Posts made by KnyteTech

@dc42

PS_ON sounds cool, but I'd rather save that for something else down the road if possible - using the expansion pins sounds even better, so let's see if I can figure this out...

I found this relay that appears to be what I need - 3.3VDC, low amperage (data sheet for reference)

• EXP42 (GND) on the duet <--->GND on the relay

• EXP43 (3.3v) on the duet <--->VCC on the relay

• EXP45 (TWD0) on the duet <--->CTRL on the relay
  Is EXP.TWD0 a valid pin to use for this purpose? Or should I use something else?

• Wire the camera trigger to the terminal block on the relay

• Gcode to define the relay pin:

M950 S1 C"exp.TWD0" ; create servo_1 for timelapse usage

• Gcode to trigger relay:

*retract + position printer for photo*
M400 ; wait for moves to complete
G4 P100 ; let vibration die down
M42 P1 S1 ; activate relay
G4 P100 ; hold relay closed for 100ms
M42 P1 S0 ; deactivate relay
G4 P300 ; wait 300ms for camera to take picture
*de-retract and resume the print*

Does that all seem correct? I did my best to google the crap out of all of this, but this is definitely not my specialty, so hopefully I'm not too wrong.

Hey everybody - bit of a weird one, but not entirely a new problem...

I have a Duet2 controlled i3-style 3Dprinter that's huge, and has dual-extruders. I've been using my Nikon D7100 with a remote-trigger for shooting timelapses on it.

Currently, the trigger is mounted on the X-axis, and physically pressed by the hot-end carriage - the problem is that the long move to trigger it causes a visible reduction in print quality that I have not been able to fully eliminate - so I want to trigger it electrically, using g-code.

Most of the solutions I've seen for this before say to use the Extruder 2 header to actuate the relay, but that's not an option for me, as that head is already in use, as are all of the fan headers (the other solution I've seen).

The trigger for my camera is just a momentary switch, so I was thinking I could replace the button with a relay, then trigger the relay using some of the IO pins and g-code. The relay closing would act as a momentary switch, triggering the shutter on my camera.

... unfortunately, I'm terrible at EE stuff, so I'm too dumb to figure this out on my own, or to know if what I want is more-complicated than I think it is, so my questions are:

• What pins on the I/O header could I control via G-code, to supply voltage to trigger a relay?
• What voltage would it be?
• What Gcode would I need to turn the pin(s) on/off?

I have not bought a relay or anything yet, because I didn't know what I would need, so I'm open to suggestions.

Thanks in advance for any help you can provide.

@deckingman I've got a few extra microSD's laying around (learning Arduino right now) - would it be okay to copy all the files off of the existing card? Or do I need to start from scratch?

Printing a single-extrusion file I've run countless times, printed successfully once, died halfway through the second time - still no real error I can see to investigate based off of. New 350W Meanwell PSU arrives tomorrow.

