Someone asked me about specific dimensions of my build. I have made 4 sizes of this printer, however I will share the measurements of my 320mm diameter build area machine along with a summary of other parts used along with some random thoughts:

• Horizontals = 425 mm
• Towers = 1105 mm
• Rod length = 400 mm
• all 20x40 OpenBuilds V-Slot extrusion
• Build area diameter = 320 mm
• These numbers, combined with my relatively large effector, seems to provide a good combination of sane rod angle limits and effector stability. Large effector is also convenient for fan mounting options - zip tied to it in my case.
• Max build height = approx 375 mm (at outer edge of the 320 mm diameter)
• Build surface is cheap glass from hardware store + purple can AquaNet hairspray on squeaky clean glass = never had a problem with (PLA, PETG, Bronzefill, HIPS, etc) parts coming up (I don't print ABS with this machine) - note this will probably not work unless your Z zero is calibrated everywhere on the bed.
• Under the glass is MIC6 aluminum fixture plate, 1/4 inch thickness - sitting on top of custom machined spacers I made with my CNC lathe.
• Bed heater is a 300 mm Keenovo 500 watt, 120 VAC unit. If you are not comfortable with 120 VAC mains for this, then get whatever 24 volt 300 mm bed heater you want to use. For extra safety, consider wiring up an entirely separate temperature monitoring system with a relay which can cut power to the bed no matter what happens to the printer electronics.
• Fostek Solid State relay for the 120VAC supply to the heating pad controlled by the bed heater connection on my Duet 0.8.5 board.
• Duet 0.8.5 running the latest dc42 firmware and PanelDue = perfection for me. Great web UI and PanelDue for direct control. Easy to config and MOST IMPORTANTLY also easy to use the dc42 least squares calibration page to get it dialed in for perfect Z zero anywhere on the bed. I will share my config.g file if anyone wants it as a starting point for their build.
• 0.9 degree per step motors - 0.9deg Nema 17 Bipolar Stepper Motor 2A 46Ncm 17HM19-2004S - US$ 13.45 - also used for my extruder.
• Lots of M5 and few M3 fasteners. Mostly M5x12 with a small number of M5x10 and M5x14 and some others. Carriage tension bolts are M5x60. MAKE SURE that whatever length bolt you're using is not bottoming out in the extrusion slot! Put extra flat washers on it if needed to take up space.
• Lots of soldering and heat shrinking (though out of laziness I purchased many of the wiring packs from Basic Wire Kit)
• As seen in photos from my earlier posts - 6mm laser cut plywood platform for the 24 volt Meanwell 350-watt power supply and another 6mm laser cut piece under the bed to keep heat away from the electronics below (I have a 180 watt CO2 laser cutting/engraving machine - but you can easily cut these with any suitable saw). These wedge into the extrusion slots very nicely and are held in place by a 3D printed washer and M5 bolt.

Do yourself a huge favor and get a M5 x 0.8 SPIRAL POINT TAP and use a good cordless drill to tap all the extrusion ends!!! (photo below of the tap). Clamp the extrusion down to edge of your work table and dip the tap into a small cup of WD-40 to lube and clean it, then line up with the hole and drill into it at high speed - being sure to STOP drilling when the hole is threaded deep enough - then reverse the drill and come back out at high speed. Make sure you keep the tap lined up with the hole so you don't break it. I've tapped thousands of holes using this technique with 99.999% success rate. If your drill has 2 speeds, use "2" because "1" is agonizingly slow . I then use a long piece of hard music wire as a ramrod to shove all the tap cuttings out of the extrusion hole (over a garbage can to reduce mess on the floor). The holes in the ends of the 20x40 are already the correct size for the M5 tap so no need to drill anything. M5x0.80 Metric Coarse, 2 Flute, D4, High 87145660 - MSC

Or just use a regular hardware store hand tap if you must.

With careful attention to cutting horizontal pieces to the EXACT SAME length (EASY to do with the proper saw setup), and pulling them into the vertex corners fully with the bolts, you will end up with a frame which almost automatically ensures the towers are perpendicular to the build platform (provided all of your vertexes are printed to the same dimensions - so I print all mine on the same printer to avoid this potential problem). Make SURE the spacing between the two lower sections is the same 40mm at all 3 corners - I fully tightened up the bottom triangle then used 3 spare pieces of 20x40 in between them and gently tapped the bed supporting triangle down against the 40mm spacer (the short spare piece of 20x40).

Depending on how your printed vertex pieces come out, you may find that they're VERY tight on the 20x40 - I did not let this slow me down beyond the extra time it took to beat them into position with a hammer and wood block (hammer on the block which is then moving the printed vertex or extrusion - and be careful to not bend or deform any part of the 20x40). If they're too loose for some reason you may want to review the calibration on the printer which made them.

