Over the past week I have been assembling my Rostock based on the parts found in my collection:
[www.thingiverse.com]
I chose to go with the traxxas rod end modified parts because the printed universal joints were extremely hard to assembly and very inconsistent despite the fact that they were printed on a friend's well build Mendle90. Originally I was building a Mini but after comparing the parts of the original Rostock with the miini and some of the modified parts out there I found that all the aprts are interchangeable between variants excluding the max and the enlarged rostock (12mm rods instead of 8mm).
As of yet I have the printer's mechanical systems almost completely assembled by that I mean:
- frame and rods fully assembled
- motors in place with pulley's
- endstops wired and bolted in
- carriages and bearings installed
- traxxas rod ends and carbon fiber tube assembled and attached
- platform attached to carriages via arms.
What needs to be done to get a moving platform:
- install belts
- tension belts
- wire motors to printrbot board
- wire endstops to printrbot board
- calibrate (should be easy JK lol)
In the interest of not breaking anything I have a few questions before I move forward with installing the belts and wiring up the printrbot board and giving it a go.
1. What is the best way to install the belts? I tried putting them on by hand but it was very hard, do I have to losen the clamp on the rods on the idler ends to get the belt on and tension it?
2. As far as endstop switches go, should I remove the thin metal lever on them ?
3. The motors I have are linea engineering NEMA 17 bipolar stepper motors that I salvaged from liquid handler machines at a local electronics recycling warehouse (got 4 for 20 bucks :)) they have the red, black, blue, and green wires like steppers I have seen on other RepRaps/RepStraps but I'm unsure what they correspond to internally on the motors. The part number on the steppers doesn't correlate directly to one on the Linear Engineering web page, I was told they were custom wound for the machines I salvaged them from. What should I do to figure out what wire means what on my steppers?
4. For my idlers I just used 608ZZ bearings with a 40 tooth GT2 idler ring I printed out to go over them, should I glue these to the bearings or is friction and the force of the belt tension enough to keep them on?
5. My rods are the exact length (I bought them from a supplier precut and ends faced with a CNC) but despite my best efforts to make them flush with the idler and motor ends one of the rods sticks up higher on each of the three axis. I think this might be because the bed of the AO-100 I printed on was not completely level. Are the rods even supposed to be flush with the tops of the idler ends? Or did Johan design it such that there is extra length to tension the belts?
Also obligatory pictures of the build:
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[www.thingiverse.com]
I chose to go with the traxxas rod end modified parts because the printed universal joints were extremely hard to assembly and very inconsistent despite the fact that they were printed on a friend's well build Mendle90. Originally I was building a Mini but after comparing the parts of the original Rostock with the miini and some of the modified parts out there I found that all the aprts are interchangeable between variants excluding the max and the enlarged rostock (12mm rods instead of 8mm).
As of yet I have the printer's mechanical systems almost completely assembled by that I mean:
- frame and rods fully assembled
- motors in place with pulley's
- endstops wired and bolted in
- carriages and bearings installed
- traxxas rod ends and carbon fiber tube assembled and attached
- platform attached to carriages via arms.
What needs to be done to get a moving platform:
- install belts
- tension belts
- wire motors to printrbot board
- wire endstops to printrbot board
- calibrate (should be easy JK lol)
In the interest of not breaking anything I have a few questions before I move forward with installing the belts and wiring up the printrbot board and giving it a go.
1. What is the best way to install the belts? I tried putting them on by hand but it was very hard, do I have to losen the clamp on the rods on the idler ends to get the belt on and tension it?
2. As far as endstop switches go, should I remove the thin metal lever on them ?
3. The motors I have are linea engineering NEMA 17 bipolar stepper motors that I salvaged from liquid handler machines at a local electronics recycling warehouse (got 4 for 20 bucks :)) they have the red, black, blue, and green wires like steppers I have seen on other RepRaps/RepStraps but I'm unsure what they correspond to internally on the motors. The part number on the steppers doesn't correlate directly to one on the Linear Engineering web page, I was told they were custom wound for the machines I salvaged them from. What should I do to figure out what wire means what on my steppers?
4. For my idlers I just used 608ZZ bearings with a 40 tooth GT2 idler ring I printed out to go over them, should I glue these to the bearings or is friction and the force of the belt tension enough to keep them on?
5. My rods are the exact length (I bought them from a supplier precut and ends faced with a CNC) but despite my best efforts to make them flush with the idler and motor ends one of the rods sticks up higher on each of the three axis. I think this might be because the bed of the AO-100 I printed on was not completely level. Are the rods even supposed to be flush with the tops of the idler ends? Or did Johan design it such that there is extra length to tension the belts?
Also obligatory pictures of the build:
