I would just add one more and that being Problems & Issues - Redudant I know...

The fewer the better. My two cents, we really needed the ability to have message threads separate. The categories are a nice bonus.

 

A reply from the master himself! Thanks Carl!! Yep those are exactly what I needed. I ordered a 10 pack will be perfect =)

 

Do you happen to have a link of the fans you used? I think I would like to use this instead of the single 40mm fan, does it require a different back plate?

 

I must have gotten a bad one, it was closing the load circuit even when not triggered.. Think I'll go with a mechanical one this time -- burning up the connector is probably better than runaway heating

 

Yours is a FOTEK one from some chinese merchant right? They're dangerous, for exactly this, and more reasons.

RS and Farnell in the UK; and Digikey and Mouser elsewhere all supply quality SSR's in individual quantities. This is not something you want to cheap out on.

If you're using a mechanical relay, please buy some conformal strong-dielectric coating for the PCB contacts if you're using a mains-powered bed. If you're using DC, you're better off using a relatively beefy MOSFET IMO

 

I'm glad someone has noticed this. I too have steel-reinforced belts on the XY.
I almost always leave my print head in the home position when not in use, and this has resulted in the steel cores snapping inside the belt where the belts sit on the F623ZZ bearing idlers.

Until last week, when I realised my belts were a bit loose (due to the way i'd tightened my own belt clamp design), I tightened them up, and the problem immediately highlighted itself on the next print I did. Symptoms were shown on straight walled parts, where I'd get a little dent running in the Z where the section of belt that had deformed, ran across the idlers during the print. I took the belts off to tighten them, and the belts were very slack in a few positions. I also get the same issue you illustrated whereby the belt resists a full 180deg ~6.5mm radius bend to engage with an entire GT2 gear.

I've ordered some normal black GT2, and some idler pulleys with and without teeth to help stop this from happening again. This all looks like the steel reinforced belts seem to have a minimum bend radius above the F632ZZ outer race OD radius. Where i got my belts from, there wasn't note of a minimum bend radius.

I'd say these belts are just not suitable, and should be avoided for C-Bot builds.

With the same 20T stepper gear and 40T leadscrew gears, my Z belt arrangement (Triple C-Bot) with non-reinforced belts hasn't slipped or deformed in any way so far, and that belt is really nice and tight.

About the print deformations, it strikes me as not having the belt clamps on the toolhead completely horizontal from the Y carriage belt idlers. Possibly a mod for either the toolhead X carriage, or Y carriage to bring them square if they aren't already? Having looked in my model, mine already are square so I can't reproduce your results.

 

I'm currently in the process of switching over to direct as well, with one Titan to start, then going to dual.

I went with these little pancakes 17HS10-0704S and dialed them in with little to no issue, minus leaving the driver at the same amperage from when I had the larger KL17H248-15-4A hooked up for bowden......

The only thing I'm trying to figure out now is why the short PTFE that runs from the Titan to the hot end keeps pushing out. It's driving me crazy, but I think there's a pinch point somewhere that is causing the filament to bind up inside the tubing and the extruder just pushes the entire thing out. I'm using a printed groove mount bowden adapter and I have a feeling that's the root cause. I've got a metal one on order with a locking collar and hope that gets the issue resolved. It has been a real test to my patience.

Otherwise, the few prints that I did get completed before this tubing/binding issue looked great. I cannot comment on other filaments other than PLA and ABS. I was getting tiny zits on layer starts, but worked them out in the software and it prints really clean now.....minus that tubing issue.

 

I can vouch for going the mosfet route with a beefy heatsink and a fan. It works great and wasn't much more expensive than the cheap SSRs.

 

I'm a bit embarassed here, but I'm not exactly sure what that means.. I assume soldering was involved?

Unfortunately I ordered last night before this thread started back up.. This time I got this: https://www.amazon.com/Current-Cont..._UL160_SR160,160_&refRID=HS43D3DJ1XRJNNPQR2J3

 

Yep soldering is involved. If you go back several pages, you'll see where this discussion has come up a few times actually.

