Author Topic: [DIY] 3D Printer Enclosure  (Read 3372 times)

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Offline sn4k3Topic starter

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[DIY] 3D Printer Enclosure
« on: July 24, 2018, 10:20:33 pm »
I come share my handmade enclosure made from bare wood. NO IKEA MOD  ;)
This is not much about electronics but may inspire some users

Handmade Enclosure for 3D Printer 60x60x60cm
24V 20A
12V 20A
5V 10A
Watt Meter
Filament dust filter
30W LED Light
Air Filter with fan speed control
Smoke Alarm
USB + RJ45 Patch
Independent Switch for each section
Plug cables for easy remove printer
Magnetic door
Cables: AWG16 and AWG14



Full Album: https://www.facebook.com/pg/PTRTECH/photos/?tab=album&album_id=428283400989172
« Last Edit: July 24, 2018, 10:33:46 pm by sn4k3 »
 

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Re: [DIY] 3D Printer Enclosure
« Reply #1 on: July 25, 2018, 03:32:47 am »
at least now i know i have a friend of the same interest  :-+... sorry for the slanted photo shoot due to the height of where the box is placed. the outer box dimension is approximately 50 x 55 x 55 cm made out of mdf painted with automotive grade paint to avoid water damage to the mdf. the door and side windows are 4mm acrylic sheet. fwiw...
Nature: Evolution and the Illusion of Randomness (Stephen L. Talbott): Its now indisputable that... organisms “expertise” contextualizes its genome, and its nonsense to say that these powers are under the control of the genome being contextualized - Barbara McClintock
 

Offline sn4k3Topic starter

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Re: [DIY] 3D Printer Enclosure
« Reply #2 on: July 25, 2018, 03:46:24 am »
Nice work, but i still think my is sexier ;D My is from Pinewood, without treatment, i may coat it latter with something.
Your printer remind me a skeleton  ;D It is one of first prusa prototypes?
I like to see handmade stuff, i think it add more value to our things and ourselves :)

How your perform with ABS prints?
« Last Edit: July 25, 2018, 03:50:25 am by sn4k3 »
 

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Re: [DIY] 3D Printer Enclosure
« Reply #3 on: July 25, 2018, 04:02:40 am »
of course yours is sexier because it exposes more! ;D if i was building it with real wood like yours, i dont think it will get a paint treatment, i cant to not do that otherwise water damage. yes its earlier prusa, and furthermore its a china clone. i've made many modifications and repairs since i bought it (including addition of the LCD, its originally controlled from USB PC only). i agree with you this thing its "print out" results are surely add more values to the surrounding or "the ecosystem". thats why it deserves a proper house. abs print is bad (curled plastic at the base everytime), with or without the enclosure. thats why i'm moving my stocks to pla 1.75mm, i still have stocks for abs, but thats it, i will only use them for temperature critical stuffs and when deformation to the dimension is not critical.
Nature: Evolution and the Illusion of Randomness (Stephen L. Talbott): Its now indisputable that... organisms “expertise” contextualizes its genome, and its nonsense to say that these powers are under the control of the genome being contextualized - Barbara McClintock
 

Offline sn4k3Topic starter

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Re: [DIY] 3D Printer Enclosure
« Reply #4 on: July 25, 2018, 04:46:48 am »
of course yours is sexier because it exposes more! ;D if i was building it with real wood like yours, i dont think it will get a paint treatment, i cant to not do that otherwise water damage. yes its earlier prusa, and furthermore its a china clone. i've made many modifications and repairs since i bought it (including addition of the LCD, its originally controlled from USB PC only). i agree with you this thing its "print out" results are surely add more values to the surrounding or "the ecosystem". thats why it deserves a proper house. abs print is bad (curled plastic at the base everytime), with or without the enclosure. thats why i'm moving my stocks to pla 1.75mm, i still have stocks for abs, but thats it, i will only use them for temperature critical stuffs and when deformation to the dimension is not critical.

Do you use a heatbed? Mine work outside the enclosure with 115ºc and 120ºc and i mainly print ABS
I currently have replaced all my prusa plastic parts, and reprint them. Now i have all parts from a MK3 siting on a box, i can give that away...

A user from other forum have done some questions, i'm sharing here the anwsers, may be usefull if anyone asks the same:


Quote
Have you considered lining the box with plasterboard for sound and fire proofing it?

No.

Quote
The airfilter case looks good, did you print it and can u share a link? Is it blowing out or in and do you have other air inlets?

