Well, now that my printer seems to be getting dialed in, and is printing reliably, I want to convert it to direct drive. I found a printable mount on Thingiverse that let me move the extruder from the vertical support to the hotend mounting plate. There are several aspects of the mount that I would've done differently, and might yet do, but it works, so there's that.
I also discovered that the data cable that connects to the extruder stepper motor was too short to reach it in its new location. Oops! I looked online for extender cables. There a few available, but not many, and they're ridiculously expensive, like $18 for one 18" cable. That's just price gouging. So, I found some spare 6-wire cable in my stockpile. I only needed 4 of the wires so I just peeled off the extra 2. I then got out the old soldering iron, plus small heat shrink tubing and spliced about 20" of it into the middle of the existing cable. That way I didn't have to deal with fitting new connectors.
Despite triple-checking the wiring to make sure I wasn't accidentally cross-wiring any of the 4 wires, I managed to cross-wire 2 of them anyway. I put it down to my declining eyesight. From having between 20/5 and 20/10 eyesight most of my life, I'm down to something like 20/27, with cataracts starting to form. I will definitely need surgery in the not-to-distant future.
Anyway, I left it late last night and tackled it again this morning. I did a continuity check with my DVOM and found the cross-wiring. A few minutes of desoldering and resoldering had the problem sorted.
That leaves the spool holder to sort out. The normal side mounting position is certainly not ideal for feeding a direct drive setup, and mounting the existing holder to the top of the rail the holds the Y axis motor is not possible because it's too low, which can lead to the hotend mounting running into the spool. I found a spool holder extension on Thingiverse that will lift the spool up high enough to clear the X axis altogether. The kit also includes a spool insert that's supposed to make the spool rotate easier. I'm currently printing both pieces.
I'll post some photos when I have the new pieces installed. Now, have to go to Amazon and order some T nuts and bolts.
I also discovered that the data cable that connects to the extruder stepper motor was too short to reach it in its new location. Oops! I looked online for extender cables. There a few available, but not many, and they're ridiculously expensive, like $18 for one 18" cable. That's just price gouging. So, I found some spare 6-wire cable in my stockpile. I only needed 4 of the wires so I just peeled off the extra 2. I then got out the old soldering iron, plus small heat shrink tubing and spliced about 20" of it into the middle of the existing cable. That way I didn't have to deal with fitting new connectors.
Despite triple-checking the wiring to make sure I wasn't accidentally cross-wiring any of the 4 wires, I managed to cross-wire 2 of them anyway. I put it down to my declining eyesight. From having between 20/5 and 20/10 eyesight most of my life, I'm down to something like 20/27, with cataracts starting to form. I will definitely need surgery in the not-to-distant future.
Anyway, I left it late last night and tackled it again this morning. I did a continuity check with my DVOM and found the cross-wiring. A few minutes of desoldering and resoldering had the problem sorted.
That leaves the spool holder to sort out. The normal side mounting position is certainly not ideal for feeding a direct drive setup, and mounting the existing holder to the top of the rail the holds the Y axis motor is not possible because it's too low, which can lead to the hotend mounting running into the spool. I found a spool holder extension on Thingiverse that will lift the spool up high enough to clear the X axis altogether. The kit also includes a spool insert that's supposed to make the spool rotate easier. I'm currently printing both pieces.
I'll post some photos when I have the new pieces installed. Now, have to go to Amazon and order some T nuts and bolts.
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