Auto Calibration Requierments

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altarke
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Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by altarke »

Hi to all,

I have the ROSTOCK V1 and I am happy with it. I am considering the use of a height probe for auto calibration of the plate height (not the delta calibration procedure).

Does any one know what is needed:
  • In term of hardware
    Firmware to work with the RAMBo controller
Basically, I want to build the height probe and need to know what I need to get the whole thing working.

Thanks
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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by Polygonhell »

If you can do Z calibration, you can do some approximation of delta calibration, it's just sampling Z at multiple X/Y positions.

The simplest one is just a microswitch with some probe that can be moved out of the way when printing. You wire it to one of the unused end stop pins and set the appropriate pin in the Firmware. Most mini Kossel's used to use this system.
Since the probe is some distance below the nozzle, you'll have to workout what the offset from the probe to the nozzle is.
There are also optical probes that don't require a way to move them out of the way, but they still have some horizontal offset, though that only matters for delta calibration.
More complex is using FSR's, where the nozzle itself is used as the probe, usually you get a little uController board, wire the FSR's to the analog inputs, and it behaves like a switch to the Rambo.
I've also seen people mount micro switches in the hotend mount, so they get the simplicity of the first method, an still use the hotend itself as the probe.
And there is also using conductive materials under the bed, with Hall effect sensors.
Or just using a metal plate on the bed and closing a circuit with the nozzle .

Using the hotend as a probe is ideal, but it's not without gotchas, you have to ensure the hotend if clear of plastic when it's probing.
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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by U.S. Water Rockets »

I'm thinking of adding hardware to my V2 for bed leveling and calibration. I've been looking at mhackney's recommendation for adding FSR's recently, and I think that's the direction I am leaning based on performance and ease of modding (I like not having to add extra wiring up the extrusions to the upper deck of the V2).

I understand that a new marlin firmware is needed to activate the FSR "endstop" Rambo input. But I have not dug really far into this. Is this just adding something to my existing V2 firmware, or is this a completely different firmware that I need to get? I'm currently running the latest downloaded from SeeMeCNC.

My second question is, what next? If the firmware knows how to read the FSR "endstop", how do I get from there to automated bed leveling? Is the leveling done with a GCODE script, or is there additional software to build for that function?

I've seen discussions of several different types/versions of automatic leveling, calibration, mesh leveling, etc. What's the consensus of the best to use with a V2?

Any feedback would be appreciated!
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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by Mac The Knife »

U.S. Water Rockets wrote:I'm thinking of adding hardware to my V2 for bed leveling and calibration. I've been looking at mhackney's recommendation for adding FSR's recently, and I think that's the direction I am leaning based on performance and ease of modding (I like not having to add extra wiring up the extrusions to the upper deck of the V2).

I understand that a new marlin firmware is needed to activate the FSR "endstop" Rambo input. But I have not dug really far into this. Is this just adding something to my existing V2 firmware, or is this a completely different firmware that I need to get? I'm currently running the latest downloaded from SeeMeCNC.

My second question is, what next? If the firmware knows how to read the FSR "endstop", how do I get from there to automated bed leveling? Is the leveling done with a GCODE script, or is there additional software to build for that function?

I've seen discussions of several different types/versions of automatic leveling, calibration, mesh leveling, etc. What's the consensus of the best to use with a V2?

Any feedback would be appreciated!
http://forum.seemecnc.com/viewtopic.php ... &hilit=fsr
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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by mhackney »

My advise: don't waste your time with Marlin auto leveling. I spent a loooonnng time trying to get it to work without success. Not worth the pain. There are reports of folks who claim they use it but at the end of the day, I couldn't. The one branch that Johann used actually DID NOT use the FSRs as an endstop, they interfaced to a thermistor input. That was a complete mess.

You won't find much help for Marlin here and basically none for auto leveling with Marlin. Save your time and money. Buy a Duet and run RepRapFirmware. They you will have the best auto leveling available to date without a lot of pain and agony.

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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by Qdeathstar »

mhackney, do you think the FSRs are better than DC's IR module?
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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by mhackney »

I have 24 hrs of experience (literally just installed it yesterday) with the IR module and 1000s of hrs with FSRs so I am not qualified to comment yet. That said, every solution is a tradeoff. I like the concept of touchless probing but having the probe position offset from the nozzle tip is not ideal.

My Rostock is set with both FSRs and the IR probe so I can switch back and forth and do head-to-head comparisons. Stay tuned.

