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Anders Olsson

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Everything posted by Anders Olsson

  1. It depends how many printing hours you have on the machine? If it has been operating more or less 24/7 (some of them actually do), you could consider replacing the timing belts, there is a kit for that. If the printer only has a few thousand operating hours though I think it will be fine with what you suggested. Pay extra attention to carefully cleaning and re-lubricating the Z-screw with the right type of lubricant as that probably is the most critical component for maintaining good printing quality. The feeder should´t need any attention unless you have been printing abrasive materials?
  2. I hate to admit it but I still use Cura 15.04 (with the same print speed setting for walls and infill) for the majority of my UM2 prints. Cura 15.04 is rather primitive but very consistent and predictable. Cura 2.x and 3.x have unfortunately had numerous bugs, the most annoying ones in my opinion related to excessive travel moves. The 3.5.1 version should have addressed the majority of the bugs, but if you are still not happy with it and can live with a primitive slicer 15.04 might be worth a try.
  3. The only reason for us to use boron carbide is that we want to absorb neutrons and boron (the 10 isotope) has very good properties for this. Boron Carbide is a chemically stable reasonably priced ceramic powder with high boron content (four boron atoms and one carbon atom). While a softer material with high boron content would have been preferable, there are no such options in a reasonable price range. Other uses is for example as a grinding powder, which explains why it eats 3D printer nozzles ? That is the basic reason behind the Olsson block and the Olsson Ruby nozzle, summed up in a few sentences ? If you are interested in further reading, we have published much of our work in an open access article: http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1402-4896/aa694e (Check out the Supplementary Data too for information about the Olsson block and other stuff) There is currently no commercial production of boron carbide filament but there might be in the future. Be ware though, if you even come across it, that boron carbide is one of few materials which is harder than ruby, so it will slowly wear the ruby.
  4. It is a bit difficult to determine what went wrong. - Burnt ABS generally means that you could/should lower the printing temperature a bit, what brand material did you use? - ABS generally don't like cooling fans, on a model like that you should definitely leave the fans completely off (or issues with brittleness and warping will increase) - What slicing software did you use? My experience is that the sudden speed changes and excessive travel moves of some of the more recent versions of Cura made things much worse, compared to the good old 15.04.06 version.
  5. The current prefix that new Cura adds has never been of any use for me, I simply don't move gcodes between machines. What I normally do though is adding the nozzle size (if not 0.4) and adding the plastic type if not PLA. I would write "600um_ABS_Ultimakerrobot" for a 0.6 mm ABS print.
  6. That question was probably not ment for me, but just the past few days I had two persons basically asking me what is wrong with the Cura development lately, because of various bugs that leads to odd behavior and stability issues in recent Cura versions. Personally I have had to roll back to using Ultimaker 2 machines and Cura 15.04 several times lately because all those excessive travels in later versions of Cura ruins the surface quality of objects that I want a nice surface on. When it comes to Cura features, even experienced users who I talk to are unaware of what are suitable settings for printing a vase or what ironing is for example. Just a simple function where the user identifies the object from a list and Cura then applies a few suitable settings (like 0% infill, solid bottom and spiralize for a vase, or slow outer shell speed and a minimum of infill for a sculpture) would be nice in my opinion because: - It would make it much easier to explain for others how to get good printing quality for certain objects. - The Cura-team could stop trying to find "one size fits all" settings for the printing variables. Just have a general setting with works decent and then tweak the parameters for certain types of objects instead.
  7. In my opinion there are two main issues with Cura currently: - There are way too many releases and while there are bug fixes in each of them, there also seems to pop up new bugs in every release. I would prefer much fewer releases with a minimum of new bugs, more testing before releasing and more focus on removing bugs so that we get to a reasonably bug free version. - While many of the new features in these frequent releases are very nice and useful the interface of Cura is currently too complex. So the majority of the users will never take advantage of things like Ironing or Spiralize, even though it would improve their prints, simply because they are not aware of the functions or how/when to use them. Until someone invents a simple way of finding these functions, like a menu where people select the type of object being printed and Cura applies suitable functions for that type of printing (like a one click "Vase mode" for example), it makes little sense to continue adding new features like these. Time would be better spent in fixing essential bugs then, since it will improve the experience for all users.
  8. If you want to design your own syringe extruder you can make one which consists of very few parts if you base it on linear stepper motor. We made the one for out delta printer in the picture using this motor: https://www.elfa.se/en/linear-stepper-motor-moons-16hy7001-11/p/15446018?queryFromSuggest=true You could probably attach such extruder to the existing print head using the print head screws.
