What's the best way to handle multiple configurations

deckingman

I have a Diamond 5 colour hot end and also a Diamond 3 colour and I may well add a simple single colour E3d volcano or some such. My X carriage is designed so that any of these assemblies can be simply dropped in and the necessary connections made. In terms of the config.g file, there are significant differences such as which tool uses which extruder and which fan is used to cool the hot end etc. What I do at the moment is I have a folder on my PC called "CurrentConfig" and in that I have a single file which is config.g. Then I have another folder which contains "5ColourConfig.g" and "3ColourConfig.g" and I'll probable have a "1ColourConfig" as well. When I change hot ends, I copy the necessary file to "CurrentConfig" and rename it "config.g" which is what I then upload to my sd card.

I know I could use macros but then I'd have to run a macro every time I turn on the machine rather than just when I switch hot ends. So I was just wondering if there is a better way than the way I'm doing it now. Any thoughts anyone?

I guess one way might be to use macros but run them from the slicer start gcode. That way, the configuration would always be correct for the object that I want to print. Is that possible?

darookee

I use [c]M28[/c] and [c]M29[/c] for this in my 'Load Filament' scripts:

M28 /sys/current_material.g ; open current_material.g for writing

M207 S6.0 F7800 Z0.2 R0.1
G10 P0 R150 S220

M29 ; close current_material.g

And in my [c]config.g[/c] I have this line: [c]M98 P/sys/current_material.g[/c]

Every line between [c]M28[/c] and [c]M29[/c] is written into [c]/sys/current_material.g[/c] which in turn is then loaded when the printer is starting up. You could even write your whole [c]config.g[/c] with a macro. But beware - comments are ignored, ';'s are stripped and the whole line ends up in the file…