Welcome the new addition to my printing machine family

I couldn't help it.  This machine looks too awesome to pass up.  Let me introduce to you... Robox.

Why did I back this Kickstarter project?  After all, I already have a Mosaic M1, 2 PP3DP UP! Pluses, and a Replicator 2.  The main reasons were better layer resolution (0.02mm vs 0.1 for the R2) and material support.  I recently saw nylon prints and found them amazing -- I bet a lot of people would love to print their own soft, custom iPhone cases!  In addition, the extruder head has two nozzles -- one large diameter one for fast infill, and another small diameter one for fine details.  On top of that, they will be supporting dual extruder heads soon, which means I'll be able to print support material out of dissolvable PVA and HIPS.  They have put a lot of thought into the design of this machine -- only time will tell if they can deliver.  I'm a beta tester, which means I'll get my unit in January 2014.  I cannot wait.  This machine should be truly awesome... and if it delivers, it looks like I'll have a few printers to sell soon.

ShopBot fun

For SLAS 2014, my company is going to build a custom booth. You know, because we just roll like that.  It turns out that the custom tabletops that would normally be really expensive fit on the ShopBot (just barely), so I was tasked with running the job.

Yesterday, I went to the TechShop to generate and verify the toolpath.  I haven't used the software in a while, but got through it with a little bit of help.  In this post, I just want to record the little tidbits of info I re-learned so that two years from now, I will be able to recall the necessary info.

First, I got the DXF in AutoCad R12 format to be on the safe side. Then I created a new project in VCarve Pro 7.0.  Since the DXF was in mm, I set the project to be in mm as well.

The important thing to remember with the software is setting up the origins and XY definition properly.  The origin should be in the lower-left corner.

I then used Import Vectors and specified the DXF.  It might not appear on-screen, but hitting F9 will auto-center the part.  Awesomely useful!

I'll jump ahead a little and talk about a problem that I had.  After generating the toolpath, I noticed that the endmill was doing something weird.  While the bit was supposed to cut on the outside of the part, in a few places it was actually flipping to the inside!  In the end, it turned out that some points on the path were not joined.  So after breaking the path up into discret curves and using the Join function in VCarve Pro, this problem went away.

Another part that gave me problems was the exporting of the ShopBot toolpath file.  Most normal software packages put something like that under File -> Export, or File -> Save as, but in this case, there's a "Save Toolpath" button that appears when you close the preview window.  Ok.  Hopefully I won't make that mistake next time.

After loading the .sbp in the ShopBot software and previewing the cuts, I was happy and it was time to call it a day.

This morning, Eric (coworker) and I stopped by MacBeath to pick up the wood for the tabletops.  Instead of mahogany plywood, Eric decided to try bamboo because it would preclude the need for veneer or any other finishing strips to cover the edge of the plywood.  This is where a minivan really shines -- you can fit a stack of 4' x 8' pieces of plywood in a Honda Odyssey without any problems!  Sweet!

Then we made it over to TechShop, got Eric his $25 guess pass, and unloaded the material.  I love how TechShop has everything you need -- we found one of those Home Depot-like carts and used it to get the raw materials over to the machine.

Getting the material aligned properly wasn't too bad.  After homing the X&Y axes to their proximity switches, I moved to the far end of Y (48") and then commanded a 96" X move.  We watched the bit as it traveled over the end of the bamboo, and believe it or not, our first try was pretty much dead-on!  After drilling four brass screws through the wood and sacrifial layer and into the leveling bed, we were finally ready to start!  This is where the wheels came off.

I really need to post screenshots, but the short story is that ShopBot came in last night to perform a software upgrade.  That's great and all, but they never bothered to tell any TechShop staff how to iuse it!  Man, I'm getting really sleepy so I have to make this quick.  After selecting the file and clicking start, a dialog pops up.  It has a yellow square next to the part filename, with what looked like a "!" inside.  So that means we have a problem, right?  Well, normally I wouldn't have looked at the yellow box if the dialog had a Start button in it.  Instead, it had a cancel button.  So we thought it might have something to do with my .sbp being in mm instead of inches, yada yada yada.  Apparently, TechShop SF had the same problem last night and couldn't run the machines.  In the end, the yellow exclamation point was really an I with a _ underneath it.  Seriously???  It turned out that you juse have to click the Start button again and then things magically worked.

Here are some photos of the machine in motion.

Bamboo sure cuts nicely!  I think I will use it for my next projects.

Here's how it looks after routing and on the Item frame the guys designed:

PCBs arrived!

Today my PCBs from oshpark came in.  Check 'em out!

