RepRap: Blog

Soooo, turns out I needed quite a lot more of the blocker pills once I got up and about, and something else cropped up during a scan. Damn. I think I'm back on top of it though. Can walk with stick, even allowed to drive the 10 mins to town (but no further). So back at the workbench, which currently looks like this:

I'm having too may problems with artefacts from slicers when trying to deposit objects. Anyone want to help write a custom slicer?

[crickets] 

In that case, to make progress, I'm going to use the png_to_gcode.py script to make something simple and repeatable, where I can alter one variable at a time. That script takes a black and white pixel image and plots it as dots of resin with a spacing and height of the user's choice. So far I've only really used it for etching in Sharpie marker.

The plan:

Determine voxel spacing needed to deposit a square that clearly isn't blobbing in at the corners. How many microns between points? Is one row of points enough for a reliable line?

Establish the height of the square's sides.

Deposit a second layer. Determine the height of that.

Repeat, third layer.

Now this all sounds nice and straightforward, but I'll be really lucky to get this done with three resets or less. I have to clean/swap probes before measuring the height of something for a start.

How far have I got? Well, I have moved the RepRapMicron onto a sturdy bench that is separate from my keyboard, so that I can operate the machine without vibrating things. I've shortened the microscope pole to lower vibrations off that, and I've prepped a slide with an aluminium reservoir (I'm using adhesive aluminium tape). I have a 16x16 PNG of a square to start with.

But I have to meet a good friend in an hour, so I can't start now. Hasta Mañana, Amigos.

# posted by vik-olliver @ 6:16 AM