Posts made by inachisiojexus

@Ak:

Only one question (right now): Is there any reason to get the whole kit built hooked up to the MSKBase first… or should I skip all that and just hook up the Duet directly? I ask because I haven't actually purchased the DuetEthernet yet. If I'll save a bunch of time going that route directly (straight to Duet), the I may as well order now so it's all ready to go at the same time…

No good reason that I could think of, aside from using it to verify that none of the parts are faulty.

What you could do in advance is modifying or swapping the connectors for compatibility with the Duet. I went the "modify" route and used side cutters and a precision knife to peel off plastic fins off the motor connectors and elsewhere where they would cause the white plastic back wall on the Duet board connectors to bend. I also replaced or split some Dupont connectors (e.g. BLTouch 1x3pin and 1x2pin to 3x1pin and 2x1pin). Be sure to at least check the wiring, as some of my kit's Dupont connectors had pretty awful crimping applied…

Be extra-attentive with the SSR (enclosed in the big black box on top, together with the PSU), and remember to generate your own PID for the hotend (and preferably the heated bed, although I skipped tuning that and just used OP's values which seem to work for me).

EDIT: You probably know, but just in case... Remember that the frame is grounded via the screwed connection to the aforementioned black aluminum case containing the PSU and SSR, so if you ever decide to relocate the PSU you have to remember to pull your own wiring from the PSU's protective earth connectors to the frame and check with a multimeter that the separate parts of the whole structure are grounded, with the most important part of course being the aluminum around and beneath the mains-powered heated bed. Checking that these parts are properly grounded is smart even if you modify nothing. I would go as far as making certain that the PSU's protective earth is in fact connected to proper pin on the back of the enclosure where the power cord is connected, and use a power cord that definitely isn't defective.

Since the magnetic rods allow for easy attaching/detaching of the effector, it would be nice if instead of connecting the wiring from the effector directly to the controller you could bundle them all together using a single connector (with properly specced wire gauges etc.) and connect that to a breakout board with the separate connectors for different components. This would make swapping extruders faster. The breakout board could ride the effector, and offer extra pins. Any problems with such implementation, aside from additional impedance/reflection introduced by non-galvanic connections?

@dc42:

Already implemented in 1.19. See https://duet3d.com/wiki/G-code#M586:_Configure_network_protocols for how to enable it.

Apologies… and thanks!

P.s. Maybe the list in the first post should be updated to reflect features already implemented (telnet support is in the first bullet)?

Any hope of getting telnet server anytime soon?

I intend to enclose my printer with walls (possibly polycarbonate) in order to contain heat better so that I can control the ambient temperature.

How well does the Delta Smart Effector tolerate heat?

Discussed here: https://www.duet3d.com/forum/thread.php?id=1668

I can only say that my endstops appear to be doing their thing, but I've had my suspicions regarding their "reaction time." I've actually been meaning to check the alignment of the sensor and the tap on carriage, as the endstop switches didn't seem that accurately assembled.

Been trying to think this through and thought I'd check here before pulling the plug.

I just put in an order for the Delta Smart Effector with all the goodies, including the rods. However I'm not certain the rods are long enough for my machine, specs of which are:

Height: 1000mm
Diagonal rod length: 397mm
Printable area: D 340mm
Delta radius initially set to, and converged by Delta Auto Calibration close to: 157mm

Tower-to-tower distance (between centers) is 400mm.

Additionally, I'm currently using wheeled carriages which I intend to replace with linear rails at some point. The thing is, the carriages' rod connection points extend away from, and thus the rod ends are a some 20-30mm (IIRC) distance from the exterior of the towers, which are slotted for the wheel carriages. So if I'm somehow going to install linear rails on these towers, the delta radius is likely to change on top of the rod length. So my first question is; Anyone know if there exist some kind of jigs for installing the rails on the extrusions?

(All dimensions are approximate.)

I've read about the "80% rule" (diagonal length from tower-to-tower distance) but I doubt it's of any value. I've also read the recommended minimum angle between the rods and bed should be about 20° at any given position, but I'm having difficulty approximating the delta radius before knowing the specific dimensional changes introduced by the new carriages (I don't currently see how I could mount the magnetic rods' carriage adapters on my current carriages). My second question is; Taking all this into consideration, is 360mm rod length likely enough or should I go to Haydn for some custom length?

My order is currently on halt until I can at least make an informed decision on whether to include the rods or not. I don't really want to lose too much printable area.

