Extruder assembled... more testing!

I got the extruder fully assembled, attaching the hot-end to the cold and clamping it all to a static location. I then connected the extruder motor and hot-end to the Gen6 electronics and launched RepSnapper. I knew from hand feeding 3mm PLA filament through the hot-end that it would melt it fine, and from my temperature testing I now knew it could sustain temperatures on the hot-end and not get hot up along the feeder tube once the little 25mm fan was on. It was still interesting to see what might happen once I asked RepSnapper to "Run Extruder"!...

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New heater block... new tests!

I made a new heater block. During the previous experments I concluded that my heat block was probably too large and impacting on 'time to target temperature'. I cut the new heater block from some aluminium square bar, working to dimensions from a more established design, and  managed to successfully transplanted the thermistor and resistor from the old block.?As others have pointed out, it's easily made, if you drill the...

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Extruder heater with stainless steel tube...

I wanted to quickly test Nophead's comment in the previous post, that a stainless steel feeder tube to the heater might result in less heat conductivity away from the heater block, allowing the block to more easily reach a desired target temperature. This, as he suggests might be more successful due to stainless steel being a poorer conductor of heat than aluminium.To test I took a 6mm stainless 'bolt'. It's actually another leftover element...

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Extruder / heater testing...the less scientific way!

Over the past few evenings I've been 'playing with' my newly assembled extruder. I've read many other blogs and studied the RepRap.org wiki, searching for extruder related posts, but there's been no substitute for trying things out myself! I suppose I could have bought more of the components and availed of the collective knowledge gathered by many, and probably been printing away by now, but for me it's also somewhat about the journey!So......

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Connecting up the heater to Generation 6 electronics...

When connecting up the heater and thermistor to the Gen6 board be aware of the following... the pin-outs printed for your convenient reference right there on the board are a) technically correct, BUT b) visually misleading at the very least! If you've already wired up your heater/thermistor you'll probably know the trap I fell into. If you haven't, and plan to using this rev or the Gen6 board, you'll get to it and then say "oh... I know...

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Extruder 'hot-end'...

I've been trying to come up with an extruder 'hot-end' design that doesn't use the expensive PEEK material that is in common use in other designs. My initial thoughts have been to use a salvaged heat-sink, clamping the feed shaft from the hot-end heater, and using a small fan to cool the heat-sink. My experiments over the last few evenings have caused me to question this approach, based on challenges I've encountered during my tests. I think I'll...

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Extruder "cold-end"...

Here are some photos of my Extruder 'cold-end'. The motor wasn't yet secured in this shot but is now bolted to the base.The cogs are salvaged from an old photocopier. I realise the smaller cog has typically less teeth in other designs but we'll see how this one goes! The stepper motor is from an old 5.25" floppy drive!The bearing recesses were achieved by clamping the two 15mm blocks together and drilling a hole 22mm diameter with a flat wood bit...

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The Extruder...

I've been building my extruder for the last while. My design is mostly based on Wade's Geared Extruder, found on the RepRap.org site, but determined to remain true to my material choice I've scratch-build my extruder from mainly 15mm oak and what ever other components I could scavenge from old computer/office equipment parts and electronic boards. Here's a picture of my newly assembled extruder, without the hot-end attached.Here's...

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