What would ZenXY the Next Generation look like… Steel cable or fishing line, or still belts on regular 2020 extrusion and delrin/POM wheels? It’s not like 0.04mm precision is needed, and loads are pretty light assuming Users are not doing crazy rapids… I don’t understand why $15k alternatives used 4’ linear rails and Nema 23’s 
My glass will be from Ikea.
EDIT: See Jeff’s Neat post for more context on…
No idea. 
You don’t have to wait if you want to use the ikea glass. My table I bring to RMRRF and Ryan’s at Open Sauce both use that ikea glass. It is linked here somewhere.
Smaller footprint would be my #1 feature request. Mostly in X and Y. Although (IMO) you need at least an inch away from the sand to get decent LED angle.
The other two troubles I have when building the current iteration are:
Maybe there is a solution to both where the ZenXY parts support the glass and align it perfectly to the glass workspace
It would be cool to mount the 4 corner feet and then just use a line in the 3D printed part to measure how long to cut the tubing. Take two corners back off and finish the build.
Feel free to just not post if you have nothing to add 
I think we are at a very cool place in the V1 timeline. We have solid machines. I think it might be time to experiment a little more, that is how the Zen started anyway. I wanted to actually use a coreXY machine (spoiler, not good for higher loads on large machines).
Since we have tiny loads, low speeds, and almost no accuracy requirements, we have a ton of freedom.
-Linear rails in segments so you do not have to buy a 5’ rail and have it shipped??
-Different motors…The motors set the edge spacing. I make the machine symmetric, but you all know it absolutely does not have to be. Moving the motors in Z can free up a ton of room in XY, by adding Z.
-belts are pretty cheap but maybe line would be easier.
The electronics are tiny, the ball and mag combo we use seems pretty ideal, software and firmware is awesome. People can use glass or wood for the bottom depending on size.
I think step one is rail choice.
PS, I have always though linear rail was kinda boring because I feel like we are buying our way out of an opportunity to be creative…but in this case size is important and the rest of the build is so inexpensive this might be a good place to spend money. With the downside of sound, I wonder if these are going to make more noise. And don’t forget to factor in we are working with powders and linear rails hate powders.
Is there a problem with the Conduit we use now that the rails would fix?
If we stick with rails is it possible to make all the rails the same size? Having to buy 2 different size conduit to only use a small portion of it isn’t exactly ideal.
Smaller motors should be fine, I don’t see where it needs the high powered motors we use on the CNC machines.
Do they have to? Can regular Nema 17 get the job done from different Z plane from rest of Core XY (or what ever belt/cable arrangement is used…) by adding some idlers and routing belt to motors mounted in two of the table legs?
I dunno. A high degree of accuracy may nkt be a requirement, but it certainly helps.
Aesthetics are a funny thing. The human eye picks up on some pretty subtle details. I would be driven to distraction if a “straight line” had a wobble in it. A place where a sandify pattern was supposed to repeat in the previous track (like letters) would stand out if the ball were even a small fraction off of the track.
Also people like to fiddle. I’m sure that more than one plotting robot has been made from ZenXY parts, and that really ought to have some reasonable accuracy.
Belts are cheap, and very repeatable. The conduit rails are cheap and repeatable, which makes the ZenXY v2 a pretty respectable low cost machine. I had some difficulties with the first ZenXY, which I never did resolve (And I think may have had something to do with the development of the V2.)
A new one? Sure, I’m game. Pretty sure the guy at the Ikea counter where you pick up stuff thinks I have glass shelves in all of my cabninetry…
Size, the middle gantry needs two rails and wheels all around them. Linear rails take all that away.
yes but for my 5’ build 1/2" was too flexy, linear solves this as well since it is fully supported. We can usea tiny rail.
I mentioned this above. Pulleys and belts can be added to shift the space in the Z direction…not ideal for a diner table or desk, fine for coffee tables.
0.0001" vs 0.1" probably is not a big deal here.
That is the part I was referring to about our current place in the V1 timeline. We have low cost and high functionality nailed. Am I leaning to gold plated everything…no, but maybe we add the branch to our tree that see what 2x the cost gets us. People can choose low cost, or low footprint in this case.
This 1000%
So looking at the scara in another topic! Now that the lr4 even makes the newest person easily cut aluminum, could you make a reliable, long scara arm out of aluminum?
could change everything.
Because scara can be a square or rectangle, just needs to be long enough.
Oh, I thought this was a private message and I was wondering why Aza would ask me this… 
So look at what this person did! he used 3d printer (literally) to make his. Interesting idea and seem to make it compact!
sorry i never learned to get a youtube at the time i want it at. You want the 3:48 time to see it.
Extrusions are a good option, we know bom wheels are silent
this is cool, and simple also
lmao, my youtube is full of these now!
This would be a fun one to let people add gears from a box and watch it draw their own pattern.
Pretty small and cheap, mgn9 rails, Amazon.com
And MGN7, Amazon.com
Linear Flat Needle Roller Bearing carriage in T-Track that doubles up as carriage holder and edge banding?
lemme see one
My concept was built around these (rather than designing based on some hypothetical part that doesn’t exist):
I was using these as both idlers and as rollers on custom rails. Using string instead of belts, and packing these at weird angles to reduce the impact of idler diameter even. Using string instead of belts, tight corners are no big deal.
It was quite the rabbit hole. Let me dig up what I have.