I used a lot of the cheap slide in t-slot nuts which require thinking about how many you need to put in the slots before bolting stuff together. I also magnetized an allen wrench which allowed me to grab and position them under the vertex pieces. You can avoid this minor hassle by using the more costly twist-and-lock nuts - but make sure they actually DO twist 90 degrees into position when tightening. Sometimes they will fail to twist into locked position.

After cutting all my extrusions and having all the 3D printed pieces ready to go - I can build one of these in around 15 to 18 hours. My first one took 35 hours (going slowly).

My latest problem is the volume of 3D printing I am now doing and size of some of the parts will require that I purchase some commercial machines to keep up (F400 from Fusion3Design may be in my near term future) - a good problem to have I suppose. I am still very happy with the performance of my DeltaSix based printers and will build more of them as time permits!

Send me a message if you have questions. I'll help if I can.

Here's a few more photos for reference:

 

The mini wheels I use are Delrin Mini V Wheel™ Kit

Which larger wheels are you trying to use? Is it these?: Solid V Wheel™ Kit

I might be able to design another version of the carriage which can work with either size wheel - with both sets of bolt holes - such that you could print the "universal wheel" carriage and use either one (or even mix and match wheels I suppose) or just print the mini-wheel carriage if you know you're using them.

Let me know the specifics of the larger wheel you're trying to use and I'll look into it.

 

If the photos from my post above are not working - I put them here: https://goo.gl/photos/EZcoV3XSA4E15Vug7

 

Maybe this image will display below - if not here's a link to it in my photos collection: https://goo.gl/photos/FqMCP1NknytKD8h87

It's the 2 size wheels profiles (from the OB SolidWorks files collection) and some construction line geometry added as needed to show the 4.395 mm radius difference between small and large wheel, taking into account how they have different V dimensions which ride at different depths in the V-Slot.

The 4.395 mm is not enough of a difference to easily convert my carriage to have both bolt patterns. However, I can make a different version of the carriage for these larger wheels which moves the wheel axle bolts out by the 4.395 mm radius difference and post the STL file for it.

Give me a few days on this and someone send me a reminder message if it looks like I forgot about it

 

Hello, another fail for me, i have managed to find mini wheel but i they are too "mini".
The ball bearing is for M3 screw. It will be strong enough this m3?
In the picture are the too big and too small wheels that i have

 

Is there a reason you don't buy the proper wheels from Open Builds? They are 25% off right now!

 

The delivery from china it will take 15-60 days, i do not know how will work with USPS, maybe 7-21. That's why i have spent more than double the price of the right set of wheels.
Now i have 2 sets, full size wheels and that mini for M3 screws.
Maybe i will find the right ones tomorrow, i will try to finish this week.
Now i'm working to finish the rods.

 

here's a UK link to wheels --- V-Slot Wheels : Mini V Wheel

 

thanks @malc, i have found the right barrings to replace on my mini wheels and now will be like the original wheel set with more than 3x cost.
the rods are done

 

Hi, me again.
@jerry426 please take a look at my photo, the left piece is taken for the last STL, and it's mirrored.
Can u plase put the god one? if i use this, the screw to tension the carriage on the profile will not work.
Thanks,
Dan

 

NO idea how that got reversed. The correct file is in here: Dropbox - Latest STL files

I opened it in my slicing software and it looks good.

 

Jerry- Again I want to congratulate you on your awesome build (builds?). You are truly a master and your willingness to share is commendable. Initially, I thought you were a little nuts with the 400mm build plate and other seemingly grandiose specifications but I now see I was totally wrong in this regard. I apologize. Best of luck with your efforts and keep us posted. Lofton

 

Ditto! Very nice work from a Gentleman Maker.

 

Here is the new carriage design to use the OpenBuilds large size wheels - where the centerline of the axle bolt holes is moved 4.395 mm outward to accommodate the larger wheel radius (based on drawing information I found on OB web site and my own questionable math).

I saved it with all the other STL files here: Dropbox - Latest STL files

Somebody who has large wheels can print one and confirm it fits well.

 

Lofton,

Thanks....but Master? Not even close.... Through extensive trial and error ending up with "it's good enough for now" I'll admit to being my own apprentice

You and ME both thought I was crazy for building my very first delta printer ever at 400mm! I now have many of them finished and running 12+ hours a day at 320 and 250mm, however I still need a lot more printing capacity but don't have time for building any for a while (except one more for a specific purpose) - so I'm stuck with buying relatively cheap commercial printers for a little while. I ordered a Wanhao Duplicator 6 earlier today to see how I like it.

