Tank3d printer build

[Boyan Silyavski]

Boyan,

there is only one extruder worth using. It is also worth going direct drive on such a large build.

The Bondtech extruders are E3D compatible so at least that is a good start.

https://emvioeng.com/shop/3d-printin...ndtech-qr-3-0/

Thanks for pointing me there! I will probably contact you as i need some quality components.


I will greatly appreciate your input if you are kind enough to share info.


But about the extruder:

-First of all its a proprietary extruder, not open source, so no place in my build. Why? Obviously to make my printer i will use open source electronics, hotend, etc. So roughly said- i am basing on other peoples work half of the printer. Isn't it a better thing to buy their products to sponsor them continue the investigation? I think so.

-Even if its the best extruder on the market and probably very nice to resale as a high end extruder with a good mark up value, i dont think thats the correct extruder for the build. Though for special order build or for a desired upgrade i could eventually use it.

-Third but not least- See, i will ask you a question. if i am to make a printer for resale, could you resale more easily that printer it it has 4 x Bondtech or a printer that has 4xextruders that do the same job 95% and are altogether combined cheaper than one of the Bondtech?

You will need to heat the bed to allow adhesion and reduce warping. Think about how you are going to acheive this on a 6mm surface.

400x200 bed. I was tempted to go 400x400 or even 500x500, but i decided that quality is better than quantity. First of all 2x 200x200 heating pads or elements will do the job cheaply. Then silicone heating pad may be . What i am contemplating is to use even 8-10mm plate, pocketed seriously from bottom and using heating wire directly or silicone pad there.

One thing is a must: the bed must not "breathe" and when pulling sth from bed machine must not need recalibration In fact- i will not accept to say that i did sth good if the machine will need any kind of later software adjustment and squaring of bed. Thats why i did not like the "raising Z design and shied away from it though people praise it. No way, its not my direction of design and thought. Even if i have to move the bed with 2 motors or a real servo motor to achieve the needed acceleration.

I have 3d printer from 3 days at home and have not seen or contemplated 3d printer design earlier. And the first thing that bugged me was pulling away the piece from the glass. I thought i will brake the bloody toy.

I could and possibly will use the way the Prusa does it with the touch probe, but better design everything so that is not actually needed.

PS:

bed heat insulation from below is a must also! and i will not shy from thermocontroller if need be. its just ~20 euros altogether with SSR relay.




Questions:

-If the printer is fully enclosed, do i need to cool the things down inside the enclosure somehow? I am not talking about the electronics. But do the electronics support that function? or just leave a hole so air circulates?



-Another question as i have 30x30 profile here and have never seen in real life 20x20 profile. Will it be ok for the gantry only one piece of 20x20 at high speeds? will it not vibrate? Thats my only doubt from structural point of view.


-haven't somebody come with super light direct drive helper combined with Bowden extruder solution? In real life i see the 4 spols in a dry box 1.5 meter away at least from printer. I dont see them hanging around and sucking humidity from air, and i live 200 meters from sea and this is a serious problem.

In fact from a couple of days i dont stop the air conditioner at all at home, because i still have not made myself a dry box for the filament

if not- too bad but anyway i dont care much about flexible filament, so Bowden drive will be

[nirmal]

There is a very neat extruder design on this thread. https://forum.e3d-online.com/index.p...led-mod.53/The water cooled hot end design on the same thread might also be a good idea if you find that a heated chamber is necessary to keep super sized prints from warping.

You can order custom made silicone pad heaters from china in whatever size you require. I presume you will go for 240V AC and a solid state relay for the bed heater. I am not sure if any of the commonly used controllers will allow the sort of currents you will need to pass through them without overheating if you go for DC and on-board PWM heated bed control.

On the subject of control boards, the Duet WiFi with the TMC2660 stepper drivers would allow you greater a choice of stepper motors with it's high current rating and as an added bonus would be very quiet in operation. I have no connection with the Duet manufacturers. I am just the owner of a previous version of the board - purchased for a still unfinished project.

[nirmal]

Sorry I messed up the link. Here it is https://forum.e3d-online.com/index.p...cooled-mod.53/

[magicniner]

I am not sure if any of the commonly used controllers will allow the sort of currents you will need to pass through them without overheating if you go for DC and on-board PWM heated bed control.

It's easy to do your control on the AC side of a transformer/rectifier circuit using a PID controller and solid state relay ;-)

[Robin Hewitt]

WOW! I got my first 3D printer for my birthday back in 2012, wore it out by 2015 and I bought another.
I have absolutely no advice to offer because I believe 3D filament extrusion printing to be a black art and beyond earthly comprehension. Every time I think I understand it a new torment pops up and hurls me back to square one.
I would say, "Good luck" but I do not want to jinx you.
Break a leg
Robin

[Doddy]

Similar to Robin - had a couple of 3D printers for a few years now. Just a point to Boyan - remember the nature of the material that you're dealing with here - it's a laudable design goal to have a tank-build, but there *WILL* be deformation of the extruded material that WILL cause head crashes - I've been watching mine recently and some of the flex in the design accommodates the fast traverses together with a clearance height that is intruded upon by the cast material. A bit of flexibility could offer protection to the extruder.

EDIT: (tongue-in-cheek) maybe in keeping with the nature of this site, Boyan should design a co-axially mounted fly-cutter to machine the build surface!