  9. Well, the properties of ABS filaments vary quite a lot and the Ultimaker "ABS" is even a blend of ABS, PC and PET, supposedly to make it easier to print. For a pure ABS on the UM2+ I would use the following settings/tricks: - Print temperature 255-260 C - Bed temperature 95-100 C - Fans off (unless the model is really tiny). - Properly cleaned glass plate with two tin layers of Tesa Easy Stick glue. - Some sort of front cover for the printer if the model takes more than a few hours to print. That said, I have found some really cheap Chinese ABS to be almost unprintable while other more expensive ABS can print fine already at 235 C, so it can vary quite a bit..
  10. As long as the surface of the build plate is at the right level, the automatic leveling should in theory work with any material. Here is a printable tool to set the correct distance: https://www.youmagine.com/designs/um3-buildplate-distance-tool That said, the automatic leveling measures the (changes in) capacitance between the print head sensor and the build plate and a metal build plate is likely to generate a much larger capacitance than the original glass plate. Even though it should theoretically still detect when capacitance no longer changes because the nozzle hit the build plate it is possible that a metal surface simply creates out of range capacitance readings.
  11. Carbon fiber filaments certainly do damage the knurled wheel on the Ultimaker machines, I have photos somewhere but I can not locate them right now. Anyway you will see wear already after a kilo and after 2 kilos you are likely to start getting feeding problems if the spring is on the default 50% setting, 4 kilos and it will be really worn. A hardened bondtech type feeder wheel lasts more like 20 kg or so before it needs to be replaced.
  12. I don't know where they get it from, but most toothed washers should do the job in your case. Just check that the sensor/heater are properly fixed after tightening the screw. Things are a bit different when you mass produce machines, extra safety margins are always helpful there.
  13. Ultimaker-blocks also has the toothed washer but they use another type with improved design compared to the ones used on the initial (and 3DSolex) blocks. It looks roughly like this: You need some sort of toothed washer there for the sensor/heater to stay safely in place! The screw is a stainless countersunk M3x16 mm. Ultimaker/3DSolex uses a Philips drive, but I actually prefer to use a hex head screw I used on the initial batch.
  14. Strange, this forum has always had like 5-10 times the loading time for me compared to other forum softwares. It does not matter what platform or Internet connection I use or which continent I am using it from, still way much slower than I demand for comfortable browsing. The speed has not changed lately for me, so appearance of the new (fast) forum should not be related
  15. Wow, that is a bit scary. I doubt there are any serious issues with the design of the Olsson block, but it is certainly a strange coincidence.
  16. As you might have noticed, I have sadly given up this forum long time ago. It is still, after almost ten months online, unacceptably slow to navigate compared to all other forum softwares and full of annoying bugs. I just can not take this kind of stupidity, that is why I am not active anymore. And I am seriously worried that the mentality that keeps this software alive might bring Ultimaker as a company down in the end. The whole idea if inventing the wheel again in this way is very difficult to understand for me. If the new forum had obvious advantages over all other common forum softwares it would be one thing, but I fail to see any advantages at all actually? As I mentioned in another post, the post counter is not working properly anymore, but I reckon that we still see about 40% of the posts that the old forum had last year at this time. Considering that Ultimaker probably sold a five digit number of printers or so since then, I would say the figures are alarming. This also brings up a very serious issue: Many people, including me, paid a lot extra to get the Ultimaker in favor of other brands just because of the (old) forum. The fact that Ultimaker ruined that means serious badwill for Ultimaker as a company. So why is Ultimaker not doing anything about this? Most likely because: 1. Too much money was spent on this project, so it simply can not fail (a bit like a certain fighter jet project). 2. Ultimaker is scattered as a company and the board is disconnected from the community section, not realizing the value of the community. 3. There are still enough users that whoever defends the forum can claim that it is just a temporary drop and that it will soon recover, that all questions has been answered, and such excuses. I would also say that the mentality that "we will never consider vbulletin" is very worrying. That goes against the open source community concept that Ultimaker used to stand for. I personally think it would be reasonable to let the community be part of selecting the forum software, as the community members largely works completely for free for Ultimaker when they post here. Forcing them to use software that does not work properly when they are trying to help other users for free is a very risky move in the long run. I am actually a bit surprised that no one has started an independent Ultimaker forum yet, I would have moved there immediately. So what can one do, apart from starting another forum? Well, the forums it its users, so I guess that if everyone just stopped using the forum until it runs on properly working software we could have it back on vbulletin in a few months..
