chrisp

At first, no heated bed. Not sure how I'm gonna go about heating it yet.

I will keep it posted here. First I have to finish my Tantillus project, which is near completion. I'm mostly into the slow crawling type of RC trucks/cars. Aluminum and graphite is super nice, but not necessary for slow crawlers, so all of my parts can be plastic. I've already designed some nice lightbars, front grilles, and back lighting systems for the Axial Deadbolt Crawler. It was for a friend who had to have nothing but the best custom parts! At any rate, it's nice to see others on the forums here interested in the same hobbies. (4) - 5mm LEDs fit into the light sockets, while the wires slide through holes that were tubed out behind the bulb. This simply snaps onto the stock Deadbolt roll cage and has 4 2-3mm holes on each side to screw it into the roll cage. If I want to go all out, then I can cut 4 small lexan circles to cover the sockets so they look realistic.

My next biggest hurdle is figuring out what I'm going to do with the buildplate. I had some friends cut me some glass and 1/4" aluminum plates, but I have to be able to incorporate a way to level the bed. The glass and aluminum seem to be too thick and I am now wishing I had a Mill. I could bore out the exact cuts I need to make the aluminum seat into the Z axis arms and then drill some holes in the corners to mount some screws and springs for adjustments. Everything so far, has lined up perfectly! I won't know for sure until the machine is running of course. The machined rods were the most time consuming. The blue prints were a little warped. I ended up printing an entire buildplate full of blue parts when the temperatures dropped in the 40's here and the buildplate wasn't hot enough, so I had a noticeable amount of warping. (I like the white pieces much better anyhow) I had to delete some pics in order to place new ones. I think there's a limit on how many you can have uploaded in your gallery.

Thanks for the info guys! I'm starting a new project building an RC Crawler from scratch and I think ABS will be much better than PLA. I have a Traxxas Summit as a guide the get my ideas from. It is a 1/10th scale truck, but looks more like a 1/8th scale truck. It's a beast. Printing the parts will save me around $500.00.

Here are the latest pics. I didn't like the way most of the original blue pieces came out so I reprinted almost everything in white. The two lower gears had to be reprinted because the stepper motors I bought have a 5mm shaft and I printed the 4mm gears. (No biggie) I also changed all of the hardware to SS. When I started this project my layers were set at 0.1 and now everything is being printed at 0.2. The speed is a much more valuable time saver and the quality of the print is very close to the same.

Is it completely necessary to change/modify the original hot-end in the UM2 to print with ABS? I realize the nylon fitting could be subject to deformation at temperatures around 260 degrees C. Has anyone successfully printed with ABS using the factory setup with the UM2? I have never printed with ABS and I have 4 rolls of it. My next project is going to require many parts that need to be done with ABS. Any ideas for modifications are welcome here.

Just an update here..... I'm still waiting on 2 linear bearings which only seem to come from China. (LMS8UU) I have everything else, accept for the power supply, LCD panel, knob, and kapton tape. I will post pics tonight of my current progress. It would be done already, if it weren't for the delayed items that are hard to get.

I have the necessary tools, just didn't want to go that route to fix it. At any rate.....thanks for the ideas.

In my opinion and through experience, the only reliable support functions of Cura are Brim and Touching Buildplate. All other options are terrible. I realize this does not help you with support for items that need support in between parts already printed to compensate for bridging, but some objects just need to be re-assessed on how they are orientated for the print. Every print I have done using Brim and Touching Buildplate has come out pretty much perfect. All supports are very easy to remove and discard.

Thanks for the ideas guys, but the holes either have to be drilled out more, or I need to replace the belt. The easy way did not work.

I spent a little time looking for a previous post on how to adjust the tension of the short belts on an Ultimaker 2. I couldn't find anything. The short belt located on the back-right side of my UM2 is loose. I decided to check it after noticing that my circular holes in my prints are a little oval and not so round. Can anyone point me in the right direction or explain to me the best way to go about tightening up this short belt? Or is there another option to adjusting settings in Cura or through the control panel?

