This is the last update for the Trinket Contest. We hope to announce the winners at the end of the week (there’s a lot to dig through!). If you didn’t see yours on one of the updates, either we didn’t get it, it wasn’t a complete entry, or you missed the deadline.
After the break you can see that final eight entries.
Here’s a great low cost filament extruder solution. It uses basic parts available from any hardware store, and a few 3D printed ones — estimated cost is well under $100.
It’s very similar to the Lyman Filament Extruder, but can be built for even less money. By using 200C set-point heaters, his setup requires absolutely no electronics — although a cheap PID controller from China could give him more extrusion capabilities with temperature control… Regardless, the system appears to make good filament and he uses it exclusively for his personal filament consumption in his Delta printer. He’s even hacked up the ABS casing of a refrigerator, ground it down, and turned it into filament using this machine! If you’re hungry for more details, the full build log and discussion can be found on the RepRap forums.
He also has a guide on making your own ABS color masterbatch to make your own filament colors!
[Thanks Liam!]
Here’s a beautiful desktop CNC mill which had one big drawback: it used a proprietary interface for driving it. To increase the flexibility of the tool it was hacked to work with G-Code.
The project is a Hackaday Hackerspace Henchmen submission from rLab, the Reading Hackspace in the UK. [Barnaby] explains the entire project after the break. The machine itself wasn’t altered, but a translator script was written in Python after capturing a bunch of packets and working out the protocol. This script listens for G-Code and does the translation into the type of commands the machine is expecting to receive.
If you know of a CNC hack from your own hackerspace send us the story for a chance to win some loot.
Continue reading “HHH: Sniffing Proprietary CNC To Hack In G-Code Support”
Have a mill that you’d like to automate? Perhaps you can gets some ideas from the work [James] recently finished. Using familiar NEMA 23 stepper motors (the same motors used in the RepRap), he hacked his Proxxon MF-70 mill for CNC control. Adding a Sanguino and the stepper controllers from other projects, [James] got a working machine for minimal investment. You can tell that [James] is a fan of Polymorph, because he uses it liberally for most of the project, even using it to create some Oldham couplings (Google cache).
After completing the build initially, he managed to burn out the spindle motor by milling steel too quickly. We found it interesting that he was able to use a TURNIGY 2217 860kv 22A Outrunner (for R/C airplanes) as a new spindle motor. Not only is it a low-cost solution, but pairing it with a traditional brushless ESC can give your CNC software direct control over the motor speed.
The image above is an example of what [James’] machine is capable of. Overall, it’s a very accessible project for most of us. Not every mill needs to be capable of 10 mil traces. If you’ve got the urge, you can probably put one together yourself. Of course, if you do, please let us know!
I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again: if you’re using a 3D printer to make a few hundred identical plastic parts, you’re doing it wrong. That’s the place for traditional manufacturing methods such as injection molding or resin casting. If, however, you’re looking at printing a few dozen identical plastic parts, or even running a script to optimize your machine time, the current open source 3D printer world leaves one thing to be desired.
An Automated Build Platform is a fairly simple idea: put a conveyor belt on your heated bed, and when the print is done, send a command to drive a motor, dumping the newly printed part into a bin, The printer then begins the next part with a clean bed, and the days of doting over a 3D printer soon fade into the past.
For such a simple and useful idea, it’s surprising there hasn’t been much done with this idea in open source circles. There are, of course, problems both technical and legal, but hopefully nothing that should indefinitely derail anyone who would want to create the first open source automated build platform.
Continue reading “3D Printering: A Call For An Open Source Automated Build Platform”
[Chris] has put together a robot head that is impressive at first sight. [Chris’] robot, Walter II, becomes even more impressive when you realize that [Chris] built every single part from scratch. Many of Walter’s parts were created using machines [Chris] built himself. Walter is a robot neck and head. His upper neck joint is based upon three bevel gears.Two steppers drive the side gears. When the steppers are driven in the same direction, Walter’s head nods. When they are driven in opposite directions, the head turns. The end result allows Walter’s head to be panned and tilted into almost any position.
A second pair of motors raise and lower Walter’s neck via a chain drive. What isn’t immediately visible is the fact that a system of gears and belts maintains the tilt on Walter’s head as his lower neck joint is actuated. For example, if Walter’s head is facing directly forward with his neck raised, one would expect him to be facing the ground when the neck is lowered. The gear/belt system ensures that Walter will still be facing forward when the neck joint reaches its lower limit. All this happens without any movement of the neck motors. [Chris] definitely put a lot of thought into the mechanical design of this system.
Continue reading “Walter Is A Robot Head Built From Scratch.”
The Garage Lab (translated) is a small hackerspace quite close to the Chaosdorf. As the name implies, it exists in a garage complex — each unit has a garage and an upstairs office. The Garage Lab shares their unit with a co-working space upstairs — basically, they get the garage at all the times, but only the upstairs on the weekend when it is empty.
It’s been around for about 2 years and has about 40 members (~20 of which are active). To be a member it is quite cheap, only €15/month or €10/month if you are a student. They mostly focus on 3D printing and electronics.
The space has several 3D printers, a large work area, and many hand tools. They run CAD classes quite often and are hoping to expand with 3D printing classes and other technical lectures. Our guide was a cool guy named [Axel] who works as a 3D designer at his own company, but loves spreading 3D printing knowledge with the world.
Check out the tour gallery!
Continue reading “Hackerspacing In Europe: The Garage Lab In Düsseldorf”
