[Fab] Fwd: Morning Update on Heating Makerbot

[miloh]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: miloh <miloh at froggytoad.net>
Date: Sat, May 7, 2011 at 10:08 AM
Subject: Re: Morning Update on Heating Makerbot
To: fab at listst.noisebridge.net


I just received lots of questions in an email about the Cupcake CNC's
at Noisebridge.

Instead of responding to each Item I'm going to give an overview of
the cupcake cnc and  troubleshooting, bcc the sender, and send it to
fab at lists.noisebridge.net.  I hope we can have a group dialogue and
get more people to find good uses for these machines.

to the bcc'd:
subscribe to fab at lists.noisebridge.net at
https://www.noisebridge.net/mailman/listinfo/fab
and of course there is the long scroll:
https://www.noisebridge.net/wiki/Makerbot


OVERVIEW:
The cupcake CNC has a wooden chassis, some XYZ motor parts, heating
parts that include a extruder motor, and the board electronics.

The board electronics consists of 6 boards, last time I checked:  The
six boards are mainboard, extruder controller, X stepper driver, Y
stepper driver, Z stepper driver, and the relay board.

Problems with the 'bot can be troubleshot by knowing what these parts
are commonly called, and being able to describe what they do.

ASSESSMENT:
IF you can simply define your problem, then you can troubleshoot it.
At the moment, Noisebridge has all the tools, electronics repair and
test equipment  to do this in house (we have DMMs!).

>From the original email it sounds like the heated build platform (HBP)
and the hot end (or extruder) on NutJob the cupcakeCNC aren't heating
up, in addition, the build platform lights are lighting up.

TEST:
They are both controlled by the extruder controller board.  Reset the
extruder controller by simply unplugging and replugging the RJ45
connector between the extruder controller board and the mainboard.
Next, check that the board shows up when you connect the FTDI cable
(between your computer USB and the 6 pin header on the mainboard) and
open ReplicatorG.  The mainboard and the hot end should report in the
status display at the bottom of the RepG main window.  Are they both
reporting?

Those are the first troubleshooting steps to take and some questions
to answer. If the problem is persistent, let's continue to discuss in
email  threads fab at lists.noisebridge.net to find a solution.  I am
pondering the chance that the mainboard, and possibly the extruder
controller could use a fw (firmware) reflash.


As more people start using the bots, we are going to have to level up
and refine the training dialogue, so it will be useful for us to have
more records to point to, as well having the larger group.


-rma