I'm making a few minor design changes to some of the parts and will post them when I can (such as thicker walls on the belt idler rollers after one of them split on me last week - so I reprinted a thicker version of it in PETG and am testing it on a few printers first).

 

I am having a crack at redesigning this in fusion 360. Hoping to build a 1 mtr ish printer.

 

Hey Jerry. I was just looking at your file for the end stop. it looks like a different one to what you have used on your printer. Would I be able to grab a version of that.
Thanks
Matt

 

I replaced the end stop STL with the new one - sorry about that

 

Don't be sorry. Thanks very much...

 

Tonight's project: Make the effector smaller so it works better in my latest 240 mm build. I had this one 30% completed when I ran out of time for building - so I'm going to go ahead and finish it up anyway.

The new smaller version still has the same 75mm rod spacing as the larger one - which means it uses the same rod mount on the carriage. This will give me approximately 30 mm larger build diameter than the larger version at the same rod angle relative to the tower.

If this ends up working well I will post the STL files for it along with the new fan shrouds in case anyone wants to use this one.


It includes provisions for bolting my twin 40mm fans on at the 45 degree angle shown. After it's finished printing and I mount the hot end I will figure out the fan shroud specifics and print a pair of them as well.


The larger one for comparison (which has plenty of places to zip tie the fans onto it):

 

@jerry426 - thanks for refining and sharing your designs.

A few questions to Jerry or anyone else:
-Anyone seen adhesion issues with the eSun PETg solid Red? Saw some Amazon reviews that said it might have issues compared to other colors.

-Jerry, looks like you are using a Traxxas ball link. Can you share a part number? Have people given up on magnetic ball joints?

-@d_a_n Sources for Carbon rods and ball links from the pics you posted?

-Duet 0.8.5 obviously has a lot of horse power. Is the Mega/Marlin still viable? Is the least squares leveling compensation in the Duet significantly better? Does it try to find the best fit plane for the bed print surface - or is it doing fancier stuff like compensating for tower misalignment? What reservations would you have using a Mega. Any favorite links for Duet suppliers?

-Some interesting new high temp PLA's coming out like from E3D, but I have to think really hard to spend more than $35/kilo. I like PETg because of the low shrink and excellent interlayer adhesion, but it tends to be stringy. I keep coming back to ABS because of the high temp and crisp clean prints that don't melt on the dash of my car. Has anyone given any thought to adding acrylic panels for rigidity, temperature and fume control for a special ABS capable set up? I usually run 50C+ ambient with a recirculating charcoal filter. Thanks.

 

Zappo,

Those are Traxxas links made onto the end of the pre-fabricated rods I purchased from tridprinting.com. You can make the rods yourself using 6mm carbon fiber rods, epoxy, and those ends - however look around for the tutorials on how to end up with ends that are not sloppy loose and how to make a jig to ensure exact same length of all 6 rods.

I'd strongly recommend the Duet 0.8.5 based on its ability to smoothly deliver pulses to the 0.9 degree stepper motors (which I also recommend). I have not tried any of the 8-bit boards with a delta printer.

I really like the ESun PLA+. PETG works well for me as long as the retraction is doing what it should. Should also note that nearly all of my PETG prints are at 0.25mm layer height which seems to help a lot.

Acrylic panels on this design would require some additional standoffs on the backside of the towers to make sure the carriage wheels have a clear path. My plan was to simply build a separate enclosure for my DeltaSix if I was going to print ABS on it. I have other enclosed printers for what little ABS I do print. Since discovering PETG I have not printed much of anything with ABS. Also note that I have yet done a car dashboard test with PETG parts either.

 

Here's the direct comparison of my original effector (which works perfectly on my 280mm and 320mm printers) and the new smaller one for my 240mm diameter printer. I'll get it installed later and continue with my assembly and post a progress photo at some point.

https://goo.gl/photos/MKsVPJpCv7J2Xaye7

 

Thanks @jerry for the carriage!
@Zappo , the rods and joints where bought from local market website, olx. But next time i will try to use carbon arrows from an outdoor equipment shop .
Anyone is using optical endstops? i'm trying to find a right way to fit on frame.

 

Dan, do let me know if my big wheel carriage actually works.

Someone asked me about breaking the tap when using my high speed drill method. No broken tap here as long as you clean it off after every hole and keep it aligned with the hole: https://goo.gl/photos/YcjMhtM9G7eSEXWV6

 

I'm looking for some help.

my horizontal triangle beam length is 300 mm and vertical triangle beam length is 700 mm.
planning to use 6mm CF tube for the arms.
the Kossel frame calculator is suggesting 240mm length for arm.
what may be the correct arm length for my setup?

thanks in advance