Comments on: Filament drive shootout

By: Pleasant Hardware » Blog Archive » Printruder II - 3D printing with MakerBot and other hardware

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 19:17:14 +0000

[...] Industries did some test with CNC manufactured worm-gear style pulleys. But I have no idea if they (still) plan to sell them in the MakerBot store and if yes, [...]

By: MBC

MBC — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 21:26:09 +0000

“This was a big deal because sometimes the filament itself would either break or elongate and deform.”

FYI in engineering terms:
brake = fracture
elongate = neck or elongation = necking
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necking_%28engineering%29

cant wait to upgrade my extruder with one of these

keep up the good work!

By: rbisping

rbisping — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 22:43:34 +0000

I made me several of these out of brass and they work great, ive been using them for about a month or so. ive been looking into making a printed part that you could use to make two of these simultaneously very similar to the double pinch wheel design i put on thingiverse. But having comercialy made ones available would be great .

By: Eric Albert

Eric Albert — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 17:32:06 +0000

At my college I have a lab with two FDM machines (one older, one new this month) – and if anyone is interested, I could take closeup pictures of the drive mechanisms — they both use 2mm ABS filament, and a similar worm drive. -Eric

By: davidbuzz

davidbuzz — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 04:15:06 +0000

Zach, I’ve been working on integration of the 5D reprap firmware (ie suppor for acceleration) with a DC extruder, as these two elements aren’t supported at the same time yet in any known firmware…. You haven’t been working on this for the makerbot at all have you? ( since I assume acceleration would be a desirable feature to have in the makerbot?)

Buzz.
email me if interested.

By: Devlin

Devlin — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 18:21:02 +0000

What if you had a cleaning pulley off to the side that would clean the drive pulley?

By: Zach Hoeken

Zach Hoeken — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 18:02:37 +0000

@grogyan – actually they quoted us about the same price we’re paying for the old pulley, so I do not foresee any price increase from this particular part.

@joachim – regardless of the pulley you use, you have to clean the teeth every single time it strips. we call this flossing the teeth. we’ll most likely offer both pulleys so no worries.

@paul yup, we’re open to lots of possibilities. we’re probably sticking with dc motor for the near future though.

By: paul

paul — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 17:38:42 +0000

I guess is out of topic, but are you some day considering change DC motor for a stepper one?

By: Joachim Glauche

Joachim Glauche — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 10:34:01 +0000

I made one out of brass with a M3,5 tap in my lathe. It pulled over 18KG first, but at least with ABS it has the problem that some plastic will go off from the filament and stick onto the worm pulley. This caused it to loose grip shortly after I started to use it.

The drive pulley you use works a lot of more reliable for me.

By: Grogyan

Grogyan — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 06:19:21 +0000

Looks very nice.

I have a niggling feeling that its going to cost a lot.