Tag Archives: edge

I actually felt sorry for that bastard

Posted on by

Edit: Jeff – Just in case you read this – I do not really think you are a bastard.  I follow your blog and am very appreciative of your in depth posts and analysis on all things MakerBot/RepRap.  The title is more about me feeling like a sucker than a commentary about you.

Jeff posted about totally abandoning his dreams of building a RepRap Mendel.  He said what pushed him over the edge was the constant question, “So, what are you going to build with it?”  Of course, the guy had to post this on 4/1.

I actually felt sad at the thought of him turning his parts into a “melted sculpture of failure.”

I suppose it’s not his fault.  I traded my MakerBot for some magic beans yesterday.

Pulley troubles

Posted on by

My MakerBot (Batch 9) uses printed pulleys.  I had attached them to my MakerBot with the bolt going down into the body with a nut underneath.  As far as I can tell, there’s only two ways to attach the printed pulleys to a ‘bot:

  1. Bolt going down into the ‘bot, nut underneath and inside, pulley with the tapered edge on the top.
  2. Bolt going up from underneath and inside the ‘bot, nut on top, pulley with the tapered edge on the bottom.
Printed pulleys, tapered end down

Printed pulleys, tapered end down

The problem with this orientation is that the pulley can slip down on the bolt.  When this happens it’s very easy for the belt to gradually ride up the tapered edge and then right off the pulley.  This ended up killing one of my test prints as the Z-stage started to descend to start the print.  Because of the way the “tapered end up” orientation of the pulley rides on the belt, I don’t think sanding away the taper would totally remove the problem.