Ulti-evening March 23rd

[SandervG 1,518]

Hi Guys,

The next Ulti-evening is coming up with another inspiring and creative theme.

As ever the interactive part is key in these get-togethers, and this time we are going to transform our Ultimaker in a desktop pen plotter!

We also wrote a blog about it, in case you can't wait or if you want to prepare yourself

Together we can transform our printers, and learn what it takes to get your Ultimaker to draw our pictures, drawings or designs.

Date: 23-03-2015

Time: 17.00 - 22.00

Location: ProtoSpace, Utrecht

17.00 - 18.00 Arrival (bring your Ultimaker) and order food if you want.

18.00 - 18.30 Short introduction

18.30 - 19.00 Food!

19.00 - 22.00 Plotting time!

See you then!

Edited April 24, 2015 by chin

[ultiarjan 1,220]

Nice topic/blog.

About the Cura profile, I guess its easier to create a new machine, rename it to (f.e.) UltiPlotter and then load the profile into that machine, to make it easy to switch back and forth.

 

[amedee 349]

Mmmmh....

And what about a vinyl cutter?

:rolleyes:

 

[SandervG 1,518]

This topic is about transforming it into a pen plotter.

But if you can convert it into a vinyl cutter I will make sure it will be the topic of one of the next Ulti-evenings!

 

[amedee 349]

Sander,

I definitely didn't want to hijack the topic, I was just thinking that with the exact same transformation, but using a 'rotary knife' (not sure about the name) instead of a pen, we would have a vinyl cutter.

Apologies if I gave the impression to ask for something else, I just saw another application for this transformation!

 

[SandervG 1,518]

Please don't take my reply as offensive, it was more an invitation to expand this hack

I think adding a knife would probably damage your build plate.

You could add a steel plate, but I am not sure if it would work. I was thinking

of a low power laser instead of a knife..

 

[amedee 349]

Let's see what we can do...

... Hardest part is always to commute to Utrecht anyway

 

[ahoeben 1,766]

Bwa, external holder for the pen... Wouldn't it be a nice idea to use that spare hole in the head? You know, that set of holes that will not be used any time soon?

 

[ultiarjan 1,220]

Made an alternative design;

https://www.youmagine.com/designs/ultiplotter-plotter-head-for-the-ultimaker2

I did try the cura .ini at first, but didn't notice a different print start position (?) should this adapted gcode not prevent the pen from crashing into the front of the printer ? Not a big deal for me as I already modified the position in firmware.

Can someone please describe what this .ini is supposed to alter ?

 

[zoev89 73]

After some hacking here my first result. I needed to make adapter since head design is different. After 2 tries this is my adapter and my result:

The adapter is mounted on the 30mm fan of my hotend. The pen still has a little play. I also played with the ini file. I changed the minimum extraction before retract to 0. This to prevent travels without a head lift. Only the start and end travel still visible the rest is good. Getting a bitmap to print well is not so easy. The lines must be thick enough.

Update :16/3

Added my files on youmagine

https://www.youmagine.com/designs/pen-holder-for-e3d-hotend

 

[kctprintng 0]

cool

 

[Labern 773]

I also tried this on my UM2 and had the pen crash into the front of the printer during the start. It also started heating up. Couldn't see any steps I missed in the instructions. To bad the ulti evening is a bit 2 far to travel.

[ultiarjan 1,220]

theres a forum link in my pen design on youmagine on how to alter the start position in firmware (thanks tinkergnome) the link to youmagine is higher up in this tread.

[Labern 773]

Thanks. I'll check it out and give it a go. I thought the .ini file was ment to alter this Stuff?

[ultiarjan 1,220]

I think (not sure) changing the start position from cura only works for the umo. For um2 it seems hardcoded in firmware. I asked at the ultievening tonight if they can communicate the startup risk with um2 more clear in the "pen blog" on the website...

 

[james-campbell 0]

Hey everyone, I'm the designer of this "little" hack, and the .ini file is designed to stop the extruder motor from moving, to turn the temperature sensor to zero, and to change the the layer height settings.

It also changes the start.plugin and should be backed up prior.

I designed this hack for an UMO with a standard size bed, so only the plotter arm and the .ini file were needed.

As it was pointed out earlier, it would be good to create a duplicate machine that uses the .ini profile.

The gcode slicer visualisation in Cura won't show an accurate representation of what the printer will print when it comes to pen plotting.

I have a custom metal bed on my UMO, and with proper pen height calibration (about 0.6mm below the nozzle) the pen arm will bend to accommodate the pressure of the pen on the lower levels without scratching and will still keep contact at higher levels.

 

[ultiarjan 1,220]

James,

problem is that for UM2 users the pen will crash into the front of the machine.... the heatup/prime position is set in firmware... You can however simply overcome this by using RepRap (Marlin/Sprinter) i.s.o. UltiGcode

instruction;

In the CURA machine you use for the Plotter Gcode, change GCode flavour (in Machine settings) to RepRap (Marlin/Sprinter).

 

This will make sure the generated G-code will override the startup settings in the UM2 firmware, so you can set the prime position of the heater.

You'll have to change the start code in CURA (top left of the screen, 4th tab)

 

 

It's by default like this (CURA 15.02)

 

;Basic settings: Layer height: {layer_height} Walls: {wall_thickness} Fill: {fill_density}

;Print time: {print_time}

;Filament used: {filament_amount}m {filament_weight}g

;Filament cost: {filament_cost}

;M190 S{print_bed_temperature} ;Uncomment to add your own bed temperature line

;M109 S{print_temperature} ;Uncomment to add your own temperature line

G21 ; metric values

G90 ; absolute positioning

M82 ; set extruder to absolute mode

M107 ; start with the fan off

G92 E0 ; set extruder position to 0

G28 ; home all

G1 Z10 ; raise z

G28 X0 Y0 ; home x and y

G29 ; Probe

G1 X5 Y15 Z10 F5000 ; get out the way

G1 Z2 E5 F200 ; extrude filament back into nozzle

M206 X0.0 Y0.0 Z0.0 ; offset home position for fine tuning

 

 

Change it to something like this

 

;Basic settings: Layer height: {layer_height} Walls: {wall_thickness} Fill: {fill_density}

;Print time: {print_time}

;Filament used: {filament_amount}m {filament_weight}g

;Filament cost: {filament_cost}

;M190 S{print_bed_temperature} ;Uncomment to add your own bed temperature line

;M109 S{print_temperature} ;Uncomment to add your own temperature line

G21 ; metric values

G90 ; absolute positioning

M82 ; set extruder to absolute mode

M107 ; start with the fan off

G28 ; home all

 

 

G1 F5000 X15 Y40 ;move to start position Y40 is a safe distance for the pen attachment, think default UM2 is 10

G1 F5000 Z20.0 ;raise bed to 20 mm

G92 E0 ;zero the extruded length

G1 F150 E25 ;extrude 25mm , prime the nozzle

G92 E0 ;zero the extruded length again

G1 F5000 X5 Y60 ;move the nozzle to the front a bit to prevent it from dipping in the prime filament puddle

 

 

For the end code you can use something like;

 

M104 S0 ;extruder heater off

M140 S0 ;heated bed heater off (if you have it)

G91 ;relative positioning

G1 E-5 F300 ;retract the filament

G28 ;home all

M84 ;steppers off

G90 ;absolute positioning

 

Ofcourse if you just use the code for playing with the pen you don't need the nozzle priming but I thought I keep it generic...

BE AWARE that altering the firmware is still the best option for UM2 as you can also safely set f.e. the bed level position.