Back to .NETMF after a few years

NETMF & Gadgeteer
21

@ godefroi - Who is this little birdy? Did he tweet?

22

Nah, I’m old fashioned, I was talking on a phone :slight_smile:

23

@ ianlee74 - to clarify, I meant the machine that produces filament from pellets, not a pellet-to-thing printer.

24

Filament diameter is critical as it is the only way you can control the extrusion rate. On the DIY printer forums you’ll see guys measuring their filament in 3-4 places and taking an average to plug in for the filament diameter. If you buy the cheapest filament then this is what you have to do as it is not very consistent.

Ian, for that large/complex of a machine I sure would think about using Mach 4. I think you would find the set up much easier than LinuxCNC.

25

Not wanting to hijack this thread, I started a new one [url]https://www.ghielectronics.com/community/forum/topic?id=22923[/url]

26

Sorry, this morning it is very clear what you were talking about. Last night I read something totally different. Old age kicking in… :wink:

27

Yea, this is the norm when high surface quality prints are desired. But, as I said that’s not really the highest priority for this extruder. It’s more about building large structures that will either be finished in other ways or not finished at all because they won’t be seen.

The machine in that picture with the extruder attached is actually running Mach (not sure if its 3 or 4…). It’s a 4’x8’ CNC. The printer he’s building that will sell with the extruder is basically a 4’x4’ CNC but not quite as heavy duty as that one. So far it seems that using a RAMBo board running Marlin is going to work just fine. My hesitation to going to Mach4 would be the unknown of G code compatibility with popular slicers. We’ll get it going with what we know for now but we may want to look more into Mach4 later since this machine is certainly rigid enough to support a router and get double duty as a CNC if desired.

28

@ Jeff_Birt - There are apparently devices that continuously measure the filament as it enters the extruder, allowing the extruder to compensate for irregularities in the diameter of the filament… sounds like a neat system to me.

29

I think I want to write a children’s book called “Everybody Extrudes”

1 Like
30

Doesn’t exactly sound “G” rated.

31

I assume you have kids? This book is famous.

1 Like
32

Well, I like to think that they have me :wink:

Thank goodness I don’t recall ever helping with homework based on that book.

2 Likes