It's made by me for a dual square combined filter, also the fan in use is different from photo, i'm using 24V 120mm Noctua 2000 RPM fan, but 3000RPM version may perform better for that filters, or even a agressive fan but noise will blow you up. Check attachment.
blowing out - Pull air off the enclosure. For inlets i have some small drill holes from cables and other small gaps. I do not have a selfmade inlet.
The filters in use are from my FumeExtractor project: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/183201678207

Quote
Do you have issues printing pla? In Portugal it must get hot in that box - hence the extruder motor cooler... I mounted a fan to the heatsink as without that it doesnt do much, but stillI have pla issues.

Not tested yet, but i guess no, i will print PLA with door open.
Also with fan you are pulling hot air from inside.
In Portugal at summer peak it can reach 40ºc ambient.
I have a cap on the extruder  8-)
Here the temperatures after 50minutes of ABS printing: Recv: ok T:240.1 /240.0 B:115.0 /115.0 T0:240.1 /240.0 @:52 B@:73 P:69.1 A:53.6 [Door closed and fan at max speed]
My internal temp sensor reports 36ºc
Outside: 22ºc
Raspi 3+: 67.7°C

After 1.30h: Recv: ok T:239.7 /240.0 B:115.0 /115.0 T0:239.7 /240.0 @:60 B@:54 P:67.2 A:54.4
37ºc internal sensor

Printing a 200mm tall vase to test how ABS behave, so far no delamination or warp



Quote from: OPK post_id=99643 time=1532488209 user_id=74399
How is the noise/vibration?
Thanks for the ideas!

Very good! Printer itself almost no noise, inside the enclosure is more damp than outside and i like the very low bassy sound that come from that. The only thing i can hear most is PSU fan and air fan, and i need to replace that PSU fan urgently!
My enclosure have big plastic feet from big speakers, so the feet also eliminate some vibrations


EDIT: the finished vase, looks perfect
« Last Edit: July 25, 2018, 04:51:07 am by sn4k3 »
 

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Re: [DIY] 3D Printer Enclosure
« Reply #5 on: July 25, 2018, 06:46:00 am »
no problem with object standing tall like that with small footprint, i mainly print something that lie flat on the heatbed wide (yes i have heatbed that can go to the recommended 120degC temp) the plastic touches the bed that warped, not the top. i read from Stratasys source iirc the deformation is due to the ambient temperature gradient experienced by the printed material during printing, ie you need surrounding temp of near plastic (glass transition) temp of the material to be printed nicely, thats why they went too far to enclose printing area even from printing head and gantries mechanism and then patented it so no OSHW can try to develop that technology, except end users like us. they call it heat chamber, its like oven in the box, air flow in or out is a big no no here imho. i cant do that since my pla roll resides in the chamber it will melt otherwise, along with other plastic parts and stepper motors will go hot like crazy. i even experienced stucked/blocked nozzle when i printed door fully closed, due to heat build up in the chamber, and pla material before going to nozzle went unstable (too fragile or liquid i guess) i need to partially open the door to stabilize temp and parts to print to the last line. maybe i will do that (the heat chamber) in another version later.

yes i think you have optimized print lamination there, i dont know but mine is not that optimum, not delamination, but uneven thickness sometime, maybe its the old firmware i'm using (Marlin) may i suggest, you dont want to plastic print any part near hot area like the nozzle and stepper motors, the part will deformed in no time. i have to handcraft printhead and stepper motors parts from mdf, plywood etc because they are more heat resistance and last until now. fwiw...

https://reprap.org/wiki/Heated_Build_Chamber
http://www.spiderbot.eu/en/blog/why-an-heated-chamber-at-90c.html

ps: sorry too many edit i hate the "last edit by dot dot dot" remark. :P
Nature: Evolution and the Illusion of Randomness (Stephen L. Talbott): Its now indisputable that... organisms “expertise” contextualizes its genome, and its nonsense to say that these powers are under the control of the genome being contextualized - Barbara McClintock
 