9/29/2023, 10:21:58 AM	M122
=== Diagnostics ===
RepRapFirmware for Duet 2 WiFi/Ethernet version 3.4.6 (2023-07-21 14:08:28) running on Duet WiFi 1.02 or later
Board ID: 0JD0M-9P6B2-NJ4S4-6J9FA-3SD6M-KV12L
Used output buffers: 1 of 26 (15 max)
=== RTOS ===
Static ram: 23896
Dynamic ram: 75936 of which 0 recycled
Never used RAM 11936, free system stack 134 words
Tasks: NETWORK(notifyWait,45.9%,242) HEAT(notifyWait,0.1%,329) Move(notifyWait,0.0%,284) MAIN(running,53.9%,458) IDLE(ready,0.1%,30), total 100.0%
Owned mutexes: WiFi(NETWORK)
=== Platform ===
Last reset 01:48:49 ago, cause: reset button or watchdog
Last software reset details not available
Error status: 0x00
Aux0 errors 0,0,0
Step timer max interval 0
MCU temperature: min 35.1, current 39.7, max 40.3
Supply voltage: min 12.2, current 12.5, max 12.8, under voltage events: 0, over voltage events: 0, power good: yes
Heap OK, handles allocated/used 0/0, heap memory allocated/used/recyclable 0/0/0, gc cycles 0
Events: 0 queued, 0 completed
Driver 0: standstill, SG min 0
Driver 1: standstill, SG min n/a
Driver 2: standstill, SG min 67
Driver 3: standstill, SG min n/a
Driver 4: standstill, SG min n/a
Driver 5: 
Driver 6: 
Driver 7: 
Driver 8: 
Driver 9: 
Driver 10: 
Driver 11: 
Date/time: 2023-09-29 10:21:57
Cache data hit count 4294967295
Slowest loop: 11.45ms; fastest: 0.18ms
I2C nak errors 0, send timeouts 0, receive timeouts 0, finishTimeouts 0, resets 0
=== Storage ===
Free file entries: 10
SD card 0 detected, interface speed: 20.0MBytes/sec
SD card longest read time 5.4ms, write time 0.0ms, max retries 0
=== Move ===
DMs created 83, segments created 13, maxWait 291223ms, bed compensation in use: none, comp offset 0.000
=== MainDDARing ===
Scheduled moves 5, completed 5, hiccups 0, stepErrors 0, LaErrors 0, Underruns [0, 0, 0], CDDA state -1
=== AuxDDARing ===
Scheduled moves 0, completed 0, hiccups 0, stepErrors 0, LaErrors 0, Underruns [0, 0, 0], CDDA state -1
=== Heat ===
Bed heaters 0 -1 -1 -1, chamber heaters -1 -1 -1 -1, ordering errs 0
Heater 1 is on, I-accum = 0.0
=== GCodes ===
Segments left: 0
Movement lock held by null
HTTP is idle in state(s) 0
Telnet is idle in state(s) 0
File is idle in state(s) 0
USB is idle in state(s) 0
Aux is idle in state(s) 0
Trigger is idle in state(s) 0
Queue is idle in state(s) 0
LCD is idle in state(s) 0
Daemon is idle in state(s) 0
Autopause is idle in state(s) 0
Code queue is empty
=== Network ===
Slowest loop: 135.80ms; fastest: 0.00ms
Responder states: HTTP(0) HTTP(0) HTTP(0) HTTP(0) FTP(0) Telnet(0)
HTTP sessions: 1 of 8
= WiFi =
Interface state: active
Module is connected to access point 
Failed messages: pending 0, notready 0, noresp 0
WiFi firmware version 1.27
WiFi MAC address a4:e5:7c:03:db:02
WiFi Vcc 3.43, reset reason Power up
WiFi flash size 2097152, free heap 24128
WiFi IP address 192.168.1.104
WiFi signal strength -48dBm, mode 802.11n, reconnections 0, sleep mode modem
Clock register 00002002
Socket states: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Alright, lets go on a journey, because I'm usually pretty good at troubleshooting a problem, but I'm steadily going insane now. I keep getting apparently random print-freezes, all reporting "reset button or watchdog" and I can't figure it out for the life of me.

Background:
It's a 350x350x500mm build volume i3-style printer, with a BL Touch and it has been working great for YEARS, but now it won't finish a print. It keeps simply stopping mid-print and I've included multiple M122's below, spanning printing multiple different Gcodes, over many days. It's an intermittent issue and even printing the same file, it occurs at random points during the print, between 8 minutes, and 3 hours into printing.

Printer specs:

• 12V 20A power supply - I'm seeing ~120W of power draw normally, up to 170W so far during a print. Haven't seen it higher than 170W while spot checking it during a print.

• A 120V heated bed controlled by an SSR with an in-line thermal fuse, and a separate ground wire tying the bed to the ground on the PSU.

• Dual 30W heater cartridges

• The hotend cooling fans are plugged into the two always-on fan headers.

• Two part cooling fans per hotend, each pair ties back to a single fan header on the board (F0 and F1 below).

• Three system fans, one blows air through the electronics enclosure, and one each on the X-axis and Y-axis motors to keep them cool, all three are wired through a basic harness I built, and are plugged into F2 on the board.