Any insights greatly appreciated…

I was also considering purchasing S3D due to vast amounts of hype surrounding it. There was a YouTuber giving it a lot of praise, then I read the comments and found out he was actually sponsored by S3D…

I'm not arguing that the thing doesn't slice well, but I have gotten the impression that the time they consider too valuable to be be used to respond to customer inquiries, they instead might invest in marketing (viral, guerrilla, sponsorships that at least once seemed rather opaque). I also recall someone saying (take it with a grain of salt) that they tried to get refunded on S3D but was ignored for weeks, after which he worked the refund through his bank. Personally, I have strong resentment for both ignoring customers (potential or established) and sleazy marketing tactics - I'm fine with viral and a bit of guerrilla, and transparent sponsorships, but not with what gives a strong stench of astroturfing. The supposed lax pace of updates and overlooking of bug fixing and feature requests also rings an alarm.

All that said, it would be nice if someone could make an objective up-to-date comparison of the most powerful slicers out there, because as much as I care about principles and all that, my number one priority is getting good prints. I have only used Slic3r and Cura, and while I've understood that many would disagree with me on this point, Cura seemed to create more sensible paths than Slic3r. I had to go back to Slic3r due to severely limited configuration in Cura. I wonder to what extent the path generation in Slic3r is hardcoded and to what extent the user can affect it, and if some of the insane decisions Slic3r makes could be re-programmed or alleviated. I would also like to see detailed, in-depth data and analysis on practical differences in tendencies between the different slicers in generating paths. Is S3D actually more intelligent, and can anyone show me exactly how? If so, is Slic3r likely to catch up, or are there half a dozen Paul Erdõs'es and John von Neumanns programming algorithms for S3D?

My searches on the subject mostly returned threads packed full of non-information, saturated with S3D hype written by people who in the same breath give a strong impression that they haven't really immersed themselves in the technology they're using, and when the recommendations consist mostly of superlatives, emotion and vague handwaving instead of technical analysis, its worth as data is close enough to nil to be completely ignored.

I was also experiencing this (IIUC) and the culprit was an uneven heat spread on the bed. I had the bed temperature set to 73°C for the first layer and 55°C for the rest. At around the fourth layer corners would begin to curl up. I felt the temperature at different points on the bed with my fingers and found out that there were stark contrasts in temperature between points only 2cm apart.

A workaround for me was to heat the bed to 90°C, and start printing when it cooled down to about 80°C. I figured this would help the bed area further from the center to contain heat better and thus prevent larger temperature differences per distance from occurring. During printing of the first layer of a larger print the temperature would set to 73°C. After repeating the routine before each print, three 1.5h print jobs completed neatly with good bed adhesion and no detaching.

Are you looking into the possibility to make room for mount holes for two hotends, or would that pose a problem for proximity sensing or (I reckon) other parts of the circuit? Any known or imaginable hacks to allow for such a setup? Thanks.

Well… I had no luck calibrating the printer properly. That is, until during bed mesh generation the nozzle crashed into the bed and DWC said that the probe was not triggered during a probing move, which led to the realization that the wiring was loose and the probe would lose power randomly during movements. I fixed the wiring and ran a 6-factor auto-calibration and it appears I'm currently getting decent accuracy at least on the XY-plane.

Cheers Dougal1957.

S9:

1.00.25 M666
Endstop adjustments X0.56 Y3.85 Z-4.41, tilt X0.72% Y-3.38%
1.00.22 M665
Diagonal 402.182, delta radius 156.490, homed height 523.115, bed radius 160.0, X -1.838°, Y 0.187°, Z 0.000°
1.00.09 G32
Calibrated 9 factors using 10 points, deviation before 0.276 after 0.063

S8:

1.04.48 M666
Endstop adjustments X2.17 Y2.71 Z-4.88, tilt X-0.29% Y-3.65%
1.04.37 M665
Diagonal 402.182, delta radius 156.697, homed height 523.175, bed radius 160.0, X -1.383°, Y 0.514°, Z 0.000°
1.04.19 G32
Calibrated 8 factors using 10 points, deviation before 0.070 after 0.022

Run in succession. Coordinates read {-3.7 -1.1 155.73} after calibration finishes.

