RepRap: Blog

After looking at the cool stuff nophead is doing, and stealing an idea from Ed, I have improved the nozzle wiping on my RepRap considerably.

The picture shows a doctor blade cut with scissors from brass shim. It has a V notch that the extruder uses to discard excess extrudate.

I have upgraded the Java code in the repository to use this type of wiper, which works better than the previous toothbrush-wiper blogged a few days ago.

Tricks: make the V angle very acute, and curl the profile down slightly so it comes up to meet the nozzle as the nozzle moves over it. Also take care to align the nozzle with the very centre of the notch when it does the wipe.

We still nead a way to clean the cleaner, I think. As you can see, lengths of extrudate build up in the notch and are going to cause trouble eventually.

Labels: cleaning, doctor blade, nozzle wipe