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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by Qdeathstar »

Excellent. I look forward to your results.
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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by U.S. Water Rockets »

mhackney wrote:I have 24 hrs of experience (literally just installed it yesterday) with the IR module and 1000s of hrs with FSRs so I am not qualified to comment yet. That said, every solution is a tradeoff. I like the concept of touchless probing but having the probe position offset from the nozzle tip is not ideal.

My Rostock is set with both FSRs and the IR probe so I can switch back and forth and do head-to-head comparisons. Stay tuned.
How does the IR probe handle different build surfaces? Glass, aluminum, kapton, painters tape, slurry, etc?
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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by U.S. Water Rockets »

mhackney wrote:My advise: don't waste your time with Marlin auto leveling. I spent a loooonnng time trying to get it to work without success. Not worth the pain. There are reports of folks who claim they use it but at the end of the day, I couldn't. The one branch that Johann used actually DID NOT use the FSRs as an endstop, they interfaced to a thermistor input. That was a complete mess.

You won't find much help for Marlin here and basically none for auto leveling with Marlin. Save your time and money. Buy a Duet and run RepRapFirmware. They you will have the best auto leveling available to date without a lot of pain and agony.
Thanks for the feedback. I will probably just install the FSRs and see if I can figure out how to use them to do a manual calibration with the data points input into the online calculator from the other thread. Then over time I'll see if something comes out of the Eris calibration routine or if I have to go with a new controller board.
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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by mhackney »

One of the tradeoffs with the IR probe is that the bed must be IR reflective so the bed material must be taken into consideration. David has a section on bed surface here: https://miscsolutions.wordpress.com/min ... sor-board/

To quote:
Glass (with or without coatings such as hairspray, PVA or Kapton tape): works as-is if placed directly on a PCB bed heater or other surface that does not reflect strongly. If there is an aluminium heat spreader or bed plate underneath the glass, then either paint the aluminium surface matt black (see below), or put a sheet of matt black paper between the glass and the aluminium.
PEI: this is highly transparent to IR. Paint the underside matt black (see below) before using adhesive sheet to attach it to the bed plate.
BuildTak: the dark grey variant works well with the sensor. I have not tested the white variant.
PrintBite: works well with the sensor.
Bright aluminium: not suitable unless the sensor is modified to reduce its sensitivity, because the strong reflection will saturate the sensor.

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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by Qdeathstar »

Are you using pei? I am going to be installing that and an aluminum heat spreader as soon as I am satisfied that I have the heated enclosure dialed in
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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by mhackney »

I always use PEI. Note that you have to paint the back black if you intend to use David's IR probe.

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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by geneb »

I wonder how some 3/16" black glass (or other totally opaque color) would work...

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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by mhackney »

I can only imagine how much black borosilicate would cost! I will never use normal window glass or mirror after the blow up I had several years ago. Just isn't worth it.

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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by geneb »

If you've got PEI glued to it, it would contain the glass well if it went pear shaped on you. :)

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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by mhackney »

True that!

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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by U.S. Water Rockets »

mhackney wrote:I always use PEI. Note that you have to paint the back black if you intend to use David's IR probe.
I see that they sell that Build-Tak material in both white and black colors. How does that compare to PEI?
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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by mhackney »

It doesn't compare, it's a completely different material. Search it, you'll find lots of issues. It gets mangled very easily too. Mine lasted 2 weeks and was unusable. But I'm still printing on the very first piece of PEI that I installed over 2 years ago.

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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by dc42 »

geneb wrote:I wonder how some 3/16" black glass (or other totally opaque color) would work...

g.
I haven't tried it, but I would expect it to work very well. The sensor will still see the surface reflection, but you won't get a reflection from the back, which is good.
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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by Johncoffee »

mhackney wrote:I have 24 hrs of experience (literally just installed it yesterday) with the IR module and 1000s of hrs with FSRs so I am not qualified to comment yet. That said, every solution is a tradeoff. I like the concept of touchless probing but having the probe position offset from the nozzle tip is not ideal.

My Rostock is set with both FSRs and the IR probe so I can switch back and forth and do head-to-head comparisons. Stay tuned.
mhackney and all other members

I'm looking for some more detailed instructions how and where connect the IR probe to. I'm still running a RAMBO board v1. as of today but have a new smoothie board sitting on my work bench waiting to be installed.

I like to try to connect the IR probe to the RAMBO board - however can't find a decent instruction that fits to my Rostock Max V2.

Do you know any link where the procedure is being described ? (hard ware connection to the board for the out signal of the board and software modifications via Arduino) ?

Thanks a lot for your help

John
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Re: Auto Calibration Requierments

Post by dc42 »

I don't know about the RAMBO in particular, but for most boards with both min and max endstop inputs, the usual place to connect a Z probe on a delta is the Z_MIN endstop input.
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