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SoliForum - 3D Printing Community → Solidoodle Discussion → Heating the printing environment idea...
Rechargeable hand warmer that run on batteries. How hot do you think they get, and would it keep the enclosed space hot enough to solve some of the issues of uneven cooling that we are all fighting?
Just a thought, I'm not sure how hot they get or if they would get the interior printing area any warmer than it is already, but it beats a hair dryer.
I think a regular heatsinked, wirewound resistor + a fan might be a better and cheaper solution. Unfortunately, it would need its own power supply.
I'm looking for the simplest solution to be honest, I'm not into hacking / modifying since I have such limited time, and what time I do have is spent printing at the moment.
Do you think the handwarmer would raise the temp inside or is it already hotter than the hand warmer gets?
I measured mine at ~48 degrees (case on door closed)
it's hotter than a hand warmer will get.
Ok that's what I suspected but thanks for the reading.
there are a few factors wee need to knwo 1st. is your unit enclosed in a case some arent' thats teh majr factor right there. Mine is suppsoed to coem with the enclosed space and i do have concerns witht he out gassing what i am considering in building a air recycler that will filter out the out gasses and combine that with a heatign unit so that cool air is not being sucked into the unit. so you have an out going hose to the air filter hose to a hair dryer and haridryer into the unit. the theory beign the hari dryer would suck the contaminated air out while blowing hot air into the space. raising the print areas temperature to a good level.
I have a case that I only use when necessary, but it's on the kitchen table so I'm not going to run a hair dryer for 3 hours while I'm printing. Just trying to come up with a quick fix.
Here is my case on Thingiverse - http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:34754
Not exactly a quick fix, but making your own case gives you the option to add a port. The heater I linked to is pretty quiet, and likely more efficient than a hair dryer. I can get the interior up to about 66C with that setup.
What about these, Edison screw ceramic infared bulbs? Need another power supply but I'm sure we all have an old lamp we don't use (aka that the wife wouldn't notice is missing for a while)
I used an infrared heat lamp trying to heat the interior of my Solidoodle 1 (pre heated bed). I ended up melting the top of the acrylic extruder. It's best not to directly heat any part of the printer, which is harder to avoid with a lamp. Even with my blower I made a makeshift hood out of Kapton to direct the airflow down to the bottom of the case so it wouldn't blow on the bed or Y carriage.
"pre-heated bed", now you're talking. Think of all the time you'd save. 
What do the professional FDM's do to control the environment?
Actually I meant before I had a heated bed, when I had to do whatever I could to keep ABS from warping. I resorted to covering the sides in foamcore so I could cut a hole to blow a heat gun into. My solution for the S2 is more effective and more efficient.
I don't know what the pro machines do, but I suspect the build area is basically a convection oven. In pictures I've seen of the Mojo, there is a kind of accordion-folding screen that separates the extruder and motors from the heated build area. As the hot end moves around, the screen stretches and folds in front and behind it.
Actually I meant before I had a heated bed, when I had to do whatever I could to keep ABS from warping.
I got it, I was making a joke. Would there be anything preventing the accordian on SD2? I guess I haven't seen your setup recently. Is it on the blog?
Assuming you could get the chamber to temp (going to insulate mine and go from there), would the motors even take 80 degrees? The X motor i've heard concerns with, but we are killing the effectiveness of the heatsink on the extruder.
60c seems to be good enough, higher than that will start to cause trouble for the Acrylic, and you want stay well clear of 100c where the ABS parts will start to soften.
My setup is at the Thingiverse link I listed above.
Assuming you could get the chamber to temp (going to insulate mine and go from there), would the motors even take 80 degrees? The X motor i've heard concerns with, but we are killing the effectiveness of the heatsink on the extruder.
They are rated for 50C ambient, max. The x-axis is driven beyond max current spec, so probably not a good idea to push it. I had an idea to use peliters on each motor to keep the motors cool, but dump more heat into the build environment. Haven't gotten around to it yet.
Elmoret, that's a pretty cool idea. (Ehm.)
The only problem I could see is that you'd probably get up to temperature quite quickly; at that point you then have a insulating peltier module on the motor. And, you'll add a bunch of moving weight because the hot side of the peltier will need a fan and/or a heatsink. For the latter reason, I think a peltier module heater system would only be suited for the Y and Z axis.
That said, I think 60C is quite conservative for a stepper motor. I see no reason why they couldn't do higher, unless the bearings were problematic at elevated temperature (Except for bearings, they have lamination that can do 200C, magnets good to 200C, and a hunk of metal. I suspect they can tolerate 80C fine).
One solution to increase the amount of heat the stepper motor can shed even when the build area is kept at a hotter temperature, is to attach a heatsink (compensating for the reduced temperature difference between the motor and the heat of the printer volume.)
The biggest problem is listed above.
Steppers are rated for 50 degree ambient temp as max.
The ambient temp is pretty much there.
I've said in a different thread that to get a proper heated build enclosure basically a new printer is needed.
With steppers outside the build area. (So something like core xy where the steppers don't need to move (so can be out side the box) and the z motor moved down to under the case. And filament supplied by a Bowden cable so that motor can also be outside the case.
Then we need to start making the carriage from metal parts only. So no plastic gets soft...
And now we don't have anything even resembling a solidoodle!!
(But with a lot less moving mass the printer should be a load faster!)
What about the concept of creating a barrier with accordian cardboard with alum foil on it. This could shield the upper portion from heat while keeping everything below the extruder tip heated. Ian said he thought that's what was done on the professional machines. It would need to be accordian in multiple directions though which could pose a problem. Some kind of flexible tarp like material with a cutout for the extruder assembly?
Just brainstorming, what would work along those lines?
Several layers of spandex would insulate pretty nicely. The issue is you need to have something that stretches 2 dimensionally, with stretch factor exceeding 5. That's kinda limiting.
Several layers of spandex would insulate pretty nicely. The issue is you need to have something that stretches 2 dimensionally, with stretch factor exceeding 5. That's kinda limiting.
I used to work with a woman who definitely got a stretch factor above 5 on her spandex, much to our dismay.
You'd also have to create a heat barrier for the z stepper.
Here is the top of the Mojo with the accordian fold for the Y axis. I can't see how they are covering the X.
If the nozzle rides between the X rods, then there could be a flexible barrier of some kind stretched below them, between the accordian screens with a slit down the middle. The nozzle would slide back and forth through the slit which would stay mostly closed the rest of the time.
This is probably well covered with patent, so there is no way Solidoodle could so something like that themselves. Apparently the whole idea of a temperature controlled print environment is patented. I wonder if they patented an uncontrolled (but still hot) one?
The technical name for that is bellows. I'm thinking we could do bellows that would flow air over the Y-axis motor that would hang from the Y-axis rods to the X-axis motor, then to the extruder. Put a 60mm fan on it pulling outside air in and bam, cooled motors. Z-axis is barely going to be worked, so it may be fine with nothing.
You can make bellows out of fabric that would work really well. Its a bit tricky making them this small I'm assuming. I'll find a link to show how to make good ones, they are widely used on Sherline style CNC mills.
All that being said, if someone can point me to a link to replacement steppers, I have no problem sending them up to high temps just to see what breaks.
Solidoodle sells them in the store for $19 each.
What fails will probably be the insulation. It is rated for 130C, IIRC. So, keep a fire extinguisher handy!
Ah the magical white smoke of electrical death. fun.
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