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Lead Screw Upgrade Kit

Discussion in 'Mods and Upgrades' started by Harry, Jul 14, 2015.

  1. zenekNY

    zenekNY Member

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    Honestly, I don't think if the nuts not drilled/tapped perfectly could cause any issues, it would be different if the nuts were the ones that spin. But nuts are sitting in a fixed position. It's the rods that turn so any wobble will shift the X carriage either direction.


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  2. zenekNY

    zenekNY Member

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    I'm only confused by the pattern of the wobble on the white piece. Why isn't it thin/thin/thin/thin but, thin/thin/THICK/thin/thin/THICK and on... ImageUploadedByTapatalk1449098378.228273.jpg


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  3. Terry Taylor

    Terry Taylor New Member

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    I had this same problem, the new lead screws would just make a loud buzz, scheduled a tech support call and it seems that the Z-Axis driver board on my machine was bad. Waiting for a replacement.
     
  4. danzca6

    danzca6 Well-Known Member

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    That seems odd that the driver board would go bad for the Z axis at the same time you upgraded. They worked just fine prior to the new leadscrews? And you installed the new firmware afterwards? Maybe the pot just needed to be adjusted a bit if so. Hopefully the new board works for you.
     
  5. Terry Taylor

    Terry Taylor New Member

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    I agree that it was odd, but it did fail that way, verified by switching in one of the others. Turning up the current did NOT help. I spent about 45 minutes on the phone working with Brian on this.
     
  6. jediknight0

    jediknight0 Active Member

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    I've still had no luck with mine.

    I've been working with Robo3D support for days - they have had me adjust the Z stepper power down a bit & they've had me adjust the Z speed up but I still have vibration & noise.
     
  7. danzca6

    danzca6 Well-Known Member

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    Do you have a video that you could share? I'd like to hear the noise and maybe see what Z is doing when it happens. Man, I know the frustration of having an issue. I take it you got the replacement parts from ROBO that are now straight right?
     
  8. Mike Kelly

    Mike Kelly Volunteer

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    Yeah I'd take a video of the wobble and send it to robo. The least amount of doubt you can give them the faster the results.

    Who have you been working with?
     
  9. Terry Taylor

    Terry Taylor New Member

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    Got my replacement Z-axis stepper motor driver board and problem solved. VERY quiet now.
     
  10. jediknight0

    jediknight0 Active Member

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    After going back and forth with Robo3D for a bit, they are sending me new lead screws / motors to see if that resolves my noise / vibration problems. The screws should arrive tomorrow so I'll know if it works in a day or two.

    For those who might be having similar problems, I'll upload a few videos of the wobble and associated vibration noise.
     

    Attached Files:

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  11. jediknight0

    jediknight0 Active Member

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    I installed the new motors and... same problem. :(

    Holding the motor in my hand and running it, the motor itself seems to be vibrating a lot. I don't really hear anything bad until it's installed in the printer *and* the x-gantry is on top. Maybe I'm not hearing the vibration until there's actually something to vibrate (like the x-gantry).

    The next step will be to temporarily hookup the original motors and see if I feel the same sort of vibration.

    In the meantime, does anyone think these ( http://www.ebay.com/itm/5-x-NEMA-17...epper-Motor-/141781704152?hash=item2102d91dd8 ) might help?
     
  12. danzca6

    danzca6 Well-Known Member

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    How frustrating that must be for you. Those dampers might help. I think you will lose a little bit of Z travel since it will lower the motor a bit, but if it cures the problem great. The other issue might be if you have the plate cover under your robo. Will there be enough room to still install the cover after you add the dampers to the steppers? If not, print a fan mount for the RAMPS board and go commando (no cover under the robo...not printing without your underwear). Haha!
     
  13. WheresWaldo

    WheresWaldo Volunteer ( ͠° ͟ʖ ͡°)
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    @jediknight0 It might also be slightly different power requirements for the steppers from the original. It has to draw enough power to overcome any additional torque required by the lead screws and nuts. I would look at calibrating the stepper drivers, or at least checking them. As a point of interest, mine were all over the place from .8 A to 1.5 A, not really good QA. I reset all of mine to about 1.2 A (600 mV).

    Here is a video describing the process:
     
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  14. jediknight0

    jediknight0 Active Member

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    @danzca6 Yes, it's pretty frustrating... especially considering that the troubleshooting takes so long. I'm already weeks behind on a project of mine and the troubleshooting & constant assembling / disassembling really eats into that time. On the plus side, loosing some Z travel won't be an issue - I rarely print anything very tall. 100mm tall is usually my limit.

    @WheresWaldo Yeah, I'm familiar with that. The first set of lead screws they sent me I turned down the voltage as part of the troubleshooting (it didn't help). With the second set of lead screws, the printer started to skip steps so I had to turn the voltage back up slightly.

    I needed to make some progress on my projects so I haven't done any more debugging yet. The horrible noise doesn't seem to cause any significant problem (other than annoying me, my wife, and running the danger of waking the kids) so I'll work on some projects for a few days and return to troubleshooting after that.
     
  15. jediknight0

    jediknight0 Active Member

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    OK, I think I might have found the problem... I think I experienced the same thing as Terry but with different symptoms.

    In short, when I hook a motor up to the Z-axis stepper drivers there's a ton of vibration in the motor itself. When I hook the same motor up to the X-axis stepper, the motor moves smoothly. I just tried updating the old case with Robo3D. Hopefully I'll get an answer tomorrow.

    It does seem odd that both of us had Z-axis stepper driver problems during the same upgrade...
     
  16. WheresWaldo

    WheresWaldo Volunteer ( ͠° ͟ʖ ͡°)
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    Please note that you are driving two motors with the Z Stepper Driver and that Robo Quality Control does not really check to see if all the stepper drivers are outputting the same amount of power. Please calibrate your Z axis stepper driver per this video:

    You are replacing motors, and if the specs are not exactly the same as the original setup, you could display the exact symptoms you describe.

    Just as an FYI, my stepper drivers, untouched from Robo ranged from outputting .8 amps to 1.5 amps, with the extruder at the high end and X at the low end. That is quite an unacceptable range for quality control.
     
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  17. mark tomlinson

    mark tomlinson ༼ つ ◕_ ◕ ༽つ
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    I doubt this is checked in any way.
     
  18. jediknight0

    jediknight0 Active Member

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    I've done the poor-man's stepper calibration: turn it down till the steppers start skipping and then raise it slightly. Even at the voltage that caused the motors to skip occasionally, the vibration in the motors was a lot.

    Robo3D is sending out a new Z stepper driver. With luck, I'll get it Saturday.
     
  19. wthierry

    wthierry Active Member

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    Added the lead screw upgrade today, i cut a 100mm piece of cardboard, looks like 800 is almost 7-10 mm to much... anyone else find this out??
     
  20. MakeJeff

    MakeJeff New Member

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    my concern
    this is a pic of my old stepper motors:
    steppers.jpg
    one blue wire was not at the end!
    red and blue were swapped, looks like.

    now I have both blues at the end and closest to where my XXL plugs in.
     

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