 

A mosfet is functionally similar to a relay, in that they both switch a connection with an electrical signal. But they have no moving parts to slowly erode/wear (contact deterioration in relays is a thing!), and can switch at very high frequencies if required, allowing you to PWM them.

Depending on the terminals on the board you get, you wont have to solder anything.

 

Sounds cool. I'll add it to the "to research" queue to replace the mechanical relay I ordered (*before* it burns up this time, hopefully).

At this point I'm just trying to get things working again.. I've been doing a lot of modding lately, and I'm starting to get burnt out on it.

 

Solid state relays have no moving parts either. The main cause of them burning up is improper heatsinking. Conveniently, this printer is made up of thick aluminum rails which work wonderfully as heatsinks.

 

Did you hook up the output backwards? your load will power on regardless of control signal if you connect the output backwards

 

I don't think so? I looked at numerous diagrams before wiring it up.. I wired the PSU (+) => SSR(+), SSR (-) => heat bed, heat bed -> SPU (-).

 

+1 for problems\issues & fewer categories the better. I like the short list above.

 

Yer probably should have stipulated that i was referring to mechanical relays only. The other points about SSR's are still valid though.

Another reason to buy a non-chinese SSR is that the heatsinking derating curves are shown in datasheets from the reputable suppliers that I mentioned earlier. I got my heatsink from aliex, but my SSR from Farnell. Not keen on crunching the SSR down to my extrusions and scratching the lovely black annodising :O

 

Thanks, I see they are cheap if you order from japan, but if you order from teh states the price is almost 7x more expensive. I'm going to order some from China and hopefully they don't take too long to get here.
Also you didn't answer my question if you need to use a different back plate? Thanks!

 

I made the bracket to fit the. standard back plate. Probably of more concern may be the hot end. I am using the E3D V6.

 

is there a duel headed version for the d bot, want to use E3d v6 heads with bowman excluders

 

Sorry for the long delay releasing my mods.. I'm still not done with the writeup and haven't had much time lately, but I created a Thingiverse page for them (SpiffBot CoreXY 3D Printer by spiffcow).

 

I'm finally back again. Been so busy. I too ordered some white steel reinforced belts I haven't tried yet and looks like from the recent posts that I need to get some regular fiberglass reinforced belts. Another long delivery . I'm finally getting to the point where I need to make a major decision on my electronics. I know quite a bit has been written up in this forum butt not to beat a dead horse I would like to ask if everyone could chime in on what they use and why. I would like to go with 32-bit was looking at the MKS Sbase the Radds/Due , or Azteeg X? possibly. I know that it's been a while so everyone has had a chance to evaluate the different boards that they are using and possibly I could get some opinions and what is working the best on their C bot... I was planning on using the direct drive with a micron hot end that I have.

 

Sorry for the delay I am still interested in trying some of your beefed-up parts but have been really busy. At the moment I am using Carls modified parts and once I get this up and running I will try some other modifications.

 

The MKS Sbase is a heck of a deal, at about half the cost of Due option.. I've been very happy with mine. I especially love the ability to set the current in the config file

 

I'd say go with RAMPS 1.4 purely because its so cheap and common. General rule of thumb is that any cartesian printer is more than easily handled by a RAMPS set-up. Deltas are a better candidate for chips with a heavy FPU and higher clocks such as the DUE.

I also was under the impression that DUE based boards haven't hit v1 yet and have a few small issues, that are not yet sorted out. Feel free anyone to correct on that though.

WRT steel belts; they'll work. My experience was that they will work their way to buckling and stretching slightly in certain places depending on how your machine is set-up. They'll be fine until your black GT2 turns up!

 

RAMPS isn't all that cheap.. Arduino is $15 or so, RAMPS is another $10, and drivers are $10-15.

The sbase is barely more than that and has built in 8825 drivers.. A quick ebay search turned up this: 3D Printer Board MKS SBASE V1.2 32 BIT ARM Smoothieware + USB,1GB SD,XH2.54,TJC3

Can't comment on the Due/Radds quality. It looks promising, but also pricey and finicky