MP3DP V4 build PLOG

It’s ALIVE!!!

I was messing with some side plates for my next build this morning. Very interested to see what you think of this one.

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It is nowhere near as loud as I’d feared that it would be. Or at least it wasn’t until I put it on an Ikea LACK end table in my closet. Even then, what makes the noise is the Z axis, so it’s not that bad.

Moving it around, it’s solid as a rock. everything feels way more solid with the panels on. It looks nice, and there are places for things like the power entry. I’d definitely do it again.

Edit: And it shows what the humidity is like around here. that ABS filament has been sitting unwrapped for probably 5 years. (Maybe more, but it was about 5 years ago that I would have hung it up in the closet.) Sometimes I think the filament dries out more being unwrapped here, particularly in the wintertime.

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Okay, I got around to programming the ESP32Cam for monitoring printing.

As soon as it powered on, the little red light on the serial FTDI came on, and it got someone’s attention…

… No, that’s the wrong little red dot…

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And, just for completeness, another cat picture… Print #2



6 layers/mm, printed in ABS for the same reasons as the first print. Gotta get it out of my bedroom, it shakes this poor little Ikea table like crazy…

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3 wall, 30% gyroid infill ?

Edit: Just found guidance for v3 printed parts, MP3DP v3 Parts - V1 Engineering Documentation, will follow that for now…

  • “Infill on the parts is not a big deal I use 20%+ will be fine 40% is really nice, but make sure to use 2-3 perimeter walls to keep the through hole support.”

23-03-14 Edit: Ended up using 3 wall, 35% cubic. Didn’t like how much gyroid infill pattern was rattling and slinging the bed around (Ender 3 Max).

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Yeah 40% is probably really good.

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I actually only did 2 walls, but using a .5mm nozzle. 30% adaptive cubic infill.

Seems to be plenty, it is very well behaved.

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Some teething pains with this printer.

Last night I tried printing a dozen little clips.

Story: I have a bunch of Ikea cabinetry in my kitchen, which I loathe, because it was installed poorly. It’s also now obsolete, so the only POSSIBLE saving grace (That you can just go to Ikea and update stuff) is no longer valid…

Anyway, one of the pieces is a lazy susan type thing to get to an area that has no door. This seems ot be so that you can get into a corner area. The shelves have a metal guard wire around them supported by a dozen or so little clips (No longer available) that attach the wire to the shelf. These break. So I drew up a replacement in CAD and set about printing them as a longer print…

The print isn’t that big, but 12 little clips about 8mm tall, and maybe 20mm by 55mm in size. Printed at 3 layers/mm, so 24 layers. The first 22 layers went pretty well. One part warped a little on the small pins that anchor the part into the shelf, but otherwise everything looked acceptable.

Then the printer decided to pick up 16 of the remaining pieces and move them around the heated bed, more or less at random. F***. End result, 0 pieces printed OK.

Time to get the steel wool, I think and give the PEI spring plate a good scrubbing.

The first 22 layers though, AMAZING! No trace of any kind of printing artefacts in them.

While I was in there scrubbing, I made some corrections…


Still not perfect but a darn sight better… less than 0.25mm total deviation over 25 points. I will call that a win.

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That is really really nice!

I just put my back panel together, as perfectly square as I could measure, with no trying. I am very excited for the panel and extrusion combo. Thank you!

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Congratulations!

Nice!

I was just wondering how to clean my PEI sheet. This is my first printer to use one…all the rest have glass beds. Thanks for the tip!

If it’s removeable, hot water and soap in the kitchen sink, then dry it off good.

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I always fall back to IPA and a magic eraser.

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I still haven’t tried the magic eraser. I need to give that a shot.

Yeah, I actually ended up using the magic eraser, but I haven’t tried it yet. I had one PEI sheet that I never did get anything to stick to.

I used to use glass, which worked reasonably well. I found that 8X10 picture frames from the dollar store had a reasonable thin sheet of glass. It wasn’t borosilicate, so it was fragile and wouldn’t deal well with thermal stress, but when each one costs $1.25, and lasts for months, who cares? When one broke I just swapped it out, put the pieces back in the frame and tossed it. Glass works great with PETg, though you have to wait for it to cool before you can remove it, and you can’t cool that glass quickly. The PEI on spring steel is nicer, because you can run it under cold water on the backside if you’re in a hurry.

Going to do some more calibration printing with it today and see if I can get it dialed right in

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I am excited to try CNC Kitchen’s flow test. That is a lot less subjective than the flow test on Teaching Tech’s guide, I think I went a bit to conservative.

I need to do another round of calibration. I think I can print faster and I have some stringing starting to pop up.

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Okay sneak peak, I kept the short front (this HDPE is expensive). I’ll save the grand unveiling for RmRRF.

You are right, the panels just better.

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Panels will stiffen it up quite a bit!

Also store the uncut sheets flat! Especially in your garage. They will warp, and good luck getting them flat again.

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