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New Product: RAMPS 1.4 electronics package

2014-07-31 Dan

RAMPS 1.4 electronics package

ELEC-0054 RAMPS 1.4 electronics package has all the core electronics for your next 3D printer, plus some useful extras.

The Arduino board is the brain. It listens to instructions written in Gcode. The RAMPS board stacks on top of the Arduino board like layers in a sandwich and gives the Arduino the ability to move up to 6 stepper motors at once.

On top of the RAMPS board are sandwiched five motor drivers – these are the high voltage chips that do the heavy lifting. They’re made to be replaceable, tweakable, and upgrade-able. Because so much current is running through them they can get hot so they come with heatsinks and special tape to help keep them cool. Heatsinks work even better when there’s a breeze so we’ve added a 12v fan that plugs into the RAMPS board. To make your assembly as easy as possible we’ve even included a small screwdriver.

If that wasn’t enough, we’ve got an optional micro SD card reader in the kit so you can run your machine untethered, a temperature sensor for your next 3D printer, and a triple set of pulleys for GT2 timing belt to move your machine.

Get the RAMPS kit today.

PS: If you don’t need all of those things? Let us know, we’ll save you some money.

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New Product: BuildTak print bed surface

2014-07-30 Dan

BuildTak print bed surface

MECH-0073 BuilTak print bed surface is a sticker that goes on the bed of your 3D printer and holds your print like it was nailed down.

I bought my first sheet on a whim at the 2014 Bay Area Maker Faire. It was my only purchase I made that weekend and after I tried it I loved it so much I had to get more for my other machines. Which is where you win, coz now I have lots to share.

As you can see in the picture above, I clean my glass and put it on a towel so it wouldn’t slide away. I peel the back off one corner, smooth it down with a credit card, check everything is square, finish smoothing, and then recalibrate my Z axis. They say in the instructions that you don’t need to “mush” your first layer to get a good stick and they’re not kidding – I mushed my first print and it took ten minutes to separate it from the bed!

It doesn’t tears like Kapton and it doesn’t make a mess like ABS mud. Each sticker is 8″x8″ (~203mm) and ~0.1mm thick with a rough black surface. Works with ABS, PLA, PET, and many other filament materials.

Get some now

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Zippy, a DIY SMT PNP (IFKWIM)

2014-07-19 Dan

Surface Mount Technology (SMT) are the tiny components found on modern PCBs. They’ve grown so small to build a board by hand you need a microscope and the steady hands of a surgeon… or you build yourself a CNC machine with a vacuum on the end that can pick-and-place (PNP) a board for you. I love automation so I think you know where my vote goes.

Richard says he runs 20-30 boards a week on it with 1206 parts. The work areas is ~2×4 feet on a 4×6 foot table, most of which is used for having many rolls of components available. The feeders are his own open hardware design designed in OpenSCAD. (mad respect, yo.) It’s a RAMPS/Mega combination running OpenPNP. I wonder if GcodeCNCDemo would help?

I was having people do manual pick and place before. The error level was fairly high. Even though Zippy needs an operator, and does occasionally drop a part, he *never* puts them on in the wrong spot or backwards.

My favorite part is the camera feedback for picking and nozzle calibration. I’ve never done any camera visualization stuff, so this to me is some dark magic right here.

Read more about the Zippy MK1.