Tuesday, August 17, 2010
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About Me
- David Carr
- I'm a graduate student in Information Ecology at the MIT Media Lab interested in the creation of low cost machines that enable personal digital fabrication.
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This is wonderful! I've been wanting to build a Mantis machine, and I've been taking guesses at the parts, but this will make things much easier!
ReplyDeleteThank you!
THANKS!!
ReplyDeleteWill Packages of all the parts avaiable to be purchased?
-Alex
Yes! I'm looking for a complete kit too. Maybe you can find a store who can distribute these kits for you? Even with a part list it's very complicated for me to get all these parts (and would pay expensive shipping costs).
ReplyDeleteRegards from Germany
Schrotti
Yes, a kit containing the parts on the BoM would be nice. Like Schrotti i'm from Germany too.
ReplyDelete@Schrotti: we could share shipping costs when ordering.
best regards, Nick
@Nick & all other people in Germany:
ReplyDeleteYes, please contact me for a "Sammelbestellung" ;-)
Maybe we could use the service of "Borderlinx" to get all parts in USA and ship them in a complete packet via DHL to Germany.
Schrotti
fox_huxucs@kurzepost.de
(this email address is valid until 24. Sept. 2010)
Does anyone know where I can find the Eagle BRD files? Im dying to make one, but my school fab house REQUIRES the .brd files. Thank you again guys. :)
ReplyDeleteYes, I'd be interested in a Mantis kit in the Netherlands - especially the motor seems to be hard to get in Europe...
ReplyDeleteBTW, Schrotti's email has expired - is there any way to contact him?
Hey Guys.
ReplyDeleteBefore I build mine, may I confirm that there is no licensing required for Personal or Experimental use.
Minkie
Hey Guys
ReplyDeleteSince the Mantis 9 pages imply it is under the share alike license, I'm going to go ahead and start my build. That license says that you shoudl be attributed. My current plan for attribution is references from my build page and to cut your URL into the side plate.
If you would like other attributions, please advise. (17themink at gmail)
Minkie
Alas, most of the parts in the "Bill of Materials" are McMaster items - as McMaster won't ship internationally this makes it very difficult for anyone outside the US to replicate it.
ReplyDeleteBut there seems to continually a mention of a "kit" - yet I see no mention of how to buy/obtain said kit - any advice on that?
BTW - how come I need a profile to add this comment when I am already logged in to Make Your Bot? (and that is not an option in the profile list).
In response to the above comment - These videos are for the other guys working on the same project. This isn't a commercial kit that is sent out/bought, this is a kit they have put together and mailed to their friends.
ReplyDeleteThe Blog is not really intended for the general public.
On the other hand, if you are interested in designing and building a cartesian robot, the videos are useful (My Bot is frame complete and moves the X axis at the moment - it looks fairly similair to the Mantis 9)
Rather than trying to find a kit, you could use the videos as a source for inspiration to design and build your own mill.
It is fairly easy to find spec sheets for the various Mcmaster parts - so you can buy equivalent parts locally - Where are you from - i can help with Australian suppliers.
Other sources I found useful include http://buildyourcnc.com/default.aspx
http://www.cnczone.com/
http://www.hossmachine.info/cnc_conversion.html
http://www.stirlingsteele.com/millplans.html
rerap
Makerbot
@Anonymous:
ReplyDelete"i can help with Australian suppliers"
please do! The only parts I've been able to find locally are hugely expensive compared to the mcmaster options.
For Supplies -
ReplyDeleteI used my Local Bunnings for wood and lead screw (The Threaded rod is very cheap - although it has been hard drilling holes so that the motors drive it smoothly - I will probably re-think that connection so that it is more fault tolerant for my version 2 - Coging the motor rather than end mounting it will reduce the precision requirement). Minor Issue - the Threaded rod from Bunnings was imperial - I wanted wingnuts (as my leadscrews) - and could not find the right size for Metric in the store that day. One of these days we will all move into the 20th Century (100 years late).
For Stepper motors I used http://www.ausxmods.com.au/
They were fast and the specs were easy to find - You can probably save a couple of dollars if you keep hunting, but I was only after NEMA17s so it wasn't worth my time. (I may end up needing a NEMA34 for my tool head swapper, expensive enough to make me price compare)
For Stepper Drivers I went with Makerbot - they were very cheap - these have been the biggest problem for me so far. I don't know whether it is a documentation problem or my understanding of them - I'm sure there is nothing wrong with the product, but they have been my source for delays.
For Software I've been using Mach3 - They encourage you to build and test, get it working before you pay anything - This was a choice between rebuilding my spare box as linux and use EMC ( http://www.linuxcnc.org/ ) or leave it as is and use a windows product.
I had a couple of power supplies lying arround so they were effectively free (A friend disenbowels old PCs for Jewelry so she supplies me all the power supplies I need - she pays trash prices for boxes that don't work - When we have free time, we salvage the good stuff and normally make a fair bit of money onselling functional gear )
My End stops are press switches that that I had lying arround from a previous project ( a look on http://www.jaycar.com.au/ says they would be $10 for the three)
The Motors were $60, Stepper Drivers were $60, Hardware was $30 and Mach3 will be 175.
I'm still fault finding the stepper drivers so I have not successfully cut in 3D, there may be more expenses to come, but they will be due to my mistakes rather than actual expense.
My plan is to have the Stepper motors/endstops mounted into the hardware, but everything is in a seperate box - that I can plug into version 2 - So the Version2 expenses will be about $100 and I can build it using version1 - only a problem if I wanted to run them both at the same time.
If I were starting fresh with what I know now, I would probably buy an AuxMod 3Axis Kit it is a bit more expensive ($440) however having everything integrated vastly reduces the complications - Also The Stepper motors look like you could mount manual controls on the back of them - so you could use it as a manual mill if you are only cutting something simple. They also supply endstops et al.
Writing this all down, I now have a temptation to just buy one of those kits rather than keep using the rats nest that my electronics have become - yes they are sending the right impulses - but I expect things to work loose and fault finding the rats nest will be nightmarish. An integrated kit fixes that, it all depends how much my time is worth - Will paying an extra $300 save me more than a couple of days worth of stress? that way once Version2 is complete, I can retire Version1 into a box and treat it as "emergency backup Mill" -
On the up side, the one Axis that is currently working has backlash that is too small for my tools to detect and is smooth across its entire range - maybe the other Axis' won't be as good, but we shall see
Is that the sort of information you were after?
This sounds like an Ad for AusxMod - you could probably save money by shopping arround more, but I would be willing to pay more get get a more "integrated" solution - your mileage may vary - for a similair discussion see http://forums.reprap.org/read.php?107,32134,32134
Minkie
Thanks Minkie.
ReplyDeleteI take it you're using standard thread, rather than acme?
AusxMod bookmarked in case I give up on 'cheaper' options ;)
The link is awesome. I had no idea you could get stainless rod and expect it to be straight!
Yeah, - it was cheap so I figure for the first mill it will be fine - I'm currently handcrafting the Gcode so my rough axis (Y) only rarely changes direction - to minimize backlash effects. (Gcode to build the second mill
ReplyDeleteMinkie
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ReplyDelete