• There is nothing plugged into the GPIO pins other than the BL touch, plugged in per the wiki using heater 3.

Config.g:

; General preferences
M575 P1 S1 B57600                                  ; enable support for PanelDue
G90                                                ; send absolute coordinates...
M83                                                ; ...but relative extruder moves
M550 P"Knyte i3"                                   ; set printer name

; Network
M552 S1                                            ; enable network
M586 P0 S1                                         ; enable HTTP
M586 P1 S0                                         ; disable FTP
M586 P2 S0                                         ; disable Telnet

; Drives
M569 P0 S0                                         ; physical drive 0 goes backwards
M569 P1 S0                                         ; physical drive 1 goes backwards
M569 P2 S0                                         ; physical drive 2 goes backwards
M569 P3 S1                                         ; physical drive 3 goes forwards
M569 P4 S1                                         ; physical drive 4 goes forwards
M584 X0 Y1 Z2 E3:4                                 ; set drive mapping
M350 X16 Y16 Z16 E16:16 I1                         ; configure microstepping with interpolation
M92 X100.40 Y100.50 Z800.00 E714:714               ; set steps per mm
M566 X600.00 Y600.00 Z120.00 E300.00:300.00        ; set maximum instantaneous speed changes (mm/min)
M203 X9000.00 Y9000.00 Z900.00 E3600.00:3600.00    ; set maximum speeds (mm/min)
M201 X3000.00 Y3000.00 Z30.00 E600.00:600.00       ; set accelerations (mm/s^2)
M906 X1100 Y1400 Z800 E600:600 I30                 ; set motor currents (mA) and motor idle factor in per cent
M84 S30                                            ; Set idle timeout
M572 D0:1 S0.08:0.08                               ; Pressure Advance Configurations
M593 P"zvdd" F35                                   ; Ringing Compensation

M208 X-87 Y-0 Z0 S1                                ; set axis minima
M208 X260 Y350 Z495 S0                             ; set axis maxima

; Endstops
M574 X1 S1 P"xstop"                                ; configure switch-type (e.g. microswitch) endstop for low end on X via pin xstop
M574 Y1 S1 P"ystop"                                ; configure switch-type (e.g. microswitch) endstop for low end on Y via pin ystop
M574 Z1 S2                                         ; configure Z-probe endstop for low end on Z

; Z-Probe
M950 S0 C"exp.heater3"                             ; Create a GPIO/Servo pin index using Heater 3 (pin 8) in the GPIO header)
M558 P9 C"^zprobe.in" H5 F120 T6000 A1 S0.1        ; set Z probe type to unmodulated and the dive height + speeds
G31 P500 X0 Y-25 Z3.1                             ; set Z probe trigger value, offset and trigger height
M557 X50:300 Y62.5:287.5 S25                       ; define mesh grid
M671 X57:297:57:297 Y56:56:296:296 P0.5            ; adjusting screw locations, bed screw thread pitch 0.5mm

; Heaters
M308 S0 P"bedtemp" Y"thermistor" T100000 B4138            ; configure sensor 0 as thermistor on pin bedtemp
M950 H0 C"bedheat" T0                                     ; create bed heater output on bedheat and map it to sensor 0
M307 H0 R0.8 B1 S1.00                                     ; SSR bed control and a heating rate
M140 H0                                                   ; map heated bed to heater 0
M143 H0 S120                                              ; set temperature limit for heater 0 to 120C
M308 S1 P"e0temp" Y"thermistor" T100000 B4138             ; configure sensor 1 as thermistor on pin e0temp
M950 H1 C"e0heat" T1                                      ; create nozzle heater output on e0heat and map it to sensor 1
M307 H1 R1.669 K0.444:0.110 D6.90 E1.35 S1.00 B0 V12.0    ; Define PID-tuned Hotend Heater
M143 H1 S280                                              ; set temperature limit for heater 1 to 280C
M308 S2 P"e1temp" Y"thermistor" T100000 B4138             ; configure sensor 2 as thermistor on pin e1temp
M950 H2 C"e1heat" T2                                      ; create nozzle heater output on e1heat and map it to sensor 2
M307 H2 R2.336 K0.422:0.219 D5.18 E1.35 S1.00 B0 V12.0    ; disable bang-bang mode for heater  and set PWM limit
M143 H2 S280                                              ; set temperature limit for heater 2 to 280C