My Replicator 2 has been really busy running makexyz jobs, and work has been a little crazy, so it haven't been able to tinker much.  I am currently learning more about the TI MSP430, because I think it's the perfect micro to power my laser tag project.  More to come later...

Sidetracked...

makexyz has had me sidetracked a bit.  I recently got a message from someone that wanted 150 pieces made.  It was a pretty cool part and had a letter surrounded by multiple rings.  When removed from the platform, the support material would break free from the axle and the rings would spin independently.  I didn't have the right color and started to look around for local sources of Makerbot PLA.  It turns out that the Microsoft Store sells it online, plus shipping is free!  It's a way better deal than through Makerbot!  While I waited for confirmation from the potential customer, I did some test prints to verify that I could produce these parts in time.  The good news is that the Replicator 2 didn't disappoint, but the bad news was that the customer backed out.

On the bright side of things, this meant that I'd have time to focus on OnSLaughT and other projects.  I made a few tweaks to the magazine and grip assembly, as well as the release mechanism.  It's definitely getting closer to something that I think will work.  I need to change the dimensions a bit so that the spring will fit inside of the release mechanism.

One other project I have left over from the summer is internet-enabling our Honeywell security system.  While looking for DIY projects that accomplished this task, I came across a $119 product called EnvisaLink 3 that does pretty much everything I want!  You hook it into your existing Honeywell Vista security system, connect it to your network, and then it will be capable of sending you emails / SMS whenever a specified event occurs.  For example, I can be notified whenever the alarm is triggered, or I can simply be notified any time a window or door is opened.  So this isn't really a maker project, as I just have to hook up some wires, but that in itself almost turned into yet another project.  Check out this wiring:

What a mess, right?  Just looking at it made me nervous -- one day I might sneeze and some wires would come off, and I'd have no idea how to fix it.  To make matters worse, the EnvisaLink 3 needed to tap into the four most-occupied terminals in the box!  My first thought was to take my newly-acquired Kicad skills and use them to produce a custom PCB that would make it easier to manage the multiple connections.  Certainly this is something that a simple piece of DIN rail and Phoenix Contact terminal blocks could handle, but not as fun.

Well, while reading up on the wiring, I learned that the alarm system has an auxiliary "zone doubling" accessory that allows us to support more than 8 sensors.  It turned out that the 4 terminal positions I had to tap into were also available in the zone-doubling accessory and used a standard 0.1" header!  Today I hit HSC and picked up the parts I needed to complete the wiring.  In case you live in the Bay Area and don't know about HSC, it's electronics surplus heaven there.  They have so much stuff and it's pretty cheap.  Power resistors, DC converters, scopes, connectors, wires, SMT stuff, you name it.  Here are a couple of pics I snapped today:

Anyhow, I got it all wired up and stuck the EnvisaLink 3 into a 3D-printed case I whipped up this evening.  Perfect fit on the first try and gave a satisfying snap as I popped it onto the chamfered pegs!

Now I just have to figure out how to complete the configuration and get my alarm system online!  On the internet, that is.

Poorly timed blackout!

Fortunately, I just finished some prints for makexyz customers!  That last print took almost five hours, and I would have been majorly bummed if I had to reprint it from scratch.

I finally got around to revising the laser tag models for the magazine release parts, and as soon as I started to print them, the power went out.  Time to get that UPS for the printer!  Well, maybe tomorrow morning I will be able to try again before I have to go to work.

Here's what the parts look like.

I never realized that making basic PCBs could be so easy!

I've only made a few PCBs before.  One was a breakout board for the gauge electronics behind the center console in my Evo.  The other was a Pololu-based stepper driver board intended to be a drop-in replacement for the MakerBot Cupcake electronics.  Both were made using the proprietary software from PCBExpress.  I actually really liked that software because it was super intuitive.  I never even had to pick up a user manual to get my boards made.  I just drew the schematic, exported to the PCB editor, then clicked Order and the boards arrived at my doorstep a week later!  My only other experience was making a special EEPROM adapter for NSX ECUs, which was done on Protel DXP.  That particular project required help from our board designers at work, because I had no clue what I was doing!  And it was that PCB that, until today, made me think that real PCB work would always be beyond my abilities.

I can't remember how I found out about Chris Gammell's new Contextual Electronics website, but it was probably from one of the RSS feeds.  In any case, I *really* wanted to take his course, but being able to dedicate 10 weeks is pretty tough with all of the things going on.  Needless to say, I was thrilled when I received one of his emails, announcing the "Getting to Blinky" series on Youtube.  For programmers out there, it's kind of like the EE equivalent of Hello World.  Now, while Hello World on any new programming language doesn't excite me very much, being able to blink an LED via my own PCB is.  So this afternoon I decided to just sit down and work through Chris' 7 videos to learn KiCad, and open source schematic capture and PCB design tool.

