exxos's Atari, Amiga & retro forum

derkom wrote: 02 Oct 2021 09:17 Looks like a Creality of some variety. Ender-6 perhaps?

Very close !

@exxos I have dual z motors on mine and they go out of sync very easily. The solution was to buy a couple of pulleys and a belt, stick them on top of the z axis screws to keep them in sync.

Not that I've got a 3D printer but I've heard that the Creality stuff is a great for tinkering but not really very reliable and they're very old designs.

Newer machines look to be far better now. I've seen lots of good reviews of new machines like the AnyCubic Vyper which aren't that much different in price.

Are you sure trying to fix your current printer is actually worth the effort?

PhilC wrote: 02 Oct 2021 10:00 @exxos I have dual z motors on mine and they go out of sync very easily. The solution was to buy a couple of pulleys and a belt, stick them on top of the z axis screws to keep them in sync.

Yeah I have seen that on my travels. But mine , you can't home and level the bed full stop. :roll:

Like on my flash forge , I set the bed level so I know its at 0.18mm. But then I've put a z offset in the firmware of about 0.23mm. This means 0.16mm - 0.23mm, meaning the heads home location is below where the bed is. I've messed with it loads. I never worked it out until now.

You can see the gremlins come in overnight and trash the printer. Where I have to level the bed again. Then mess with the offsets again, as everyone knows I've been going around in circles with this stuff for pretty much years now.

On the new printer its easier and quicker to fiddle with stuff, so I quickly noticed the problem as I am physically looking at the thing while using the touch screen to move the axis about.

It's down to the switches. Some must be worse than others as every printer should have this fault. On one review of my printer, one guy moved the z probe, as I did. Another glued a block onto the z home switch. So the problem is out there, but nobody has joined the dots on it all.

So I'm trying to find a normally closed hall effect end stop board now. They seem to be all normally open :roll:

@exxos mine has the z switch disconnected and homes on the BLTouch but you then have to set the offset for how far the touch is away from the nozzle on all three axis

PhilC wrote: 02 Oct 2021 11:04 @exxos mine has the z switch disconnected and homes on the BLTouch but you then have to set the offset for how far the touch is away from the nozzle on all three axis

I have no idea if I can home to the z probe... There is literally no manual for this printer :roll:

@exxos you'll need to tweak the firmware to let it do it I think.

PhilC wrote: 02 Oct 2021 12:26 @exxos you'll need to tweak the firmware to let it do it I think.

Yeah, not gonna happen :lol:

stephen_usher wrote: 02 Oct 2021 10:29 Are you sure trying to fix your current printer is actually worth the effort?

Well the i3 I am going to scrap. Will save the motors and PSU.

Flash forge, I've sunk £300 into it so far. It will be a lot of work to fix , but I think I know what the problems are now. Its not high up on my to do list exactly.

The new printer was 400. That's the one with the end stop problem.

I've ordered one of these..Looks like I need to buy the sensor seperatly , can't really figure out where it goes :roll: these are normally open, I need normally closed. Was it was just a 393 comparator , I was thinking of swapping the chip for a inverted output one, then thought I could swap the inputs to invert it, but now thinking of just bodging on a BC548 to invert the output.

Idea being the PCB will bolt on where the switch is now. Then I'll glue the magnet onto the Z frame. I'm trying to avoid drilling holes in it as I've only had it 2 days :lol: :roll:


I have ordered a opto end stop, so its really just what will turn up first.

Edit:

Ahhh U1 & U2 are the sensors. It threw me being in sot packages !

I'll probably design my own board and bend it for my will once I get the voron board running.