; Sensors
M308 S10 Y"mcu-temp" A"MCU"                      ; defines sensor 10 as MCU temperature sensor
M308 S11 Y"drivers" A"Duet stepper drivers"      ; defines sensor 11 as stepper driver temperature sensor

; Cooling
M950 F0 C"fan0" Q500                               ; create fan 0 on pin fan0 and set its frequency
M106 P0 S0 H-1 C"Part Cooling 1"                   ; set fan 0 value. Thermostatic control is turned off
M950 F1 C"fan1" Q500                               ; create fan 0 on pin fan0 and set its frequency
M106 P1 S0 H-1 C"Part Cooling 2"                   ; set fan 0 value. Thermostatic control is turned off
M950 F2 C"fan2" Q250                               ; create fan 2 on pin fan2 and set its frequency
M106 P2 H1 L0.0 X0.6 B0.5 T50 C"System Fans"       ; set fan 2 value L-Min 0%, X-Max 60%, B-Blip Time, T-Trigger Temp

; Tools
M563 P0 D0 H1 F0                                   ; define tool 0
G10 P0 X0 Y0 Z0                                    ; set tool 0 axis offsets
G10 P0 R0 S0                                       ; set initial tool 0 active and standby temperatures to 0C
M563 P1 D1 H2 F1                                   ; define tool 1
G10 P1 X87 Y0 Z0                                   ; set tool 1 axis offsets
G10 P1 R0 S0                                       ; set initial tool 1 active and standby temperatures to 0C

; Custom settings are not defined

; Miscellaneous
T0                                                 ; select first tool

It all started a few weeks ago. I was printing as normal, left, came back, the printer had rebooted, didn't think much of it, checked all the connections, resliced the file, uploaded it, restarted it, and it worked for several days, no problem.

Crash 1:
Was printing a new file I just sliced, saw the Gcode Spinning bit (didn't realize that that error was from over a month before), and ran a mesh reduction, and successfully printed it multiple times without issue.
9-5-2023.txt

But then that reduced-mesh file froze mid-print with what appears to be the same issue.
9-6-2023.txt

Then I got some console messages that there was a short-to-ground on driver 2, so out of an abundance of caution and just wanting to be done with this problem, I replaced both motors with new ones and ran new wires. Worked for a couple days, and then boom:
9-8-2023.txt

This happened with a bunch of notices about a short to ground on driver 2, so after double checking the motors and wires, I assumed it was the stepper driver itself was failing (the board has been running like a champ for 2-3 years). Bit the bullet and ordered a new controller.

Got the new controller, set up the networking, updated the firmware, swapped my SD card from the old controller to the new one. I also took this opportunity to install my second hot end carriage since I had it all torn apart (and updated the config.g to add the fan, heater, extruder and tool, this is what's in the video above).

Again, it worked great for a few days, probably ~30 hours of printing time, then got a crash due to a power spike.
9-27-2023.txt

I adjusted the pot on the power supply, and ordered a new one just to be on the safe side (it's getting old as well, and I'm going to have to replace it soon anyways when I go to quad-extrusion). I decided to start another freshly-sliced file, and was rewarded with another random freeze due to "reset button or watchdog"
9-28-2023.txt

I figured the only other thing plugged in to the header with the reset pin is the BL Touch, so I swapped in a bl touch from a different printer, still crashed.
9-28-2023 number 2.txt

Right now, I have it printing a file that was sliced a few months back, I'm going to keep doing that until/if it crashes again, to see if it's something to do with my slicer, which, here's the S3D Profiles:
Regular Slicing Profile.txt
Clone Slicing Profile.txt

Once the new power supply arrives, I'll swap it out, because I'm going to need the extra amperage for a future upgrade anyways, but other than that, I'm open to ideas, because this is driving me nuts at this point, and it just doesn't make any sense from what I can see/understand.

