Assembly manual discussion thread!

[dtgriscom]

(boy, do I love nitpicking!
Dan)

And you never seem to run out of nits to pick!

I'm just getting started!

But seriously: if I didn't like this kit and manual so much, I wouldn't be spending so much time documenting errata. Much faster to figure it out for myself and then move on. But unfortunately this IS a great kit, and it IS a great manual, so Gene has to deal with my zealousness. It's nice that the benefit will be shared by everyone; I mean, I've gotten a whole lot of benefit from all the nitpickers who went before me. (I've got it easy; how about the early kit purchasers who had to work by guessing and trial and error? Ouch!)

[Eaglezsoar]

Hey Dan, one of the things you will learn about me is I love to make people understand what great printers are manufactured by Seemecnc, I love to help users as much as
possible and I love to razz users if at all possible so nitpick away. Besides Gene needs something to do and you are certainly giving him something to do.

[geneb]

I'm confused about the #2-56 5/8" pan head screws and nuts. Specifically, how many of them do I use where?

The biggest confusion is on the LCD mounting brackets. These have four slots each for #2 nuts. But, the instructions call for only six nuts and screws. Even worse, on the picture where I can see the nuts (17-3) there are clearly only two of them. And, add six sets here and six more to the limit switches and you get twelve, but SMC supplies fourteen sets.

Perhaps I should install four nuts in each LCD mounting brackets (filling all the slots), use two per bracket to mount the LCD, and two per bracket to mount the trim panel? If so, then:

- On page 145, change the count of #2 nuts from 6 to 8, and the count of #2 screws from 6 to 4

- On page 148, add (4) #2 screws to the list

- On page 149, show the additional two locations for the #2 screws.

You're correct that the #2-56 count listed was wrong. Got that fixed.

Now that being said, right under Fig. 17-1 is this text:
"Note that the photo above doesn't show all the #2-56 screws & nuts that are required for this assembly step. You may notice throughout this process that some of the #2-56 hardware is missing in the photos – this was due to an accidental part shortage when I was doing the initial photography. Please follow the text and make sure all the #2-56 hardware is used as directed."



g.

[geneb]

A few more corrections/suggestions (page numbers from doc version 1.05):

- The list on page 31 includes the Base Plate Top, although it isn't used until page 48 (you might want to start a list there including the related parts for the Base Plate Top)

- The list on page 31 also includes the Onyx Heated Bed Pack. Most of this (all of this?) isn't used until page 50, and probably should be moved there.

It's part of the base assembly process.

- On page 37, you should say whether the vertical supports should be installed with the #6-32 flat head screws on the inside or the outside, and there are no such screws visible on figure 4-11 (I had to read through to the end to find out they were for the base covers, and should be on the inside).

Page 6(ish):
"Please read this entire guide before you begin assembly of your new Rostock MAX v2! It will help you avoid any unpleasant surprises and will ensure that you’ve got everything you need BEFORE you need it! Understand that the photographs in this assembly guide do NOT tell the whole story of each step! Make sure you read and understand the accompanying text for each step!"

- On page 42, item 12: these are actually 3/8" screws (also change p 43)

Fixed, thanks.

- On page 75, you list the end stop switches, #2 screws, and #2 nuts. These items also appear in the earlier list on page 70; you should probably remove them from page 70.

Fixed.

- On page 146, make it clear that you're talking about the left bracket when describing the SD card slot, and in figure 17-3

Eh? "You want the left bracket oriented as shown in Fig. 17-3" and then right after that it shows you the left bracket with the obvious SD card notch. How is this unclear?

- On page 148, item 2, these are actually 3/8" screws

Fixed.

(boy, do I love nitpicking!
Dan)

Pick away! I may not always make the changes you suggest, but your effort is appreciated!

g.

[geneb]

Besides Gene needs something to do and you are certainly giving him something to do.

Trust me, I've got PLENTY to do without you bunch helping me out.

g.

[dtgriscom]

- On page 37, you should say whether the vertical supports should be installed with the #6-32 flat head screws on the inside or the outside, and there are no such screws visible on figure 4-11 (I had to read through to the end to find out they were for the base covers, and should be on the inside).

Page 6(ish):
"Please read this entire guide before you begin assembly of your new Rostock MAX v2! It will help you avoid any unpleasant surprises and will ensure that you’ve got everything you need BEFORE you need it! Understand that the photographs in this assembly guide do NOT tell the whole story of each step! Make sure you read and understand the accompanying text for each step!"