  17. Labern has the answer, these MIG-nozzles happen to fit the Olsson block, I could not resist testing them when I found them at the hardware store I would not recommend them to anyone though. There are other nozzles one could try, just scan the market for M6 threaded nozzles with at least 6 mm long threaded part. Haven't been very active since the forum change, partly because I have been very busy lately, but mostly due to forum related factors. Since Sander asks about me not being active at the forum: While I admire Sanders efforts and patience trying to promote this "forum", I simply had to realize that I am not compatible with the concept. When I have spare time, I end up spending that in other forums, writing PM to people, emailing and such. Not because I am less active in 3D-printing, I am more active then ever, but because of the software this forum runs on and because the change in the community that came with the forum upgrade. This thread is just one of the threads lately that clearly shows the problem. Most of the developer/inventor-community that existed on the old forum is gone and there are no new members in that category joining, sadly but not surprisingly. One would be a fool to blame anything else than the forum upgrade for that. The post counter mysteriously stopped working properly last time I posted something (which was related to the popularity of the forum) by the way. You might want to check that, Sander, it counts far less than true number of posts right now. And make sure Ultimaker RD does not loose the prototype nozzles this time, like they did with the first prototype of the Olsson block.. And tell them not to over-tighten them, they are prototypes and will break at 1 Nm, the last ones I made are stronger. I'll be back when the forum is upgraded to vbulletin
  18. I totally agree. They've nearly wrecked their showpiece...their community....by mucking around with the forums. Either buy a platform like vBulletin and leave it alone! 8) Yeah, I was really hoping that taking the website offline meant we would get the old forum back, or at least a forum based on common forum software. That kind of "upgrade" would have made perfect sense together with the community-inspired upgrades on the UM2+ ! Getting the old community back is far more important to me than the UM2+ improvements actually. I would come back and give it a try if that happened for sure , although it might already be too late to recover the old community. December 2015 saw about 80 posts/day compared to about 170/day December 2014 as an example, and the trend is declining.
  19. The E3D nozzles have a chamfer on the lower side of the hex-part. The 3DSolex-nozzles never had that as far as I know, so that way you can separate them. Just finished sorting my nozzles. Have hundreds of them as you probably can imagine, lots of prototypes and other "difficult to identify stuff". Ended up with only one unknown Soon there might be more nozzle options for you, those will be easy to separate from the existing types of nozzles though..
  20. So, I wrote a long reply a day ago, but this forum-thing happily ate it all when I was about to post it.. say no more.. Anyway, I would first like to mention that Carl (swordriff) did at least 90% of the work up until Ultimaker started talking about shipping the olsson block it with the printer. Marketing, sales and manufacturing is much more time consuming than designing things after all, lets not forget about that. Then, when approaching Ultimaker, 3DVerkstan played a key role. Without Carl and 3DVerkstan this thread most likely would never have existed! For me the heater block was just a small thing that I had to do to get on with more important stuff, like the boron carbide printing. What is fun and slightly annoying at the same time is that this small thing that I spent not more that two days in total on designing gets so popular. And then I can spend years building spectrometers and other scientific instruments and no one seems to care even slightly.. But that is life I guess and I am very happy that so many people can experience the feeling of freedom that I remember feeling first time I mounted a nozzle in the prototype-block Now, if I could just get that old community back I would be even more happy.. I most likely would not have been able to get the Olsson block project done as the community looks today. The old forum had just about enough coverage among advanced users to be able to run these kind of community projects. So, one problem fixed, a new problem created, that is how I see it.. This problem I seem to be unable to fix though..
  21. So, I spent a few hours at Internet archive to collect old forum data to add it to my log of the new forum. The answer to the question "is the forum dying"? definitely is YES, unfortunately: How to present this data to our beloved community manager in a way that makes us get back the old forum is another story. I have tried, believe me..
  22. I thought someone would reveal the truth by now just by the sheer size of the robot It might be a bit offensive to post here, but here is how 850 grams of Ultimaker robot, scale 11:1, was made: Printed with 0.8 mm RSB nozzle and 0.4 mm layers, initially at 50 mm/s but lowered to about 35 mm/s due to heating issues. Printing time 19 hours. Failed overhangs and bridging were fixed using a SMD hot air soldering iron. This was one of the most fun thing I printed so far, the reactions and smiles are priceless The purpose however was to test how well really large things prints, and how well things scale. The ugly retraction stringing was caused by a flow setting bug, similar to the <100% flow bug in the UM2 firmware. SanderG: Nope, this has nothing to do with the things I am developing right now. Give me back the old forum and I will write more about that..
  23. ..It was just sitting there when I got home from work..
  24. I haven't had time to develop my version as much yet, but it works quite well so far. Whoever claimed you can not use retraction when printing ninjaflex are wrong by the way:
  25. I have never seen anything like it. It simply can not leak there. There has to be a major manufacturing error on that block. I was curious about that "ring" around the threaded part on your blocks surface by the way, so I did some destructive testing. It turns out that I got a similar ring, which I first thought was deformation after heavily over-tightening the nozzle. However it seems the "ring" in my case was just scratches from the 7 mm socket. The nozzle nozzle breaks at about 6 Nm, compared to the 0.3-0.5 Nm the torque wrench would give, and the block still seems undamaged. Contact the dealer where you bought it to get a new one! (and maybe return the broken one for inspection, if it's not too much work for you, I am sure you can get some free things in return) You should be able to insert a 1.6 mm hex key through the slotted hole to push the sensor out by the way.
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