RMax v2 Build in NC

[lbarger]

Got my kit yesterday. Inventoried the parts. Thought I was missing the Upper Tower Mounts, but turns out they changed the design and I simply did not recognize them for what they were! While I was planning on taking the forum's advice and initially build it stock, there were a number of 'upgrades' that would be so much easier to do from the beginning.

My first modification, if you call it that, is to give the melanine coated parts a spiffy two color paint job. The horizontally oriented boards are now sport glossy blue edges and the vertical boards have bright green edges. Those happen to be my company's colors. Unfortunately, I did not pay close enough attention to the paint can labels. While the primer and the green paint were fast drying, the blue is not. According to the label, it is good for a second coat after 2-4 hours, okay to handle in 5-9 hours and fully dry after 24 hours! Hurry up and wait! Painted this morning and parts are still tacky. I don't dare assemble before its fully dry as I may want to break the printer down (for mods) at some point in the future. Well, at least it gives me time to start a thread on my build.

Second mod was to get a beefier power supply. Originally purchased a 550W supply. Decided to return it yesterday and up it to 750W. While I may want to add multiple extruders at some point, I don't really think I will need all the 750W. The reason I swapped out was to get one with modular cables. I only need to add the lines I need. Should help keep the wiring looking relatively neat.

I also purchased extensions for the PCI-e and motherboard lines for my third mod. They may be redundant given that I ended up with a modular supply, but I can cut wires on these inexpensive extensions instead of the PSU. Should the PSU be dead or die in the future I will only have to unplug and unbolt the unit and put a new one in. Since the power supply remains unaltered, I don't void its 3 year warranty!

The forth mod is the vibration dampers. Guess I will not be playing music on my Rostock. With the plan location for the printer just 6 ft behind my desk, I would probably have gone crazy trying to work while printing. Also note the printer will be behind me. Delta are so cool to watch. If it were where I could see it, I'd likely end up watching it all day instead of working on my next design project.

All these mods are already incorporated in what little I have been able to assemble. Just waiting for the bottom and top of the base to dry so I can continue assembly. Perhaps I will start working on the Onyx wiring....

Future mods... I will probably end up with another hot end, maybe even the Kraken, if I can justify it. Will also be looking for an excuse to get carbonfiber arms. Given the light level in my office, and my 50 year old eyes, I will probably be slapping on some LEDs on the tower or hot end platform in the near future. I'm hoping to get this build done in the next couple of days (I have the time block off) so that I can help with automatic nozzle wiper project that is being discussed in another thread.

I am really looking forward to going through this build process and being able to print my own parts. Just kicking myself for not getting fast drying paint! (twiddle thumbs... Oh! Onyx - meet my soldering station!)

[Kanthus]

I have ordered mine and am currently waiting delivery. Any updates on problems or success's would be greatly appreciated.

[lbarger]

I have ordered mine and am currently waiting delivery. Any updates on problems or success's would be greatly appreciated.

Knowing that I will likely want to try different hotends (or multiple hotends) in the future, I opted to go for the connectors recommended in the assembly guide. However, I apparently managed to double order the female sockets and omitted the pins. I am hoping the pins will get here tomorrow. Making the connections to the hotend and extruder motors are the only assembly items left. Since calibration needs to take place at temperature, I have not been able to do that yet, but soon.

As far as things to watch out for. Given the smell of the laser cut melanine sheets you will want to paint the edges. Make sure you read the labels of the spray can to make sure it is quick drying paint. My build was delayed a full day as the blue paint I chose required 24 hours to fully dry!

I also thought that I was missing the 6 upper tower supports. Had I looked just one page further in the guide, I would have seen the proper shaped parts. They changed enough to be unrecognizable for a newbie. The sheet layouts were also different than shown in the guide. I panicked and thought somehow they managed to omit these pieces. My mistake.

There are are some apparently common upgrades that are likely worth doing up front depending on your budget. Priming and painting the sheets is fairly cheap and easy. I also upgraded the power supply to a 750W supply with modular cabling. Only installed the cabling that was needed to keep the rat nest effect down. TigerDirect has the one I bought last week on sale now for $40, it was an Ultra brand. I also opted to get extension cables for the 24 pin motherboard connector and the two eIDE connectors. (Intrex computers has good prices.) This gave me access to the various wires without having to cut the connectors. With a three year warranty on the power supply it was worth a few bucks to not invalidate the warranty. The last mod (for now) was getting the NEMA 17 vibration dampers. Seems to make the printer rather quiet. Replacing any of these things after the build would not be impossible, just more of a pain.

Other than that, follow the guide and it should go fairly smoothly. Took me a little longer than I had hoped, but probably still withing the expected 20 or so hours. I just wished I had taken more pictures through the build process.

[lbarger]

What's the difference between a "Post Reply" and "Quick Reply" I thought I did a quick reply, but don't see it posted.

Anyway, what I tried to say a few minutes ago was my previous post was very much stream of conscientiousness. Sorry for being a bit rambling and/or terse in any area. I was on my way out the door and wanted to get a quick response out there.

Basically, the only issues I had with my build were self inflicted with one possible exception that I will get to in a bit. Not getting fast drying paint delayed my start. Having the upper tower mounts look significantly different than those first shown in the manual through me for a loop, especially given the discription of the melanine sheets where different (two large and two medium sized instead of three large and one small). Had I taken the time to look one or two pages further in the manual I would have save myself another delay and embarrassing call to tech support. I also clicked the wrong line item when ordering pins, sockets and housing to do quick disconnects on the hot end and extruder. (I'm still waiting for the correct pins to arrive.)

The one issue previously not mentioned was the trouble I had initially connecting to the printer from my PC and downloading the firmware. It took several attempts to make a connection and once I did, I could clear the eeprom, but could not upload the firmware. I decided to try using my wife's laptop and had no issue, but I did do one thing different. Per instruction I installed the Rambo USB driver first. When it was time to install the Arduino IDE, I unselected the box for installing the Arduino USB driver. (At best it should be redundant and at worst it would conflict with the already loaded Rambo driver.) Her laptop was flawless in connecting and uploading. I can not say if it was because I skipped the second USB driver installation or if there is something going on with my older computer, but that it would be worth noting for those interested.

I'll hopefully post a couple of pictures in the next day or two. Seems silly to do so now with two connections (and printed fan mounts) short of being complete. I wished I had taken the time to take more pictures during the build process. (I did not want to show how messy the kitchen table got during the process!