The Profilenator

Thanks to everyone for helping get our Makerbot settings back in order tonight. Using the Profilenator we were able to work up some settings for each color of plastic in the following spreadsheet link. I recommend setting up profiles for each color just to make things easier. We didnt get around to PLA or the natural ABS so we need to work on that.

Profilenator Settings

So now armed with some math, you need to properly configure the skeinforge settings as follows: Fill, Raft, Speed, Carve, and Inset.I’ll walk you through the settings for black ABS. For any of the others, take the numbers from the spreadsheet above and plug them into the appropriate highlighted fields.

Fill

You should set the 3 settings for extra shells depending on whether its a small object or not. Thin objects like gears or things with lots of holes I would set at 0, most other things at 1, and water tight vessels at 2 or even 3. Also, infill solidity can be adjusted generally anything from .25 to .5 fill is good. Small things could work just as well at 1.0.

Raft

Under raft we’ve been setting the thickness/thickness settings to match our w/t value. YMMV. Also for posterity I like to set the temperatures here but I don’t think it actually does anything.

Speed

Under the Speed settings is where we set diamter/thickness to match our w/t setting, our feedrate in mm/s (somewhere around 30-36), and our flowrate PWM setting that should be no less than 240 and no more than 255. Our travel feedrate seems to function best at 32 mm/s regardless of material.

Carve

Here once again is our width/thickness setting and we will also need to setup the layer thickness. Layer thickness seems to work at .36 but that might change for PLA or baby elephant pink.

Inset

One last time for our w/t setting.

And now you should be done with setup and can save all the settings, generate gcode,  and start printing. Well not quite. Because things are retarded and I can’t figure out another way to set temperature we’ve had luck hitting the gcode tab after generation and modifying the temperature settings at the beginning of the file.

See that 220? Lately that seems to work for ABS at 210. Change the number, save the file, then you can hit the build button. Remember if its got a shiny or bubbly top when it finishes printing its probably too hot and you should drop the temp by a few degrees. PLA for us anyway seems to need to run cooler than the ABS or it becomes a syrupy mess.

GOOD LUCK!

Filed under: Skeinforge, Software

Software team

The software team will be responsible for all activities related to software generation and manipulation including, but not limited to the following: gaining a working knowledge of various 3D modeling programs including Sketchup, Blender, or others; providing demonstrations or links to tutorials for learning these 3D modeling applications; becoming verse in the various software utilities such as Skeinforge and Replicator G used in the fabrication process; while working with the mechanical and electronics teams to perform the necessary testing and calibration needed to generate the first test prints with the fabricator and demonstrating this process to the class.  Important infomration for this team can be had at the following links:

How to print something on the Makerbot Cupcake CNC

Design guidelines for Makerbots

Using Google Sketchup

Blender’s main page

Replicator G and Skeinforge page

Thingiverse tutorial archive

Filed under: Software