Offline sn4k3Topic starter

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Re: [DIY] 3D Printer Enclosure
« Reply #6 on: July 25, 2018, 02:26:54 pm »
no problem with object standing tall like that with small footprint, i mainly print something that lie flat on the heatbed wide (yes i have heatbed that can go to the recommended 120degC temp) the plastic touches the bed that warped, not the top. i read from Stratasys source iirc the deformation is due to the ambient temperature gradient experienced by the printed material during printing, ie you need surrounding temp of near plastic (glass transition) temp of the material to be printed nicely, thats why they went too far to enclose printing area even from printing head and gantries mechanism and then patented it so no OSHW can try to develop that technology, except end users like us. they call it heat chamber, its like oven in the box, air flow in or out is a big no no here imho. i cant do that since my pla roll resides in the chamber it will melt otherwise, along with other plastic parts and stepper motors will go hot like crazy. i even experienced stucked/blocked nozzle when i printed door fully closed, due to heat build up in the chamber, and pla material before going to nozzle went unstable (too fragile or liquid i guess) i need to partially open the door to stabilize temp and parts to print to the last line. maybe i will do that (the heat chamber) in another version later.

yes i think you have optimized print lamination there, i dont know but mine is not that optimum, not delamination, but uneven thickness sometime, maybe its the old firmware i'm using (Marlin) may i suggest, you dont want to plastic print any part near hot area like the nozzle and stepper motors, the part will deformed in no time. i have to handcraft printhead and stepper motors parts from mdf, plywood etc because they are more heat resistance and last until now. fwiw...

https://reprap.org/wiki/Heated_Build_Chamber
http://www.spiderbot.eu/en/blog/why-an-heated-chamber-at-90c.html

ps: sorry too many edit i hate the "last edit by dot dot dot" remark. :P

I know about that patent thing and the electronics can't be placed outside the enclosure, i hate that kind of stuff, someday air is patented too if not already  :-DD
I had buy a heat ventilator and a STC1000 to place on my wood box, but guess what, i put that somewhere out of my view and when making the holes on the wood i forget to add it :( My initial idea was place it on bottom left where USB+R45 patch are. It was a 400W heater but after some experiment i think i don't need it. If i preheat printer for 10m the air will be in the 30's ºc to a max of 40ºc. Maybe usefull on winter... And i can't put printer electronics outside without a heavy and dirty mod
To use a real heat chamber we need to place every electronic outside so we can reach good temps like 90ºc



What temperature are you reaching inside the box? I hear from other users they have problem with PLA too
To print that vase i use auto cooling with fan ON so ABS have time to cooldown before apply the new layer which is another win here with the enclosure, fan now blast the hot air from the enclosure.

My printer is the Original Prusa MK3, with some mods.
I use 0.6mm nozzle at 0.7mm extrusion width and sometimes 1.2mm extrusion to boost prints like enclosures. Printing at a max of 30mm/s^3 with volcano
Layer height is most of the time 0.45mm

Last serious ABS print before enclosure: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/183327112610
It warp just a little bit but still come good.
Stls if you ask: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2847365
« Last Edit: July 25, 2018, 02:37:55 pm by sn4k3 »
 

Offline sn4k3Topic starter

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Re: [DIY] 3D Printer Enclosure
« Reply #7 on: July 30, 2018, 01:32:09 am »
Update

Made a wide ABS print, the two parts on same print, big XY print area.
I have print the same object before enclosure with bed at 120ºc and using a plastic bag to cover the printer, still i got some severe warp (some mm's) on the corners

Before:


Now with enclosure i redo the print with Air fan OFF and bed at 115ºc.
Results are [At complete time, 2h]:
Recv: ok T:240.3 /0.0 B:115.0 /0.0 T0:240.3 /0.0 @:0 B@:0 P:73.3 A:58.6
Raspi: 72.0°C
Ambient Inside: 40ºc
Outisde: 27ºc

I'm very happy with the results, no warp, object come straight, no deformation on first layer, dimensions come correct.
I kept air filter fan OFF all the print (2h) to keep all temperature that i can inside, after print finish i turn that fan to max to purge the air and wait before open. I will have to buy a air sensor to monitor this for i know when i can open the door, a blast of hot abs air on my face is not pleasing.

Now:




So far the enclosure is a plus in everyway
« Last Edit: July 30, 2018, 01:35:06 am by sn4k3 »
 

Offline sn4k3Topic starter

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Re: [DIY] 3D Printer Enclosure
« Reply #8 on: August 14, 2018, 02:32:29 pm »
New update

I have buy a air quality monitor to test ABS fumes and extraction.

Room values for reference: +/- 0007 ug/m^3 PM2.5 and PM10

Still in first layer with few seconds the values fire up:



After i wait some minutes to see what max. value i can get:



Then i turn on the Fan at max speed while still printing and the air purge very fast (+/- 2 minutes)



After turn off Fan the values fire up again.

Another win with the enclosure, it's doing it purpose :)
 


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