S8:

1.40.41 M666
Endstop adjustments X1.22 Y3.60 Z-4.82, tilt X0.33% Y-3.54%
1.40.23 M665
Diagonal 402.182, delta radius 157.024, homed height 523.242, bed radius 160.0, X -1.255°, Y -0.003°, Z 0.000°
1.40.08 G32
Calibrated 8 factors using 10 points, deviation before 0.130 after 0.056

Head position reported by DWC: {2.5 0.1 155.78}

Configs:

; bed.g file for RepRapFirmware, generated by Escher3D calculator
; 10 points, 6 factors, probing radius: 150, probe offset (0, 25)

G28
M561
G30 P0 X0.00 Y128.57 Z-99999 H0
G30 P1 X118.86 Y68.62 Z-99999 H0
G30 P2 X129.90 Y-75.00 Z-99999 H0
G30 P3 X0.00 Y-150.00 Z-99999 H0
G30 P4 X-129.90 Y-75.00 Z-99999 H0
G30 P5 X-118.86 Y68.62 Z-99999 H0
G30 P6 X0.00 Y56.25 Z-99999 H0
G30 P7 X64.95 Y-37.50 Z-99999 H0
G30 P8 X-64.95 Y-37.50 Z-99999 H0
G30 P9 X0 Y0 Z-99999 S8

G1 X0 Y0 Z150 F15000

; config.g

M111 S0
G21
G90
M83
M555 P1
M665 R157 L397.1073 B150 H525
M666 X0 Y0 Z0 
M208 Z0 S1

; config-override.g
; This is a system-generated file - do not edit
; Delta parameters
M665 L397.1073 R157.000 H523.395 B160.0 X0.000 Y0.000 Z0.000
M666 X-1.058 Y0.551 Z0.507 A0.00 B0.00
; Heater model parameters
M307 H0 A90.0 C700.0 D10.0 S1.00 B1
M301 H0 P10.0 I0.100 D200.0
M307 H1 A455.7 C314.0 D7.0 S1.00 B0
M307 H2 A340.0 C140.0 D5.5 S1.00 B0
M307 H4 A340.0 C140.0 D5.5 S1.00 B0
M307 H5 A340.0 C140.0 D5.5 S1.00 B0
M307 H6 A340.0 C140.0 D5.5 S1.00 B0
M307 H7 A340.0 C140.0 D5.5 S1.00 B0
; Z probe parameters
G31 T1 P500 X0.0 Y0.0 Z0.70
G31 T3 P500 X0.0 Y0.0 Z0.70
G31 T4 P25 X0.0 Y0.0 Z11.30

Sorry about some garbage leftover I've neglected to clean (like that deployprobe.g call from my preceding setup with BLTouch - I'm sure there's more).

EDIT: I tried adjusting the rod length from 397.1073 (manufacturer default) to 396.6 (not that precisely measured by myself), not sure whether it was for better or worse, so I changed it back. Now I'm noticing that when I home all axes, after the head moves down the last time the effector shifts horizontally. Is that due to successful or unsuccessful calibration, or my tweaking of dimensions parameters?

EDIT2: Did one more S8 round.

P.s. I realize we're way off-topic now… Just wouldn't make sense to create a new thread at this point.

I just changed it from 3 to 9 to do the 9-factor calibration as you requested. However, DWC console says I need 9 probing points for 9-factor calibration, and I'm clueless about the theory behind the probing procedure and what the firmware might expect, and consequently the proper conventions regarding constructing the grid. Is there a general explanation that you could direct me to study?

Apologies if my questions are too elementary. I appreciate the babysitting and hope that I get the opportunity to pass on the knowledge to the next rookie.

@dc42:

The M558 P1 command needs to be in config.g so that the pullup resistor is already disabled 4 seconds after power up, which is when the sensor checks for it and decides which more to operate in.

I thought I didn't change any configs between testing on USB and 24V, but had I done that, that would explain the behavior. Looks like I read the instructions too hastily - my bad! Thanks for the clarification.

@number40fan:

inachisiojexus, try running the calibration with a factor of 9 and post your M665 and M666 after it is done. Make sure bed compensation is disabled if you don't already have that in your bed.g.

I couldn't figure out how to do that… Do I need to write in the probe points by hand, and if so, how should I calculate them? My bed.g currently has seven probe points:

; bed.g
G28
M561
M98 Pdeployprobe.g
G30 P0 X0 Y129.9 H0 Z-99999
G30 P1 X112.5 Y64.95 H0 Z-99999
G30 P2 X112.5 Y-64.95 H0 Z-99999
G30 P3 X0 Y-129.9 H0 Z-99999
G30 P4 X-112.5 Y-64.95 H0 Z-99999
G30 P5 X-112.5 Y64.95 H0 Z-99999
G30 P6 X0 Y0 H0 Z-99999 S9
M98 Pretractprobe.g
G1 X0 Y0 Z150 F15000

The sensor flashed two times on power-up (USB). I had sent the M558 P1 via DWC, following the instructions here: https://miscsolutions.wordpress.com/mini-height-sensor-board/

I proceeded to power the board from 24V and did the exact same steps (M558 P1, G31 P500 Z1.0) and for whatever reason I started getting correct readings from the probe.

Next I ran Auto Delta Calibration and got a bunch of "Error: Z probe already triggered at start of probing move", but after a bit of scratching my head I increased the M558 H parameter from 2 to 5, and it went through neatly.

One more question:

I ran the calibration three times:

1.52.25 G32
Calibrated 3 factors using 7 points, deviation before 0.240 after 0.240
1.51.24 G32
Calibrated 3 factors using 7 points, deviation before 0.252 after 0.244
1.43.36 G32
Calibrated 3 factors using 7 points, deviation before 1.740 after 0.257

I have no idea how to interpret the numbers. Is this something to worry about? I have a fair 0.5mm (or so) deep cavity in the center of my heatbed from when I went looking for oil down there (in all seriousness, I tweaked some slicer settings when I had no clue what I was doing). It runs through the black low-friction surface material up until the glass bed, latter of which luckily looks undamaged. Aside from the drilled hole right at my X0 Y0 Z0, I wonder if the irregular surface on top of the glass could pose a problem for the IR probe… I've been considering peeling it off anyway after giving it hell in a multitude of creative ways on more than one occasion.

M665
Diagonal 397.107, delta radius 157.000, homed height 523.378, bed radius 160.0, X 0.000°, Y 0.000°, Z 0.000°

M666
Endstop adjustments X-1.04 Y0.55 Z0.48, tilt X0.00% Y0.00%

I'm having the same issue of trigger going from 1 to 1000. Could you share how you fixed this?

I was also thinking if it would be viable to divide the temperature curve (R:T) into ranges and have the software adjust the temperatures reported by DWC in the lower range to better reflect actual temperatures (while relying on actual readings in detecting faults). Not exactly necessary but there's something about those incorrect readings on my all-powerful control interface that rub me the wrong way.

Thanks for the input.

Dyze explains their choice of using a thermistor on their blog: https://dyzedesign.com/2016/09/comparison-between-temperature-sensors-used-in-3d-printers-part-3/

dc42 countered in another thread: https://www.duet3d.com/forum/thread.php?pid=1071#p1071

@dc42:

The resolution of a thermistor/ADC combination is greatest when the thermistor resistance is about the same as the series resistor. For a typical 100K thermistor and 4.7K series resistor, this is at around 103C. At 220C the resistance is about 300 ohms, so resolution is degraded. A 10-bit ADC such as found on most 8-bit electronics has a resolution of about 1C @ 220C. At 250C the resolution worsens to about 1.8C. So in a system with a 10-bit ADC, the Dyze thermistor does offer significantly improved resolution at these higher temperatures.

However, the Duet series uses a 12-bit ADC + 1-bit oversampling. Even if we ignore the oversampling, that means we have 0.25C resolution @ 220C, and 0.45C resolution @ 250C.

For comparison, the thermistor daughter board for the Duet WiFi provides a resolution of 0.25C over the entire temperature range. The PT100 daughter board provides a resolution of around 0.03125C at low temperatures, and only slightly less resolution at high temperatures.

I am using the 500°C Dyze thermistor. I really don't mind inaccurate readings at room temperature, but as it is I'm uncertain about accuracy in general. I also got a lot of fluctuations in readings which at least once caused the board (Duet Ethernet) to halt the hotend.

Another one of these threads… Searched the forum and Google and got this far, but not sure if the behavior I'm getting is to be expected.

I have done what dc42 suggests on RepRap forum for values 4500000 and 5120 for parameters T and B respectively for the M305 command to set the resistance and the Steinhart-Hart beta coefficient.

The problem is I'm getting a reading of 14°C at room temperature at which my heatbed sensor reports 25°C. I can correct this by setting the M305 H parameter to approx. 5.5, but then DWC reports the temperature to be 19.4°C if I disconnect the thermistor. I found that I had to set H-1 to ensure the board fault states the hotend, but this seems to vary a lot (sometimes H0 would suffice, sometimes not).

I tried heating the hotend while unscientifically measuring the hotend temperature with the sensor cable of my handheld multimeter, and found that the temperatures reported by DWC were consistently 10-20°C above those indicated by the multimeter. up to about 150°C, after which the temperature readings on DWC climbed up to 180°C while my multimeter seemed stuck at 150°C, which made me stop the experiment.

If the incorrect readings at room temperature are just something I have to live with having gone this route, then that I can do (if I can find configurations that give me accurate readings above 150°C), but if it poses potential hazards or inconsistent temperature control then I'll have to look into other options such as PT-100. I might do that regardless, but it means even more waiting and at this point I'm tired of doing things to my printer and want it to do its thing for change…

Any tips?