Assembling a new batch of ToMs, MK6 Plus and RepG 25
Assembling a new batch of ToMs, MK6 Plus and RepG 25
by PedroR
Fri Jul 08, 2011 5:38 pm
Hi all
We've been assembling a new batch of ToMs for customers who Order their Thing o Matics pre-assembled.
The nice thing about Assembling ToMs from time to time is that you get in touch with the latest developments and improvements that Makerbot is continuously doing to their products.
This time the machines we assembled came with the MK6 Plus Heater. This Kit is now standard on all Thing o Matics and it consists of a new Thermal core and a Heating Cartridge to heat the Nozzle/melt the plastic for extrusion.
This is a twofold improvement over the previous method of heating (using Resistors):
1- The assembly time and complexity of the extruder is significantly reduced (which was by far the part that took the longest to assemble).
Using this new part the assembly time gets reduced by 1-2 hours at least.
2- When in operation the Aluminum Thermal core + Heating cartridge means the Extruder heats up much faster and cools down faster as well.
Thing-o-Matic with MK6 Plus by RoboSavvy, on Flickr
MK6 Plus Heater Safety Cut off switch by RoboSavvy, on Flickr
The safety cut-off switch is designed to protect the machine from any overheating of or around the Extruder. The Cut off switch works independently of the Motherboard and offers an additional layer of safety.
If any overheating is detected, the relay switch immediately cuts power to the heating cartridge and a signal is sent to the Makerbot Motherboard through a cable that connects to one of the End stop plugs.
Another area where small but important improvements were made is the new ReplicartorG 25.
There are 3 new features which we really liked:
- There is now a new Wizard for Homing your machine (i.e. setting the maximum range of motion on all axis) where you basically manually place/move the extruder to be top of the platform and center the platform with the nozzle. Once you do that click OK and the Wizard will take the "measurements" itself and save them automatically (no more need to manually edit start.gcode).
- The Homing settings seem to be recorded on the Thing o Matic motherboard now instead of start.gcode on your computer.
This is another important improvement (and to be honest one that was long overdue).
This makes things a lot easier if you run multiple ToMs, have multiple computers that you use to generate Gcode or print from SD frequently.
- Finally, one other great feature is the new Print-o-Matic
Print-o-Matic in RepG25 by RoboSavvy, on Flickr
This is a simple Wizard where you enter Layer Height, Nozzle Width, Filament Thickness and Fill factor. RepG automatically optimizes all of the settings for the best print quality.
This is one of those things that really make our lives easier. We've been using "Profile Maker" for a long time now (which saved us from printing calibration cubes over and over again!). Now with the new Print o Matic feature built into RepG things have just become even better.
We were surprised to find out the "Print-o-Matic" wizard is even capable of warning you about non-optimal settings:
We tried layer thickness of .36 with a 0.4mm Nozzle and were immediately warned the setting was suboptimal: that layer thickness was too large for this Nozzle width.
This sums up the news about our latest mission assembling Makerbot Thing o Matics.
ReplicatorG 25 is available for download (for free) to any owner of a Thing o Matic or Cupcake.
A full list of changes on v25 is available on the Makerbot Blog
As for the MK6 Plus Heater Upgrade (Cartridge Heater + Aluminum Thermal Core) you get grab it from our online store.
Regards
Pedro.
We've been assembling a new batch of ToMs for customers who Order their Thing o Matics pre-assembled.
The nice thing about Assembling ToMs from time to time is that you get in touch with the latest developments and improvements that Makerbot is continuously doing to their products.
This time the machines we assembled came with the MK6 Plus Heater. This Kit is now standard on all Thing o Matics and it consists of a new Thermal core and a Heating Cartridge to heat the Nozzle/melt the plastic for extrusion.
This is a twofold improvement over the previous method of heating (using Resistors):
1- The assembly time and complexity of the extruder is significantly reduced (which was by far the part that took the longest to assemble).
Using this new part the assembly time gets reduced by 1-2 hours at least.
2- When in operation the Aluminum Thermal core + Heating cartridge means the Extruder heats up much faster and cools down faster as well.
Thing-o-Matic with MK6 Plus by RoboSavvy, on Flickr
MK6 Plus Heater Safety Cut off switch by RoboSavvy, on Flickr
The safety cut-off switch is designed to protect the machine from any overheating of or around the Extruder. The Cut off switch works independently of the Motherboard and offers an additional layer of safety.
If any overheating is detected, the relay switch immediately cuts power to the heating cartridge and a signal is sent to the Makerbot Motherboard through a cable that connects to one of the End stop plugs.
Another area where small but important improvements were made is the new ReplicartorG 25.
There are 3 new features which we really liked:
- There is now a new Wizard for Homing your machine (i.e. setting the maximum range of motion on all axis) where you basically manually place/move the extruder to be top of the platform and center the platform with the nozzle. Once you do that click OK and the Wizard will take the "measurements" itself and save them automatically (no more need to manually edit start.gcode).
- The Homing settings seem to be recorded on the Thing o Matic motherboard now instead of start.gcode on your computer.
This is another important improvement (and to be honest one that was long overdue).
This makes things a lot easier if you run multiple ToMs, have multiple computers that you use to generate Gcode or print from SD frequently.
- Finally, one other great feature is the new Print-o-Matic
Print-o-Matic in RepG25 by RoboSavvy, on Flickr
This is a simple Wizard where you enter Layer Height, Nozzle Width, Filament Thickness and Fill factor. RepG automatically optimizes all of the settings for the best print quality.
This is one of those things that really make our lives easier. We've been using "Profile Maker" for a long time now (which saved us from printing calibration cubes over and over again!). Now with the new Print o Matic feature built into RepG things have just become even better.
We were surprised to find out the "Print-o-Matic" wizard is even capable of warning you about non-optimal settings:
We tried layer thickness of .36 with a 0.4mm Nozzle and were immediately warned the setting was suboptimal: that layer thickness was too large for this Nozzle width.
This sums up the news about our latest mission assembling Makerbot Thing o Matics.
ReplicatorG 25 is available for download (for free) to any owner of a Thing o Matic or Cupcake.
A full list of changes on v25 is available on the Makerbot Blog
As for the MK6 Plus Heater Upgrade (Cartridge Heater + Aluminum Thermal Core) you get grab it from our online store.
Regards
Pedro.
