Wednesday 25 April 2012

Springs Springs Springs.. then things went wrong...

Seeing as thou my extruder was lacking in the grip department i had planned to get the mill up and running so i can make a hyena style drive bolt. but being struck down with some food poisoning of some sort, i was stuck at home unable to play with my mill at my mates workshop, i started to clean up the work room and found some springs, these were smaller in diameter and a bit longer than the ones that i have in the extruder and this got me thinking will these fit??

I pulled the cold end of my extruder off the printer, this was a pain, i took out the cam shaft and drive shaft to remove the springs then sized up these new springs for fit, but they were about 5mm too long.

then playing around between donations to the porcelain gods i noticed that these two springs would just screw inside one another, so i tried to jam this combination into the extruder but it would not fit until i got out the big side cutters and lopped off 5mm from the ends, this allowed the springs to fit in just enough that with a G clamp i managed to get all three pairs compressed enough to  install the camshaft, its a tight squeeze very little space to move the camshaft into place once, the original springs were just short of fully compressed, there was no way the longer ones with more turns was ever going to fit without being cut down. and the way they are inside the other this keeps them all spaced correctly.

the bigger springs are from a packet labeled C-624 the inside springs are labeled C-614  they have 1mm wire thickness and now are 28mm long when not compressed. this new double spring combination seems to have enough grip on the plastic..i would be able to say for certain but would you believe it, i had a Mosfet die on me for some reason it became short. then i replaced that. then my arduino crapped pants and no longer talks to the usb bus :( !Not Happy Jan!
so i have not been able to fully test this out yet but i am pretty sure it will work.. I have ordered a new Mega off ebay buy it now for $32 delivered in 7 days if i am lucky. i also ordered 2 new atmega 2560 chips and 2 atmega8u2 chips all from different suppliers and they are all going to take 5-7 days to arrive at best :( really not happy i want to print now......

While i wait i guess i will get to finish off the milling machine,  not too much to go on there for a basic CNC setup. need to add lcd and touchscreen. then work out the accessories pcb that interfaces the air compressor coolant pump and endstops and servos for speed control etc.. then it will be time to build the tool changer.. i have just about completed the dividing head just have to cut a worm drive and that will be ready.  but i want to print :( damn it...

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