Yes, but nobody memorizes the manual before they begin building, and spending ten minutes searching the manual to find the one image that shows the screws (page 174) is more than you should be asking of the reader. Remember that there's no hint of just what those screws are for, which makes the answer even harder to find. And, if they do it wrong (e.g. my first reasoning was "the screw heads should point out because there's no way I'm getting a screwdriver in there after assembly") then they won't know until that page, when the only way to fix it is to disassemble the whole base, wasting a few hours in the process.

Why not add the following sentence to the top paragraph of page 37: "Install the vertical supports with the flat head screws facing inwards."?

Thanks,
Dan

[dtgriscom]

- The list on page 31 includes the Base Plate Top, although it isn't used until page 48 (you might want to start a list there including the related parts for the Base Plate Top)

- The list on page 31 also includes the Onyx Heated Bed Pack. Most of this (all of this?) isn't used until page 50, and probably should be moved there.

It's part of the base assembly process.

In most of the manual you follow the pattern of having a list of parts followed by the instructions to use those parts. Then, when you're done with the instructions, you'll be done with the listed parts. This consistency is really helpful to us tyros.

The list on page 31 includes the Base Plate Top and the Onyx Heated Bed Pack, and then the base assembly instructions go through page 40. On page 41 you have us put the drive gears on the stepper motor (no list of parts). On page 42 you have a new list for assembling the tower supports. Only on page 48 do you start using the Base Plate Top, and parts from the Onyx Heated Bed package.

If you want to stick to that documentation pattern, you might want to:

- Remove the Base Plate Top and the Onyx Heated Bed Pack from the list on page 31

- Change the paragraph at the top of page 41 to a parts list (gear wheel pack, stepper motors, Locktite)

- Add a new list to the top of page 48, with the Base Plate Top, T-nuts (from Onyx package) and #6 screws


My $0.02,
Dan

[Tesson 1]

Gene, great manual!! Received the V2 (black beauty) last Friday. Other than a few missing parts and a white onyx platform the build was complete in 23 hours. Your instructions were very clear and concise.
Black beauty powered up just fine with the only issue being Y axis having the travel inversion. Instructions to update firmware went perfect. "Y" is now compliant!
A couple of things I did not see in the manual, and could use a little help. I figured out belt tension but need to double check.
Belt tension procedure, and layer fan mounting with the new carriage mount. I like the fan duct idea on thingiverse"could u suggest one?"
If you could send any preliminary pic's or instruction that would be awesome.
The z height and switch adjustment (bed leveling is finished and went well) I did not have to mess with "concentricity" The grab is good on all 4 scripts.
Can I get a black onyx support sent so it does not stick out like a sore thumb?

Thanks
Scott

[dgriff]

A couple of things I did not see in the manual, and could use a little help. I figured out belt tension but need to double check.

I was curious about the belt tensioning procedure as well - I went back to the Max V1 manual and found some instructions there that seemed they should work with the V2, but wanted to doublecheck.

Also some great notes in the V1 guide about initial printing and troubleshooting that could probably move across too.

[geneb]

Yeah, it dawned on me the other day that I'd completely forgotten to discuss the belt tightening process.

The first two prints are the required fan shrouds. I'm finishing up the PEEK doc now and the layer fan should come soon after.

g.

[Eaglezsoar]

Gene, great manual!! Received the V2 (black beauty) last Friday. Other than a few missing parts and a white onyx platform the build was complete in 23 hours. Your instructions were very clear and concise.
Black beauty powered up just fine with the only issue being Y axis having the travel inversion. Instructions to update firmware went perfect. "Y" is now compliant!
A couple of things I did not see in the manual, and could use a little help. I figured out belt tension but need to double check.
Belt tension procedure, and layer fan mounting with the new carriage mount. I like the fan duct idea on thingiverse"could u suggest one?"
If you could send any preliminary pic's or instruction that would be awesome.
The z height and switch adjustment (bed leveling is finished and went well) I did not have to mess with "concentricity" The grab is good on all 4 scripts.
Can I get a black onyx support sent so it does not stick out like a sore thumb?

Thanks
Scott

If you want the black onyx support you need to contact [email protected]
They cannot be contacted via the forum

[geneb]

With the Onyx installed I can't even SEE the star mount. Did you put a mirror under yours?

g.

