Ultimaker2 Feeder System - Improvements and Ideas

[ian 32]

good morning guys ! :-)

So after 10 hours of constant printing. the results are just... hehe... incredible... zero under extrusion.

I need to test some models with different retraction settings to see how the design handles that and also longer prints and faster prints of course as well. Really test out this baby .... :-)

Of course I still need to addres a few issues but now I have a solid black and white list of things I simply have to change and add...

THINGS ARE LOOKING GOOD THIS MORNING ;-)

Ian :-)

 

[onkelgeorg 36]

Congratulations! Really good job Ian.

Do you see any chance to adopt this design for the UM1, once it is finished for the UM2?

Best regards,

Joerg

 

[hjbinnema 0]

Hi Ian,

Looks very promising.

How do you think about the idea to have an adjustable tension? (the PLA might wear out after some time)

Harry

 

[3d-magic 0]

Wow, Ian, that looks promising! I really would like to follow your example, but honestly I'm a bit scared to just take away the original parts and start drilling and screwing in my brand new UM2. Your printing speed is great. For me to get a nice print, I print at about 50/60 mm/s.

Pfff... what shall I do? My knowledge of the printer is still very basic...

 

[ian 32]

to upgrade your feeder system on an ultimaker2... you dont need to drill or change anything !!!!

just unscrew the feeder housing, put it in the bin :wink: and click onto the exact same location the new one... tighten up the 4 screws and start printing faster and better :smile:

Ian :smile:

 

Wow, Ian, that looks promising! I really would like to follow your example, but honestly I'm a bit scared to just take away the original parts and start drilling and screwing in my brand new UM2. Your printing speed is great. For me to get a nice print, I print at about 50/60 mm/s.

Pfff... what shall I do? My knowledge of the printer is still very basic...

 

[ian 32]

Hi Ian,

Looks very promising.

How do you think about the idea to have an adjustable tension? (the PLA might wear out after some time)

Harry

 

Because this simple design has answered so many of the problems exisiting with the original feeder. I simply need to address one corner of the left side of the test rig. try a few different flexable tensioning systems and then... design is ready to rock n roll....

 

[ian 32]

Congratulations! Really good job Ian.

Do you see any chance to adopt this design for the UM1, once it is finished for the UM2?

Best regards,

Joerg

 

Joerg great idea !!

Why not.

I want to finish this project in the next 2 or 3 days.. and I think thats doable... then i can modify this for the ultimaker1... would be a very nice upgrade for that ! :-)

Ian :-)

 

[DidierKlein 729]

Great job

I guess this is one of the first things i'll print once i have my UM2 this will probably help me not to grow more white hairs ^^

 

[ian 32]

Great job

I guess this is one of the first things i'll print once i have my UM2 this will probably help me not to grow more white hairs ^^

 

give me a few more days my friend and you might even grow a few nice black hairs !!! LOL

Ian :-)

 

[DidierKlein 729]

You have at least 15 more days until i receive my UM2 so no problem for me

 

[skint 61]

Nice work Ian, very persistent

If you use the small feeder clip on the left of the box that should help right ? Probably don't need to design a new one.

I would prefer to see a larger chamfer / entrance on the top section of your "D" shape, it looks quite tight for the filament to enter?

Keep up the good work fella !

 

[ian 32]

Nice work Ian, very persistent

If you use the small feeder clip on the left of the box that should help right ? Probably don't need to design a new one.

I would prefer to see a larger chamfer / entrance on the top section of your "D" shape, it looks quite tight for the filament to enter?

Keep up the good work fella !

 

if its not broken.. dont fix it.. so the feeder clip is no problem.

About the entrance of the D shape... it actually works fantastic but... i do want to change the approaches a tiny bit for optimal performance and user friendlyness... :-)

Crazy isnt it... a persistant irish man... didnt actually think they existed... well except for the boss of Ryan Air ;-)

Ian :-)

 

[ian 32]

would it be ok if you posted your last post on another tread ?

I try and keep this tread just for design discussion and development.

I mention at the beginning of the tread. I want to keep this a pure engineer and make things better discussion.

As I dont respresent ultimaker I am not in the position to officially answer any of those questions. But maybe a seperate tread might get the response from daid.. or sander.. or harma...

Hope thats OK ?

Ian :-)

 

[ian 32]

ps im doing this because as a heavy user of my ultimaker2... i spotted growing problems with the feeder.. problems that lead to a decrease in print quality.. so as a qualified Industrial Designer I sat down and started a design campaign to design something better !! :-)

 

[skint 61]

What post ( I just deleted it... wondering where to out it lol )

 

[ian 32]

What post ( I just deleted it... wondering where to out it lol )

 

thanks mate ! :-)

 

[skint 61]

No prob. Started a new thread.

