Design a machine (mechanism+automation), including the end effector build the passive parts and operate it manually document the group project and your individual contribution
Throughout the course we have been trying to decide which machine we should build, some options we had in mind were:
- Chocolate Printer
- Ceramic Printer
- Plasma cutter
- Augmented Reality Sandbox
We really liked the printers but decided upon something that could be built and used immediately and consistently with a local material: sand.
CORE XY SAND PRINTER
Tutorials:
- http://www.instructables.com/id/CoreXY-CNC-Plotter/
- http://www.instructables.com/id/MaxDraw-a-Plotter-XY-Built-in-CNC/
Sand Plotter - CoreXY
Materials:
- 4steel rods 50cm long from a recycled 3d printer
- two motors for x and y axis
- arduino microcontroller with motor driver shield
- 3d printer
- acrylic 3mm transparent
- wood 1/4" plywood - fine grain sand
- strainer
- metal ball
- magnet
- 3d printer board
Melzi Version 2.0
Mechanical Design
We watched tutorials of how an xy printer works.
We downloaded available files to study how the machine would work.
We prepared a list of materials and divided the work up among the students.
We had some spare parts at home that we had been saving for a rainy day.
We were also able to source some of the components from local providers.
We had an old 3D printer that hadn't gotten any use in the last year and decided to take it appart to salvage what we could.
Lucky for us the printer had 6 pulleys that would work perfectly for the project.
We were also able to repurpose the motors and rods that would hold the magnets and bearings for the belts.
Using our MakerBots we printed out some of the motor housings.
With most of the components acquired we began assembling our core xy sand printer.
We attached the magnet to the center slider and fastened the corners in place.
Using sand from a local beach, we strained it using a chicken wire mesh. Additionally we passed a magnet over the sand behind a coffee filter to attract any magnetic particles and remove them.
We filled the transparent box with 1mm of sand and the machine was now ready to program.
---- FIRST TEST MANUALLY OPERATING 3D PRINTED SLIDERS WITH MAGNET AND BALL. ----
Test on acrilic box with no sand and manually moving motors:
Test #2 identifying directions moving motors manually:
Test #3 moving motors manually using milk powder as a medium:
Problems:
- the original belt of the printer was very short and I bought one, from a plotter.
- We connect the engines to the melzi board version 2.0 and it does not work properly.
- Then we connect it to the arduino with the shield, and it did not work. but Rodrigo (friend) guided us on how to get and upload the firmware with the CORE XY system configurations
- The ball did not move fluidly because it was not as strong as the sand was too thick. the magnet is changed and the sands are filtered
Mechanical Design
We began testing first by attempting to connect with an Arduino.
Connecting the motors to the Arduino.
We were unable to program the first board, so we tried with a second board that Michael had at home.
We connected the board to the computer and looked for the right software to work with.
Again we were unable to get the board working
After design the espiral on illustrator, we use the fabmodule to make the gcode of the draw. with the code and GRBL controller we can mkae work the machine.