[dgriff]

The package arrived yesterday and today was the first day of building! Everything went very smoothly, and with about 4 hours of work, the lower base is complete (page 49)! Tomorrow will be onyx bed, wiring and more!

Think I found another typo in the parts list:

pg. 14 - "14 each, #6-32, 1” Phillips Pan Head Stainless Steel screws. Used for Cheapskate plates and EZStruder mount." I think these are actually 2" screws (according to the parts list in Hardware package #1, which matches the photos).

The longest (and messiest) part of the build so far was removing all of the lasercut parts from the sheets and stripping the tape/protective paper off. Only 1 piece was difficult to remove where the laser hadn't cut through the surface on the opposite site of the material, but a bit of bending and xacto-knife work got it out in a few minutes.

[img]http://i.imgur.com/1EqkPPTs.jpg[/img]

Oh, and I ordered a white kit, but got a black kit. C'est la vie... I'm building it anyway

[Eaglezsoar]

Dgriff, good luck with your build and send us some pictures! We love pictures of new builds.

[geneb]

dgriff, please send me a pm with that correction - I'm at SeeMeCNC HQ for MRRF and have limited ability to do edits right now. I'll get it fixed on Monday.

Tnx!

g.

[dgriff]

Few more little gotchas from today's build:

• Didn't realize that the cheapskate inner carriage plates were not perfectly symmetrical when building (the holes on one side are slightly farther apart), so I built one cheapskate backwards, resulting in the outer plate (with the SeeMeCNC logo) needing to be reversed to make it fit. Didn't see any obvious signs that this would be a problem as the cheapskate carriage still fits properly and moves smoothly. Maybe could be highlighted in the build instructions for others to indicate direction of hole orientation
• Pulling the wires through the tower extrusions can be tough unless you have a line to fish them through with - I used fishing line to pull everything through easily.
• To feed the endstop wires through more easily, I just spindled the ends of the pairs, then put 1 dot on the white line for the "X pair", 2 dots for the "Y pair", and 3 dots for the "Z pair" and pulled them through as a bundle. Much easier than feeding individually.
• No problems with the fit for the lower tower extrusion sockets, but the uppers were a bit finicky and took a combination of finesse and force to get a solid fit.
• Onyx bed mounting wasn't too bad, although the #4-40 flat head screws are just a hair on the short side. I needed to pull a couple of the T-nuts tighter with a screw and a washer combo before they could get a solid grip through the Onyx plate.

Think I should be finished tomorrow. Got about 10 hours of building in so far.

[img]http://i.imgur.com/v0OieL6s.jpg[/img]

Dave

[Pingel]

Type between star and the checkmark spot on page 50.

[img]http://i.imgur.com/D9mrRPD.jpg[/img]

On the next page, "should you decided" sounds a bit wonky.

[img]http://i.imgur.com/wgWa9gj.jpg[/img]


EDIT: 5 days later I noticed I had a typo in the word typo...

[dgriff]

Aaaaannnnnd... Done!

Finished the build tonight and powered up. Everything worked perfectly on the first try, aside from one stepper motor (Y axis) that was reversed.

Note: I think this is actually going to happen on all builds, as the Y stepper is mounted on the opposite side of the tower from the other two tower motors, so is "backwards in hardware", so to speak.

Rather than reversing the axis in software, I took the advice of another forum member and swapped two pins on the y-axis plug to reverse the motor in hardware.

After making this change, I successfully homed the hot-end and performed both the hot end and heated bed calibrations. The z-stop calibration wasn't too difficult, however the firmware that was loaded onto the RAMBo controller (yes, mine came pre-loaded) was of a slightly different vintage than the documentation (and I didn't update it as-yet), so the menu options were slightly different.

Anyway, I would have started doing the bed calibration and such, but it was getting late. I also don't have any ABS, so can't print the fan shrouds yet anyway, so that's a task for next week.

Dave

[JD79]

Okay I have a question about wiring the cooling fan for the Rambo in the assembly guide Fig. 18-6 shows the cooling fan being soldered in place to the board. But in Fig. 18-24 the Rambo is installed and it shows what looks like a 2 pin fan connecter instead of soldering in place. What type of connector is this? I would prefer to use a connector than soldering fan to the Rambo.

[joecnc2006]

Okay I have a question about wiring the cooling fan for the Rambo in the assembly guide Fig. 18-6 shows the cooling fan being soldered in place to the board. But in Fig. 18-24 the Rambo is installed and it shows what looks like a 2 pin fan connecter instead of soldering in place. What type of connector is this? I would prefer to use a connector than soldering fan to the Rambo.

