Big FDM Printer: de Kleine Reus

Translation of “de Kleine Reus” is little Giant :-)

The creation of this printer began with dismantling of Big DIY Printer 2. It was fun to experiment whit this very big printer, but it was time to change it again. I never printed outside the heat bed (300x300mm) although this printer could do much larger than that. Also it took a lot of space and it was not portable at all. So a new printer design came into my mind. This printer has everything Big DIY printer 2 had but even higher in the Z axis. The X and Y axis are made much shorter this time because I didn’t exceed the dimensions of the Heat Bed anyway. This new printer is portable and takes much less space than Big DIY 3D Printer2.

The aluminum profiles I used are 30mmx33, 5mm, but other material whit other dimensions will also work. For instance 30mmx 40mm can also work due the design of clamping the profiles into place with a wedge construction. See the black ABS wedge on the picture. The brackets that hold the Z motors and rods fit on something that is 33,5mm.

The aluminum parts are screwed to the corner parts using M4x10mm bolts that go into little brackets that hold the nuts. These brackets (alu prof under m4 nut bracket.stl & alu prof under m4 nut bracket2.stl) fit into the slots of the aluminum parts.

The parts that connect the aluminum lengths of the frame are printed with 6 wall counts and 6 bottom and top layers. The Infill must be at least 35%. Otherwise it is not strong enough. One corner did break, but I was able to glue it. The material I used is PET-G

There are 2 different X cars: one is bigger and is made for 4 (LM10UU) linear bearings. The other is made for 2 (LM10LUU) linear bearings and is a bit shorter. In the pictures I have the lager one because this one came of the old Big DIY 3D printer2 and I didn’t want to print it again.

The diagonal aluminum profiles I used are actually too short. So do not follow this example. Of course it would be better to have these a bit longer so they will reach corner to corner. This will give the printer frame more stability. A cross would be even better. But for now these short ones work for me. This printer has run for more than 100 hours now. For example: the red Vase alone took one day :-). Later I also connected the frame with dampeners to the wall to take out even more vibrations.

The Heat Bed is just a glass plate (300x300mm) with a Kapton tape sticker that holds copper lanes as a heater. The glass plate is hold onto aluminum strips whit clips. The aluminum strips are mounted with bolts and springs onto other aluminum corner profiles. This Heat Bed has a dedicated 360W power supply. So I let this one be regulated by its own external FET. I have included a simple schematic with the pictures also. Yes I like to use an Opto-Coupler always, but it is not necessary.

Then I like to address the issue of having 2 motors on the Y and Z axis. The Ramps 1.4 board I used does not support more than one driver per axis. You may get away with wiring the motors in parallel on each driver, but I didn’t test that. Instead I just wires 2 drivers parallel per axis. I included a simple schematic on how to do this. It’s important to set the motor current the same on each parallel wired driver.

The spindles on the axis are M8. The standard spindles (included with nut) you can buy everywhere. I just used M8 treated rod and a M8 nut. To install the M8 nut the “m8 nut converter part.stl” can be used.

The extruder I used is a geared one, but a direct drive can also be used. For more info about the extruders see: https://pinshape.com/items/42621-3d-printed-geared-extruder  or the direct drive one: https://pinshape.com/items/41864-3d-printed-direct-drive-extruder . I did include the STL’s for both.

The controller is a Ramps 1.4 hacked with DRV8825(X & Y axis) & A4988 (extruder & Z axis) drivers and an Arduino Mega. I have included the marlin firmware that I used. But beware, the steps/mm are for this printer, so they may be different for yours. It will work only if you have:

·         Geared extruder 43 teeth to 10 teeth with an M8 extruder driver and 16 micro steps

·         Z axis using treated M8 (metric) rod and 16 micro steps

·         X & Y axis using a pulley with an diameter of 12mm and 32 micro steps

For information about configuring Marlin you can consult: http://marlinfw.org/docs/confi...

In the photos you can see the Power Supply’s and my DIY mains net filter mounted on an aluminum strip. If you do this be sure to isolate the Net filter and Power Supply’s from the rest of the frame and the metal case where the controller is housed. Otherwise the Atmel chip will do some very strange things due to EMF frequencies that are being dumped to the ground. Also it is very important to connect the net filter and power supplies to earth. Otherwise the EMF frequencies cannot escape and the Atmel chip will be influents in time, making long prints impossible. For the schematic please see the picture. Note that the capacitors need to be of an X2 and Y2 class so that if they die they are guaranteed not to short. C1 & C2 need to be of class X2. C3 & C4 need to be of class Y2. Also this filter needs to be in a metal case (see picture)

The Red fan ducts on the side of the nozzle are not my own design (RoPa here on Thingiverse: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1264477 ).

The Case for the Full Graphic Smart LCD Controller is a design by Wersy ( http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:87250 )

for the parts list please see :https://www.thingiverse.com/th...   or https://www.myminifactory.com/... I have reached the maximum in this text field :-)

If you have any questions feel free to ask :-)

If you think I forgot something or I made a mistake (it’s possible I’m only human :-)  ),feel free to comment