@sebkritikel when I said "a standard i3 printer" I meant a regular i3 printer shape (a la Ender 3, Prusa Mk4, etc), and not and IDEX printer.

I was trying to add the functionality of an IDEX's duplication/clone mode to a non-IDEX printer. I built the printer with two X-axis carriages on two linear bearing blocks, on a shared MGN15 rail, driven by a single X-axis motor. Each carriage has a clamp on the top that grabs onto the belt, so they are easy to reposition quickly.

The idea behind the macros is that right now, returning to "regular" dual extrusion is going to be inaccurate since my existing carriages weren't really intended for this, so they can't index off of each other accurately, but this is a function that I specifically want to include in the "final" version of my printer - I already knew I needed to re-design my X-axis carriages to make them more modular, but this definitely added some ideas for features that needed to be included to make this kind of function-change easier.

The Macros make it easier to reposition the heads on the belt that drives both carriages, and once the carriages are re-designed to include the added features I thought of, it'll be both more-automatic and more precise, but still require a little manual intervention.

The printer running: https://www.instagram.com/p/CxvR9s2gZuV/ (it's a 350x350x500mm build volume, Orbiter V1.5 extruders and Dragon HF hot ends, with a BL touch). I'm planning to replace the BL touch with a simple micro switch, add a DUEX board, and move to a part of Volcano Chimeras running in bowden mode, possibly still using Orbiter's, but more likely a BMG clone.

Thanks for the info on defining a third tool - I will be playing around with that and see how I like it compared to the way it's running now.

TL;DR - the command I needed was "M567 P0 E1.00:1.00" combined with defining a single tool that contained all fans, heaters, and extruders. So I was able to get it working in time for the show I was going to.

---

It's a standard I3 printer, and I wanted to be able to convert it between what I now know is called Clone Mode, and standard dual extrusion, because I plan to upgrade to dual Volcano Chimera hotends in the near-future, and it would be amazing to change between running two dual-extruder configurations in parallel, and a single quad-extruder setup with minimal effort - this is step one on that journey. I needed to get it running, so I could figure out what I needed to add to my hot-end carriage design to facilitate calibration, and changing between the two modes reliably.

So here's what I've done so far (Simplify 3D is my slicer, in case that matters):

1. Updated the slicer profile to have Extruder 1 and Extruder 2, a second heater on the hot end, and second part cooling fan. No changes to the starting or ending scripts, just halved the X-axis build volume. It is otherwise identical to my standard slicing profile for the printer.

2. I updated config.g to add the new heater, fans, and the two hot ends as separate tools (my hot end fans are always on, so they're not in the tool definition below):

; Tools
M563 P0 D0 H1 F0                              ; define tool 0
G10 P0 X0 Y0 Z0                                  ; set tool 0 axis offsets
G10 P0 R0 S0                                       ; set initial tool 0 active and standby temperatures to 0C
M563 P1 D1 H2 F1                              ; define tool 1
G10 P1 X87 Y0 Z0                                ; set tool 1 axis offsets
G10 P1 R0 S0                                       ; set initial tool 1 active and standby temperatures to 0C

3. Then I created a Macro to restore the default state of a standard dual-extruder configuration:

; Build Volume Reset
M208 X-87 Y-0 Z0 S1                                ; set axis minima
M208 X260 Y350 Z495 S0                             ; set axis maxima

; Tools
M563 P0 D0 H1 F0                                   ; define tool 0
G10 P0 X0 Y0 Z0                                    ; set tool 0 axis offsets
G10 P0 R0 S0                                       ; set initial tool 0 active and standby temperatures to 0C
M563 P1 D1 H2 F1                                   ; define tool 1
G10 P1 X87 Y0 Z0                                   ; set tool 1 axis offsets
G10 P1 R0 S0                                       ; set initial tool 1 active and standby temperatures to 0C

4. Finally, I created a macro to enable Clone printing mode. Initially, it helps you to put Extruder 2 almost-exactly 175mm away from Extruder 1, with minimal effort (just unclamping from the belt, the printer moves Extruder 1 away while you hold Extruder 2 in place, then prompts you to re-clamp the belt), then it updates all the printer settings to reflect a single massive tool.

