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Sunday, May 29, 2011

Z Axis Success and Starwars

A few days ago I received my timing belts for the Z axis and the 115 tooth belt was a perfect fit. After installing the belt I noticed that my alignment was off enough that the belt could come off the pulley, so I made a "flange." The flange, which you will see in a video posted below, also doubles as a Z axis adjustment knob.

As I did with the XY axis I added a substantial amount of weight to the z axis probably about 10 pounds to test the movement. In RepG it would jog at about 400 mm/min with out the axis being calibrated. It takes about a min for it to move through its 12ish inches of movement.

My new thermocouples came in, they are way to long but that was purposely done. The bed PID controller was bad, so I ordered a slightly better new one for the extruder and the old extruder one will be used on the bed.

I received some electronics from China that make it possible to use an old laptop monitor as a computer monitor using VGA or DVI.
Link: LCD Controller Board Kit with DVI Interface
It works flawlessly. I am now working on a over built monitor stand that includes drawer slides and cabinet hinges and the hinges from the laptop.

Tomorrow I plan on attaching the thermocouple to the hot end, calibrating the XYZ axis, and test the extruder to make sure that my nozzle works properly.

The video is of the printer playing the well known "Imperial March" gcode from the makerbot website.

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