You can download and try it out for free. There are tutorials on the internet and YouTube which will give you the basics, or you can read their tutorial from the website.

Hey Nicolinux, Have you tried Moment of Inspiration? It's cheap and very intuitive for someone who has 0 experience with cad software. It's what I use and I can design just about anything within it. Never had an issue with any prints out of this program. http://moi3d.com/

I used a 3mm drill bit and spun it by hand.

Nicolinux, My answer would be yes, only because mine was 2.5mm I.D. when it is supposed to be 3mm. My filament didn't pass through.

Gr5, I have been feeding from just below the extruder, however it's not lined up perfectly straight. The hole in the extruder that the filament enters is slightly curved to the bottom left to accommodate the roll of filament being mounted on the back of the UM2. I have my roll on bearings, feeding at that exact angle from underneath. Correct, the bearing never touches the gear because it is against the black ABS in the extruder and cannot go any further. I was just thinking about designing a new extruder that is beefed up out of PLA and there happens to be one already? I love it! *Is there a problem with quoting for anyone else? I can't seem to copy and paste anymore.*

I just wanted to add another finding that may or may not be an issue. Under my extruder album I have a few pics of the bearing that is mounted in the tensioner, which seems to be rubbing against the black plastic so tight that the bearing has I hard time turning. The tension screw is as loose as it goes and the tensioner with the bearing is so tight it sits. I know once the filament gets feed through the extruder, pressure is pushed against the bearing, which would cancel out this problem, but I don't know how to confirm it. Also the black plastic from the extruder case always wears down making the hot end susceptible to pieces clogging the nozzle. What type of plastic is the black case enclosing the extruder?

Nicolinux You just unscrew the milled fitting, then slide the nozzle and heating element out together. The screw directly behind the milled fitting is only a guide, it's not screwed into anything. Even after opening up my Teflon fitting, my printer worked good for about 1.5 weeks and now it's back to unexplained under extrusion. I am really loosing my sense of patience with this machine. I just completed a 25 hour print that needed to be watched almost the entire time with the end result being as less than desired print. I used the translucent blue from the Ultimaker store.

I was going to post here about another clog that I recently had with the cheap filament I've been bragging about, but after further investigation, this is what I found. It's hard to see in the pic, but the filament has a huge bulge that is well beyond 3mm, which stopped the filament from entering the Bowden tube where the extruder is located. now I feel like I need to roll out the rest of the roll to check it.

It's worth a shot. I think that my temperature sensor in my meter would be more accurate than the water test, but I can try both.

I knew I wasn't crazy..... On that note, my under extrusion issues are still there when I use the PLA Orange & Blue from the Ultimaker store. I haven't been able to figure out the cause yet. I have been printing perfectly fine at every layer from 0.2 to .06 with this white PLA I got off of ebay.

Hey AaronAlai, These are nice! You and I seem to have a bit in common towards 3D printing. The glasses are definitely on the more difficult end of 3D printing. I only printed my first version and put them on the backburner because it's so time consuming and there are so many other projects to start. I'm going to follow your progress on these to see your outcome. What are you most interested in printing first?

Sander said in a previous post about the gap being between 1-2mm I think. Maybe it too much of a gap. Mine is at 1.5mm. I know this sounds ridiculous, but it made the difference for me. I was at 1mm before moving it to 1.5mm. As for the Bowden tube, it can be moved down after you adjust the gap again.

Your pulley is loose. Just take the allen keys that came with your UM2 and loosen all the pulleys attached to that rod, then push the rod all the way in. Then make sure the pulleys are pushed up against the black spacers, then tighten them back up. On a second note, you might want to check the rest.

Oh, on another note, I noticed in your pic above that the wires from the side fans are rubbing up against the back fan that cools your nozzle. That alone can stop the fan from running, which might be another issue. This has happened to me.