Exploding heads, Jedi-fixer dudes, and Leveling up.

[EL Cuajinais]

I finally finished my Rostock Max V2 build over this weekend. I clocked in 37 hrs to get me to powering it on. I spent extra time with painting the edges white and squaring the towers: nothing special, just many failed attempts, and in the end I squared them with the glass on top of the build plate and they magically appeared squared, so I guess the bed was not level or screwed on too tight. I only timed myself to powering it on since once this baby got power, the excitement was too much and I simply couldn’t be bothered with the time keeping. I barely slept as my first fan shroud was printing. Set it up at .100 layer height with a .35mm nozzle instead of the stock .50mm using Simplify3D software. Woke up at 3:30 AM and when I got to the printer I could not believe my eyes: The part was so smooth, you could barely see or feel the layers, if I remember correctly you can’t feel them with your finger-meat, just your fingernails. I was blown away. I couldn’t believe it. Then with realistic expectations, I tried to fit the fan inside my beautifully printed shroud… it was at that moment that my head just gave and proceeded to explode.

Such an incredibly tight and perfect fit! Weren’t FDM printers used mainly for crude trinkets? What type of sorcery was this!?

After seeing that fit (and finish) I could not sleep again while the 2nd fan shroud was printing. I just laid in bed tossing and turning, thinking of the world of possibility that had just been unlocked for me…


So after a crazy weekend of feeling like a little kid again I now have more questions. But I’ll create separate thread for those. I’ve already been able to trouble-shoot two show-stopping issues very quickly: Chattering due to loose belt due to not tightening the idler bearing screw enough, so the idler had traveled back to the bottom of its slot. As if possessed by knowledge of having built the machine, I just pulled away the acrylic on top of the Y-tower and found the problem instantly. No searching on iFixit on how to disassemble and find the hidden screws. I felt like a badass Jedi fixer-dude. And then there was the partial disassembly of the EZStrudder that had chewed up the filament. Of course it was easy to spot the problem, with the transparent part the lovely folks at seemecnc designed. This issue happened because I decided to unspool 4 or 5 windings of filament and print with the resulting tangled mess on top of my printer. I made that bad decision because I had ruined a print due to the filament locking itself up in the spool. Anyway bad idea. I’ve since partially unspooled and re-spooled the filament. What I should have done in the first place.

And that’s the cool thing about this printer, when things go awry, as I hear happens with all printers, I have the factory-worker who put it together on speed dial. And he’s a pretty awesome fellow if I do say so myself. I paid the price of building it and will reap the rewards of 24/7 on-site tech support.

Well enough blabbering. Thank you seemecnc for designing this awesome product. Thank you community for answering all my questions (with a lot more on the way). There were a few details/mistakes on the manual that can still be improved. I’ll try to provide feedback on what I remember. Oh and thank you to the dude that put together the labels for the screw baggies (there were 1 or 2 mistakes on those as well). Those labels took me probably an extra hour of time to print, cut, and tape onto the hardware baggies. But that is the only way to go if you are a newbie. They should be included in the manual, or better yet, the hardware baggies be labeled at seemecnc. I can’t imagine finding out I used the wrong screw and having to tear down X hrs of work. I would have lost my sanity. It was a scary thing putting this printer together but I came out the other side with a lot of useful knowledge that is impossible to get any other way. In a phrase: I leveled up. Cheers.

[teoman]

I bow with respect...

[Eaglezsoar]

Congratulations on getting the printer built and calibrated.
Great job! We are here to help if you have any questions.
Happy printing!

[McSlappy]

Hey that's the first white Rostock that I've loved how it looks! Very sweet with the painted edges!

Well done on your build!

[yoliveras]

Very nice! Congrats

[Neptune]

ROSTOCK MAX V2 Achievement U N L O C K E D !!!!

[EL Cuajinais]

Thanks for the encouragement everyone!
I'm still figuring things out, alternating between simple prints and complex ones, PLA and ABS. I also have the materials for the PEI upgrade on the way.
Special thanks to MHackney's for his incredibly useful guides.