[Robin Hewitt]

Boyan should design a co-axially mounted fly-cutter to machine the build surface!

and a 300degC air blower to soften the top layer before deposition should you dare to print any substantial area :distrust:

I'd also like a micrometer adjust on the Z axis so I can tweak it without reprinting. A mere 0.1mm too low on the first layer means no squidge and I lose adhesion :fat:

I prime the bed using an ABS wash over Kaptan over Pyrex over aluminium, with yellow dusters on top for a quick warm up. What a palaver. No wonder ebay is full of patent sticky beds :stung:

I used to use cheap ebay filament but now only the best will do, and small reels because you only wind up throwing the excess the moment it has sucked enough moisture out of the air. Pop fizz :culpability:

[Neale]

I'd also like a micrometer adjust on the Z axis so I can tweak it without reprinting. A mere 0.1mm too low on the first layer means no squidge and I lose adhesion

Agreed - one of the first things I printed with mine (early Prusa now around 5 years old) was a fine Z height adjuster. Invaluable. I would also like auto bed levelling - I take my printer to exhibitions from time to time (good machine for this as you can see all the working parts very easily) and it doesn't travel too well. Always needs 10-15 mins of fiddling around to retweak the bed (heat-proof glass on PC board heater). I managed to find a ground glass trivet in a local discount hardware place which gives very good adhesion with no more effort than the occasional wipe with acetone.

[Boyan Silyavski]

Dont know, am i lucky or what? had no idea whatsoever before 1 month , decided a 3d printer before 2 weeks, 3-4 days to learn software and from one week ago i am non stop printing on my friends Legio / a Spanish knockoff of Prusa 3/

He told me he needs hours if at all to level the bed and that the machine is super flimsy/ it is/ . Last week he gave me the machine. I did not know how to operate it at all.

First thing i tightened properly the belts. Took from garage the hot glue gun and a precision square. Hot glued all that i did not like / ALL / . Hot glued machine to a kitchen board/ not best but i am going to weld a base/ . Hot glued the belt ends to the belt plates. As i said -all.

Then leveled the bloody bed for 2 min and it would have been faster if people were aware that 3 screws leveling is easier than 4 screws leveling.

Did some prints and 1 print f%%%d up cause unglued from bed. So i sat down infront of google and after 10 min i knew the magic. Went to garage, took a bottle of C200/ white wood glue. diluted it 1:1 in a small hermetic jar and tapping gently a sponge primed the glass bed. From then on glues like a ...you know the saying. Only thing is i have to wait 5 min for the bed to cool a bit from the 55C i print. Then it comes off easily. I see the hotend or the hotend extruder combo is not perfect, but i print always from then with rafts and skirt so no problem at all with the crappy breathing bed.

I printed PLA and from a couple of days only pla 3d850 which i intend to be the main material as its stronger than ABS when cured, very detailed prints, and hi temp resistant when cured. Its Ingeo but made in Spain so at 19euro per kg is a no brainer that i master it.

The only problem till now was to master the material which i did in a day, had problems and it made me learn Simplify3D up and down , at the end it was bloody material being 1.69mm thick, but when logic was implemented it took me only 2 hours to find the bug.



What i am saying is PVA glue is the way. Rafts also. No need to hurry and try to save 5 min or 0.05 cents of material. No need for special stuff. Or to use my wifes hair spray.



Ok, i dont know if you guys are aware but on a properly designed DIY CNC when head hits the table or gantry hits the end or similar, if steppers are used the machine just stops and thats it. Plus if you use digital drives most probably stall detection will happen and alarm signal will stop the machine.

So if the printer is properly designed i dont see what will happen apart from stopping.

I am still not there and will ook into that but: Arent these printers using some digital drivers with stall detection?????

I am much more worried why these toys dont use some kind of smoke detection or fire prevention??


Anyway, i moved further with the design. Managed to make the gantry very tight vertically, same with the hotend. Plus at the end i decided how what to do with the X motor, which will go in the clearance between the gantry sides and the table, which means keeping the structure height etremely low. That combined with the shallow depth will make it a real table top machine. Not some ugly cube. At the moment stands wide 620mm and high 370mm. I am still playing with the idea if i need or not the top and bottom cross bars, look last picture where removed. Looks more simple and better to the eye, I will decide that later . Their main idea was so if i sell the machine to sb all linear elements to be premounted here by me, Guess i have to receive the 20x20 profile and see how it will go. Their other function is if you fit servo drives and do crazy speeds so the machine to wobble. Though it wouldn't if side and top panels are fitted


Another thing that bugs me is the cable chain. Yesterday printed some cable chains and they are not properly designed for printing even if they tell so. I will check what price are Chines, design proper one or use what they use on the Original Prusa. Some kind of cable tie organizer???


have also started printing the parts and well, i am quite happy with the result. Till now had to redesign only one of the, All else is indestructible by hand. Which is how i like it to be strong. The hotend plastics are downloaded from internet. Just printing them now, cause i think i will have to redesign them to be stronger and ventilator adjustable somehow up and down in case i switch to the Volcano heater

[nirmal]

I used to use cheap ebay filament but now only the best will do, and small reels because you only wind up throwing the excess the moment it has sucked enough moisture out of the air. Pop fizz

I store filament in airtight clear plastic paint buckets with a rechargeable portable dehumidifier and a cheap digital hygrometer. It won't miraculously make poor quality filament good but it keeps it dry enough to use the whole reel for very little expense.