Arduino Printer Part 2

Please see part one here. 

Now that I got my new K'nex in, I've been able to expand the full printing size of the printer. I've also replaced the wire with rubber bands and hot glue that have been very crudely assembled. Hopefully I can find a better alternative to this method. (Or maybe I won't because I'm lazy ha) I purchased a power supply to power the motors since the Arduino itself is not strong enough to do it, however I used it in another project and it broke so I'm getting a new power supply shipped now. I started doing the coding but can't test without it so for now the project is on hold. 

Here is the first line I "printed." ...Something about one small step for man...

K'Nex arrived!

For 20 bucks I got enough supplies to last me for many Arduino projects. 

Broken Variable Resistor

had a broken variable resistor among a bunch of them and I couldn't remember which one it was. I could have just set up a very basic circuit and tested each one but that'd be too easy. Instead I set up three variable resistors to an RGB LED to control all of the potential colors of light it could produce. Also, I found the broken variable resistor.

Arduino Printer

This is my newest project that I just started. I've finally gotten to the point where I think I know the coding well enough that I decided the more challenging task for this project was designing the K'Nex system to support it all. I setup what you can see in the pictures below. 

The first picture shows my first mock up design of the system. A pen goes vertically into the green block which can slide along the two parallel red rods in the x-direction. Those rods are then connected to another pair of parallel rods which can move in the y-direction. The pen will be continuously connected to the paper. I may in the future add the ability for the pen to raise and lower, but for now we'll stay at this. The combined x and y motions will allow for "printing".

The second picture shows an updated version of the first picture with consideration for how the motors would be positioned. There are two motors, one positioned at each green disk. The yellow wire which runs from each green disk to each gray wheel will control motion in each direction. 

From here, I have to make some redesigns to how the pen mount and the green wheels and then I will have to find a piece of wood to mount everything to. From there, the coding will begin!

The Messy Work Station

I've wanted an "action shot" of my work space for awhile. Here it is.

Progression of a Design

Some time ago, I posted about my successful coding and wiring of the control system followed by the case I planned to put it into. After almost 3 hours I've just about finished converting all the wiring from a messy ball to an almost completed wired system ready to be screwed into its casing. I'm happy with my success for the night but dam did that take forever.

Converted the temperature sensors to clip ins or whatever these are called so I don't have to yank them out of the breakboard and they can be nicely attached to the wall of the case I'm making. 

So many less wires. 

Senior Design Control System

Yesterday I 3D printed the two halves of the case that will house the components for the control system I am designing. Managed to print the wrong version of one of the halves and had to reprint it, wasting almost an hour of time. I popped in the components to see how they fit. I'll have to enlarge some of the holes for the Arduino ports since it's a tight fit. Next step, which I can't say I'm looking forward to is all the wiring and soldering that will come from converting everything seen here into the little box shown below. A quick note, I didn't tolerance the holes for the ports correctly so that's why the side looks crappy. I also printed a really thin shell so that the print time was faster. Will make it nicer once I print the final model.