at 3D Print World Aylesbury it looks like it might be easier to invest in Simpify 3D.
This seems to be better for dual material use and means I can leave Cura set up for the Prusa i3 in the mean time.
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peterwaller
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Re: 3D printer supplies

Post by peterwaller »

Right I have had some time to play with the new printer and it hasn't all been plain sailing.
When I first ran the machine the controller board kept getting reset or hung up when the printer ran to the start point using the micro switches.
I contacted Amazon and they offered me an exchange or refund but as I had invested 10 hours building it and it would be difficult to return I settled for £133 discount assuming it was either the power supply or controller card and I could replace them for that.
Reading on the manufacturers forum I found it was a known problem and all you had to do was cut the NC pin on each of the micro switches and all was well. :roll:
The overall mechanics I think are good and with all metal drive belt pulleys rather than 3d printed ones slightly better than the Prusa i3 I have.
Because it all works on 24V the heated bed heats up much quicker and can easily get to 100 c without having to lay a cork mat on it as I do with the i3.
I have had it printing in PLA Nylon and Polycarbonate with a separate support material from the other head.
I tarted off using PolySupport see http://www.polymaker.com/shop/polysupport/ and this worked well with the PLA .
When I removed the PLA from the bed the support structure remained behind with just a few stands to remove from the PLA afterwards.
Image
But when it came to the Polycarbonate and the Nylon the higher temperature 250-260 seem to melt the polysupport and it was not a great success.
I found an old sample of HIPS which prints at 250 and gave a better support for the higher temperature materials.
At this point I had a extruder blockage and having stripped it all down I made the mistake of running a tap down each of the threads to clean out any surplus plastric.
Since than I have not been able to get the threads to seal properly and keep getting plastic coming out of various places on the extruder.
I finally decided to strip it all down again but this time I managed to shear the extruder tube.
The extruder arrangement is I think the weakest part of the printer so I have decided to upgrade them to E3d extruders and maybe even bowden rather than direct drive as the mass of two stepper motors is much higher than the old i3 head.
I have still stuck with Cura at the moment as it copes well with multiple machine settings.
I will let you know how I get on.
Occashokka
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Re: 3D printer supplies

Post by Occashokka »

I'm getting crazily bogged down looking for a printer,there's waayy too many different things, I have been looking at a £210 i3 in a post elsewhere a £299 wanhoa steel i3 pre assembled that i can only afford because my dad said he would chip in £50 if he didn't have to build it,and a £240 i3 with filament here http://m.ebay.co.uk/itm/PRUSA-I3-HIGH-A ... 0408.m2460 And here https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B01K6P5R74?psc=1. I have also seen tonnes of others and my budget is up to £300 but ideally around £250 or less as I don't really want to spend every single penny I have
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peterwaller
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Re: 3D printer supplies

Post by peterwaller »

I have made some progress with the new printer.
I have obtained two E3D hot ends (well the cheap Chinese copies but unfortunately they have PTFE right next to the heater block.
They work well with PLA and ABS but have problems with Nylon and Polycarbonate at 260 C.
I replaced the PTFE with some brass tube and have had some success but it does seem to block up a lot.
I have ordered a range of parts direct from China which includes all metal barrels but they haven't arrived yet.
I have now designed a new mounting system for the two E3D hot ends that allows there height to be changed independently and removed the extruders and steppers from the X carriage.
I have designed a new extruder that mounts on the frame with a bowden cable to guide the filament to the head obviously I will need a second for the other head.
This system is printing well in ABS but I need the all metal barrels to test it with the Nylon.
Here is what it looks like so far.
Image
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peterwaller
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Re: 3D printer supplies

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The parts from China finally arrived on Christmas eve.
Here is what the finished printer looks like
Image
Here is a close up of the homemade extruders using the original motors and drive gear but now with an adjustable spring loaded tensioner.
Image
Here are the E3D hot ends now with full metal heat break tubes.
Image
I also printed some feet with soft rubber molded noise reducers built in.
Image
While I was waiting for the bits from china I built my first ceramic heatbreak hot end.
Image
I have yet to try it but without plastic in it I was getting just about 100c across the heat break.
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peterwaller
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Re: 3D printer supplies

Post by peterwaller »

With the new setup I was able to get the heads adjusted to the same height and now finally managed to print nylon supported by HIPS.
The nylon item lifted off the table leaving the HIPS support structure in place and a really smooth finish on the supported surface.
Image
This has proved to be quite a difficult task but enjoyable in its own way but now I can get back to building robots although there is still the ceramic heat break head to finish.
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peterwaller
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Re: 3D printer supplies

Post by peterwaller »

May have been a bit premature with the celebrations I just tried printing a more representative test and it all went horribly wrong. :oops:
It appears that the all metal head keeps jamming on longer runs when printing PLA and HIPS but is fine with ABS and Nylon.
Also when the supported nylon part has holes and shaping it still fails to adhere to the HIPS enough to print properly.
I have reverted to the PTFE insert heat break tube for the support head as they are all below 245C and that seems to have fixed the first problem.
As to the second I am going to try some different support materials to see if they are any better.
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Shakey
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Re: 3D printer supplies

Post by Shakey »

Yeah once I had an all metal hotend I stopped doing PLA for that reason. MUCH more prone to jamming than higher temp filaments.
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peterwaller
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Re: 3D printer supplies

Post by peterwaller »

Thanks for the confirmation it always helps to know it is not just something that I am doing.
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peterwaller
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Re: 3D printer supplies

Post by peterwaller »

Reading on the internet it appears supporting nylon is generally a problem as nylon doesn't stick to much other than itself.
I have tried using the same nylon as a support on the I3 but at the temperatures needed to give good inter layer bonding it is difficult to separate the model from the support.
To get the nylon to stick to the glass table I use a PVA glue stick so that suggested that nylon should stick to PVA plastic so I ordered a sample of Kai Parthy HIGH-T-LAY which is a PVA based water soluble support material. While waiting for that to arrive I thought I would try using a slightly different nylon as a support material. I had noticed that at lower temperatures the nylon loses its inter layer bonding so I ran with Taulman t-glase nylon as the support structure at 230 C and the Alloy 910 Nylon for the model at 260 C.
This actually worked quite well and I was able to separate the two parts reasonably easily.
The PVA material arrived today and that worked better giving a really good bond to the nylon and a good finish.
The dissolving in water wasn't as quick as I had hoped but after about 30 mins in fairly hot tap water it all softened enough to clean out quite well but longer soaking would probably be better.
Below you can see the two parts produced the one on the left being the one using nylon and the other the PVA.
Image
I think the PVA is the best option especially in hard to reach places but like the nylon the PVA is prone to moisture uptake and as the sample had been out of its sealed bag for some time there was a lot of moisture boiling off during the print process.
I stuck some of it in my oven for about an hour but seem to have over done it a little at it has gone a bit brittle so I I am leaving it out to see if it softens up a bit as it reabsorbs moisture.
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