;Head Moving Script
G28 X ;Home X-axis
G1 X{175-tools[1].offsets[0]} F3600 ;Move Tool 2 to X-Axis center
M400
M291 S3 P"Unclamp Extruder 2 from the belt and hold it still. Press OK to continue."
G1 X0 F1200 ;Set Head Spacing
M400
M291 S3 P"Re-tightend clamp to the belt. Press OK to complete."

;Update Tool Command to create one massive tool
M563 P1 D-1 H-1                                    ; Delete Tool 1
M563 P0:1 D0:1 H1:2 F0:1                    ; define tool 0
G10 P0 X0 Y0 Z0                                     ; set tool 0 axis offsets
G10 P0 R0 S0                                          ; set initial tool 0 active and standby temperatures to 0C
M567 P0 E1.00:1.00                               ;Set tool 0 to drive both extruders

; Axis Limits (Single, Dual Ducts)
M18
M400
M208 X-43:175 Y0:350 Z0:495       ; set axis min and max

G28 X ;Home X again
G1 X0 F3600 ;Move to X=0
M291 S1 P"Confirm Extruder 2 is now in the middle of the bed."
T0

The command I was looking for was a way to tell the printer to drive BOTH extruders on the tool, when only one extruder was being commanded to move, and M567 was what was needed.

I also learned during testing that the M18 was needed in that last macro so the printer would accept the new Axis Minimum value. When I didn't have the M18 in there, the final G28 X was still homing to X-87 which would then drive the whole thing to out of position, but by turning off the motors before I redefined the build volume, it would then report the updated X-minimum value reliably.

Which M3D printer are they? Presumably they are the Bowden single-extruder kind, or you'd have mentioned that.

If so, then from most people's perspective (since it's not as well-known a printer) they're basically an Ender 3 with the dual-Z mod, and a better controller. New/used doesn't really matter that much since the company isn't around anymore, so you'll likely get ~$200-225 for it, stock.

If I were you, I'd upgrade them to use some sort of bed probe and update the printers to utilize it. Then I'd set up one of them, and run input shaping (because I'm betting they didn't include it in the stock configuration), and increase the stock accelerations a fair bit, then clone those settings to all the other printers. Then I'd update the listing to say that they were upgraded printers, highlight the improvements you made compared to an Ender 3 (since nobody's heard of Crane) and raise the price closer to the $300 mark.

They went out of business because their quad-extruder flagship product was unreliable, and their printers were mediocre at best without that feature. Make them less mediocre, and get a better price for them - tons of people are selling used print farm printers, selling a printer that somebody obviously actually put care into, tends to get a better price. For example when I finally got rid of my PrintrBot Metal Plus, I listed out all the extra parts I had for it, the mods I'd made, etc, etc, etc, and it sold REALLY quickly - cheap printers are abundant, good printers, at a low price, are not.

I have a fairly large 3D printer that I'm steadily adding more and more hotends and extruders to. It is currently dual-extrusion (two Orbiter v1.5 + Dragon hotends in direct drive), but I'm planning to upgrade to Quad extrusion in the near future (likely four BMGs in bowden mode, with two Volcano Chimeras).

Obviously, putting multiple materials into a single part is cool, and configuring that is pretty straight forward. What I need help with is using the printer to print two of the same part, at the same time, in parallel.

I'm working on a slicing profile for S3D that will halve my X-axis width, and a macro that will help me space the two extruders equally on the X-axis (for switching modes), but I'm not sure how to make the printer pre-heat and monitor both hotends and drive both extruders, when it's only receiving commands for a single tool.

Do I simply need to update my M563 in that macro to define Tool 0 to use both extruders, both heaters (which are mapped to both sensors), and both part cooling fans? Or is there more to it?

Thanks in advance.