By the way. As a new user, I have already experienced the " thin strands of PLA to pull from the feeder during material change ". I think that aspect of your design proposal is a winner

 

[woofy 12]

Ian, this is phenomenal work, really well done. I've been following this thread closely and I'm looking forward trying out the new design. Hopefully it will at least help with my extrusion problems.

Apart from better extrusion, I like the open nature of the design. A couple of times now I've had to remove the bowden on the motor end to clear nuggets of pla that were stuck. This should make life much easier on that front.

I am printing non stop tonight with my design.. over speed 100 with temp 220 and zero under extrusion.

Can you give us the layer height as well, or cubic mm/sec, otherwise it doesn't mean too much.

Have you compared old and new designs to qualify the performance, would really like to see that.

Again, top marks to you. Really impressive work.

 

[Nicolinux 288]

Hey Ian,

now you've got me hooked on your design

About those two ball bearings at the bottom. Would it be a good idea to add springs and let them regulate filament curvature to some degree? The reason I suggest it - imagine a case where the filament comes in with a sharp angle. Then it would bypass the second ball bearing and move too much to the left where it would add pressure to the feeder entrance. Here is a picture (very lowres, I just used the preview of one of your photos):

 

[coofercat 3]

Ian: You've definitely made a very good looking feeder :smile: I wonder how it copes with a few turns of loose filament dumped on the floor (which tends to over-tighten and kink unless you use a lazy-susan)?

I only have a UM1, so I can't directly contribute, but there are two things I've wondered about:

1) The knurled bolt - if this was more of a knurled wheel (say 100mm diameter), then more of it would be in contact with the filament at any time. That means more of the 'teeth' would be frictionous against the filament, and so you'd be less likely to 'grind' after one tooth slips a bit. You'd presumably need a correspondingly larger ball bearing opposite it to get the full benefit.

2) On my UM1, I too have large spool of filament hooked on the back of the printer. This is a nice neat design, but now that my reel is getting older and emptier, the curve of the filament is much smaller and harder to overcome. I wondered if the feeder needs a "pre-feeder" that is motorised, but perhaps only uses some rubber wheels to move the filament (so that it can slip if it needs to). The motor could probably be a normal non-stepper motor that can stall if it's already pushed enough filament, and can slip if it's 'out of sync' with the main feeder.

The idea here is just to get the filament reel to turn, and to push the filament up to the main feeder. It's primarily a way to offload the work of unreeling the filament from the main feeder, which needs to concentrate on getting filament through the bowden and hot end.

I also wondered if there should be a (straight) heated tube between the pre-feeder and the main feeder. That heater could maybe get up to 50-100C, so no where near the melting point, but enough to ease the bend in the filament so that it feeds more easily.

My 2 pence :smile:

[IRobertI 520]

Man, I'm semi absent for a couple of days and look at how much I miss... Cool looking design Ian, I'll have to give a try. You mentioned something about getting worse performance over time (with the old one)? I remember from a few weeks back you mentioned in the "latest print" thread that you were printing a hell of a lot faster than I ever could. That has actually changed over time?

As for my efforts... well, I changed the design slightly to add a little pocket for a short piece of bowden. My thought behind that was to make the entrance more slippery, guide the filament and to possibly straighten the filament a wee big before entering. I haven't tried it yet so I don't know if it'll work though. And since Ian's design apparently is working I don't know if I should bother heh. Also, it's not very cool lookin

 

[gr5 2,172]

well, I changed the design slightly to add a little pocket for a short piece of bowden

 

I'd rather see this pocket allow a longer piece of bowden that starts at the bottom of this feeder and turns towards the bottom of the Um to be clamped down there somewhere. Like someone else did... on some other post...

http://umforum.ultimaker.com/index.php?/topic/4145-small-question-about-material-feeder/?p=35649

 

[IRobertI 520]

My intent was that you could sacrifice a small section of your existing bowden so you didn't have to buy another one. I have thought about adding a longer bent section though.

 

[ian 32]

Man, I'm semi absent for a couple of days and look at how much I miss... Cool looking design Ian, I'll have to give a try. You mentioned something about getting worse performance over time (with the old one)? I remember from a few weeks back you mentioned in the "latest print" thread that you were printing a hell of a lot faster than I ever could. That has actually changed over time?

As for my efforts... well, I changed the design slightly to add a little pocket for a short piece of bowden. My thought behind that was to make the entrance more slippery, guide the filament and to possibly straighten the filament a wee big before entering. I haven't tried it yet so I don't know if it'll work though. And since Ian's design apparently is working I don't know if I should bother heh. Also, it's not very cool lookin

 

some really clever ideas in there Robert !!! :-)

I especially love the idea of adopting a small amount of bowden tube at the bottom of your feeder. so the filament slips in nice. and then back out... really like that !!

When are you going to print and test your little beauty ?? :-)

Ian :-)

 

[IRobertI 520]

Will be printing it right now actually, just had to wait for another print to finish. Well, it's the second time since I forgot to remove some interfering geometry. Doh!