I would say if your board does not have a connector in that location then I would solder a JST plug to the board and other plug to fan wire this way it can be plug and play.

[dgriff]

Okay I have a question about wiring the cooling fan for the Rambo in the assembly guide Fig. 18-6 shows the cooling fan being soldered in place to the board. But in Fig. 18-24 the Rambo is installed and it shows what looks like a 2 pin fan connector instead of soldering in place. What type of connector is this? I would prefer to use a connector than soldering fan to the Rambo.

In the instructions, the fan is indeed soldered directly to the RAMBo controller (it's a very easy soldering job). It would also be easy to add a 2-pin header to the board and just connect the fan there, but probably not necessary.

[geneb]

I really discourage people from flipping the pins in the stepper motors. They're too easy to damage if you don't know exactly what you're doing. Since you have to upload the firmware to the board anyway, it's trivial to make the needed change. Note that the current version of .91 on github has this change made already.

I used a 2 pin connector on mine simply because I'm a wiring nut and won't direct-solder anything I can stick a connector on.


g.

[Eaglezsoar]

I really discourage people from flipping the pins in the stepper motors. They're too easy to damage if you don't know exactly what you're doing. Since you have to upload the firmware to the board anyway, it's trivial to make the needed change. Note that the current version of .91 on github has this change made already.

I used a 2 pin connector on mine simply because I'm a wiring nut and won't direct-solder anything I can stick a connector on.


g.

That's not being a nut, that's doing it the way it should be done. Imagine having to unsolder and resolder that connection everytime you want to take
the card out. Granted, you don't take it out often but I would never solder anything directly to the card.

[geneb]

Well soldering the cooling fan is ok because the only time you'd remove the RAMBo from the mounting panel is if you've blown the poor thing up and need to send it in for repair.

g.

[cgbobio]

Finished the build of my Black V2 and here are the parts of the manual that caught my attention and things I did that helped me out:

Page 62 - I found it easiest to get the 18ga wires through the extrusions by twisting the extrusion in a counter-clockwise motion while feeding the wires through in a clock-wise motion (rather than just pushing them). It worked like a drill and pulled itself through.

Page 64 - to thread the 22ga and 26ga wires I pulled the 22ga first, with the same twisting motion I used on the 18ga. When it came time to pull the 26ga. I pulled the 22ga back out enough so I could spindle the 26ga into 22ga (rather than taping them), and with the same twisting motion was able to pull them all through together.

Page 67 - Setting the towers I found it easiest to remove the idler bearings where the wire needed to pull through. Once I had the wires routed, I replaced the bearings both on the base and later on the top. This made routing the wires much easier and I didn't have to bend them.
Also, I know I read it in the V1 manual, but you skipped the section about squaring the towers to the bed...


Page 71 - Upper tower mounts look different than the ones I received, although they still had the same hole pattern. I thought at first that I was missing parts!

Page 81 - Installing the u-joint carrier on the cheapskates... You might want to have everyone match up the inner and outer pieces for this before they start mounting the u-joints... The screw holes are not symmetrical with the two on the left of the SeeMeCNC logo being farther apart then he two on the right side. Maybe have them stack the two pieces and thread a screw through to get the proper alignment before proceeding.

Page 95 - You mention not tightening down the idler bearings, but you never come back to them and say when or how much tension to put on the belts...

Page 131 - Attaching delta arms to effector platform. Which side of the platform (I'm assuming the flatter of the two) faces up and what is the little protrusion on the one point for and which direction should it face?

Page 161 - Wiring the RAMBo - specifically the end stops. The image shows where to plug in for the MAX endstops, but in a later image on page 164, the endstop wires are plugged into the MIN sockets...

Page 179 - powering on the machine to see a blank LCD ready for programming and found mine to have software already installed...

Page 180 - Mentioning for Mac and Linux user to skip the Driver install, perhaps tell them to skip ahead to XXXX section?

Page 183 - The Arduino software looks the same on a Mac, but the Serial port does not show up as COMxx, it shows up as /dev/tty.usbmodem3a21 or something like that... Let me know if you would like screen captures since I am using my Mac.

Page 190 - Repetier, again the Mac version looks a lot different than the PC version. Again, if you want screen grabs I can supply them.

Hope these help to clarify some parts of the build.