This is epicness. I didn’t even think that was possible to do a different delta robot design but hey.
Very cool. Not being too experienced with 3D printers, how does the stated 0.01" vertical tolerance compare to other types of 3D printers?
That is something new! Very cool!
Yea that’s normal. it’s only as accurate as you can drive the steppers. If you can do 1/128 micro stepping you’ll get a lot more precision.
Love delta robots!
Not quite. Micro-stepping increases resolution but not precision. Think of it like cutting a strip of paper into smaller pieces. I’m an analog machine and can cut a strip of paper into lots of tiny pieces that are roughly the same size. The number of pieces I can cut it into is the resolution, the accuracy of the size of each piece is the precision. A stepper motor is fairly accurate when moving to full step and half step positions but further micro-stepping does not increase precision, it does increase resolution (i.e. number of distinct positions) thus slow speed operation is smoother.
Accuracy/precision is all about the mechanics of the machine. There is only so much you can do with the electronics.
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That is pretty funky.
@ Jeff_Brit, that’s true; you will get more resolution with micro stepping not precision.
I doubt they’re stepper motors, but I could be wrong. Harmonic drive, maybe?
Hypnotic to watch
@ HughB, It is isn’t it. I feel like making a trance remix of the video 
Meh. Could be better but not horrible… (I’m not sure “tolerance” is the word they really meant to use but I could be wrong)
0.01 inches is 0.254mm. Most home 3D printers usually print in the 0.1mm to 0.3mm range, though some can go quite smaller. The “record” is 0.01mm (10 microns), done on a MakerGear Prusa. I’ve gone down to about 0.03mm on my Ultimaker and I’m sure I could go thinner if I really tried. Another Ultimaker driver was doing single-step at 1/16 micro-stepping, which is just under 0.001mm (0.975 microns, iirc) though that wasn’t really “layers” - it was more of a segmented spiral that moved z one step at a time for each segment.
These numbers are more about nerding out and bragging rights - there’s no real visual/tactile benefit in going under 0.05mm - which is why “record” is in quotes. That and a print at 0.01mm takes about twice as long as one at 0.02mm. Any sort of real object can take up serious amounts of time at those resolutions.
godefroi: Rostock runs RAMPS (RepRap Arduino Mega Pololu Shield) with NEMA17 steppers. Check it out at Rostock - RepRap and Rostock (delta robot 3D printer) by Johann - Thingiverse .
Interesting. That would make it more affordable, to be sure.
Rostock - now that’s beautiful.
They’re talking about keeping the price at/under $500 so it’s not nearly as expensive as it might look. That proably doesn’t include printed parts so if you don’t already have a 3D printer (or are not friendly with somebody that does), it’ll be more… I’d guess buying printed parts would be an extra $100-200 or so. Not free but not crazy.
If people would really like one of these but want it more to print with instead of tinker with, they should probably hold off a bit. There are a number of derivitives already and there will be a bunch of churn as evolution works out the details.
Wow, that’s pretty sweet!
If anyone wants to collaborate on designing a NETMF/RLP version of this, let me know!
Lol, as it turns out, in the beginning of the FezCNC project the original target was to make a CNC milling robot for one of the first GHI competitions after the Fez family came out.
It’s still actually a target!
My list of awesome projects to work on with people just keeps getting longer and longer!
Yep, I have that problem too. One look at Rostock and the price point (and the MBI discussions of late) and I too was thinking I needed a 3d printer. I think I have no mad 3d design skillz but that’s a new challenge too.
Agreed. If could get Rostock to carry a dremel then maybe I could also have my PCB CNC mill 