The courses are laid out very well, and the breaks between them are logical.  If you weren't able to sit down and power through all of them at once, I think you would have a very easy time picking up wherever you had last left off.  Chris seems like a pretty soft-spoken guy, and I definitely had to crank up the volume on my speakers to be able to hear him clearly.  Other than that, the videos themselves are well-produced.  The screencast is clear, and I especially like how the keystrokes he's using are displayed on-screen.  This is very useful because KiCad is very keystroke-intensive.  I think you are much better off learning the keystrokes than trying to find the various commands in the menus and toolbar icons (most of which don't really make sense to me).

Perhaps the only thing I would have liked in the videos was more cues that he's going to click on an important toolbar icon or introduce a new keystroke.  When working in KiCad on my other monitor, I think the process would have been smoother if I knew when to glance over at what Chris was doing.  I had to frequently rewind the videos to try to catch which button / keys he was pressing.  I guess some people do this naturally to begin with -- i.e. watch a bit, pause, do the steps, unpause.  I happen to like to do things at the same time, and it was a little difficult.  That said, all of the content you could possibly need is there in the videos, and you will learn how to use the fundamental KiCad tools!

KiCad seems like a very powerful tool, and it never ceases to amaze me what these open source software packages can do, at no cost to us users!  It has its quirks -- sometimes keystrokes wouldn't quite work, like V for via was failing during the routing session, and I had the darndest time trying to delete lines from my drawings.  But in the end, everything worked out.  By far the weirdest issue was with the footprint creation.  I couldn't close the editor because I had to save the footprint, but I couldn't save the footprint because it wasn't associated with a library.  This was the weirdest problem I've ever seen, and fortunately Chris ran into the same problem during his video... and that's the best part -- you get to see a real error when it happens, and have someone actually explain to you how to get around it!  Can you imagine other edited tutorials that might have completely glossed over or removed this error from the video, leaving you scratching your head?  I can, and it would really suck.

Anyhow, here's how the course is broken down:

1. Introduction
2. Symbol Creation with the Component Library
3. Schematic Creation with EEschema
4. Part Association with CvPcb
5. Creating Footprints with the Module Editor
6. PCB Layout with PCBnew
7. Output Files and Making Your Board

And yes, oh yes, by the end of this series of videos, you will have ordered your very first PCB.  I couldn't believe how simple the process was!

I can't thank Chris enough for providing us with some free, extremely useful videos to help get some of us kickstarted with the PCB design process.  I do hope that this gets those whom are on the fence about joining his course to sign up and go for it!

Oh, and check out my version of Getting to Blinky: (note that I didn't care about how bad my battery holder outline looked, nor did I size the pads and spacing exactly right, and I didn't follow the directions and move the component identifiers -- I just wanted to see the board!)

I promise to do better on my new two projects -- a new stepper board based on the ST L6470, and OnSLaughT, which is the new name I have given to my Open Source Laser Tag project.

More SmartJars work...

I haven't been putting out new designs for the laser tag project lately, because I've been obsessed with getting the SmartJars insert to be financially feasible.  I finally have a part that I think makes sense, but we'll just have to see if anyone decides to pick up a set.  I went through several iterations of the design to get a part that wastes less material, yet feels sturdy enough to use.

The open source hardware I'm really excited about is my SmartJars carousel, because it's a perfect opportunity to re-acquaint myself with OpenSCAD.  I used to use this amazing software a few years ago to make things parametrically.  This awesome software package allows you to write code that translates into 2D and 3D objects.  I only use it for things that I want to produce on the laser cutter, so this means 2D stuff.

Before OpenSCAD, I would create a 3D model in Alibre Design, and then create a drawing.  Then I would export this drawing to DXF and import it into CorelDraw.  An alternative way to design parts is directly in CorelDraw itself, but this can be painful for all but the simplest projects.  My 56 state quarter frame was done entirely in CorelDraw, but since it was just a bunch of circles, it wasn't a big deal.

The SmartJars carousel is the perfect application for OpenSCAD.  Once complete, you will be able to specify how many SmartJars on a panel (rows and columns), and how many panels in the carousel.  With this information, OpenSCAD will allow you to output DXFs for the panel and top and bottom carouself pieces.  Each SmartJar panel will interlock and screw into the top and bottom panels as well!  Check it out (I know that the holes aren't centered yet...)

Once I get this done and make the carousel, I have a really cool v2 already in mind.  :)