Wasn’t sure how to title this: could have said “How the {bleep} do I get Windows 10 to recognize my Mini” but that didn’t seem as friendly. Can anyone help me with getting my printer setup on Windows 10? I am having very little luck finding what I need.
Here’s what I’ve done:
(Foolishly followed the directions in the book that came with the printer, which no longer matches the software version available)
Downloaded and installed the latest Cura Lulzbot edition (2.6.66)
Hooked up the printer with the usb cable and turned it on. Windows did the beeping thing to say it saw me plug in the cable.
Started up Cura and set it for the Lulzbot Mini. Got a green checkmark on the printer monitor button. Assuming that’s a good thing.
Rocktopus did not auto load as the book suggested, so I just loaded a simple 6 sided dice STL
Now I’m trying to load my filament, which the book says I must first preheat the nozzle and gives directions that no longer work. So I’m assuming that after clicking on several things, I’m intended to use the printer monitor button since it has a “preheat hotend” option within. So following the book’s suggestion, I enter “240” and click the “Pre-Heat” button. Immediately the Hotend says “240C” but nothing is actually heating up. I’m pretty sure about that since my finger is sensing absolute zero on the nozzle. Yeah, it’s that cold.
So I figure what’s the harm in randomly clicking buttons in the printer monitor, so I click the “wipe nozzle” button hoping to see it move the printhead around and nothing happens except I get an error “Printer is not connected”.
And that’s where I’m at. Reading stuff on the internet suggests that I might have a driver issue but no one can tell me what driver I need to install for the Lulzbot Mini.
I’m not an idiot, but then I’m not a genius either. Can anyone help me get this thing running?
In the screen grab you posted of the preheat function, up above that you can see that it says USB device available in the green box. That means Cura isn’t currently connected to the printer so the commands you are sending aren’t being received. As a first step, try just hitting the connect button a bit further down that same screen and see if the status listed in that green box changes to printer connected.
No joy on the “connect” option. I get this:
It never resolves to anything other than the “searching” message. I’ve been chasing down possible device driver issues and I wanted to ask you what yours looks like in the Device Manager. Here’s what mine shows:
I’ve also manually set the baud rate to 115200 which is what Cura had the printer preset for. That didn’t help either. In my searching, I came across a posting that suggested two different drivers. I installed the “3D printer powered by RAMBo” driver and that had zero joy as well. The other suggestion was for Arduino 1.0.1, which had lots of drivers in it. Any attempt to get windows to use one came with the message “the best drivers for your device are already installed.” This happened whether it was the driver shown above or the RAMBo driver.
Thank you so much for the info so far - knowing what the printer monitor should look like is a great help! At least I’ll know when I’m successful instead of thinking all was fine.
Well, you can try to eliminate Cura 2 from possibilities by installing the old Cura and seeing if that version can find the printer. The two can be installed on the same PC (although the printer firmware is different for the two, so you can really only use one at a time – so treat this suggestion as a trouble-shooting-only thing, and don’t actually print with the old Cura (unless you install the older, matching firmware for the old Cura as well)).
I installed the version of Cura that was on the thumb drive (17.10) and I set the printing temp to 240C. And the printer made a noise! And then it started to smell a bit! This time, I saved my finger from being burned and used a damp towel to touch the head and it sizzled a bit! Wow!
So I just recklessly dived in and clicked on “Print” to print the 6 sided die I loaded instead of the roctopus. It moved the print head up and then started dropping the temp of the print head. I’m thinking “Whisky Tango Foxtrot?!?” Took it about a minute or more and then it went into cleaning mode and then the leveling test and it’s printing it as I type this.
Here is a screen shot of the printer monitor after the leveling test. What is it telling me in the red outlined section and does everything look good?
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that I re-installed Cura 2.6.66, told it not to load the drivers (since the drivers for 17.10 were working), and sure enough, it can’t find the printer. And it does use the “RAMBo” driver for 17.10.
Well, there may be some benefit to pushing through and solving whatever is wrong with Cura 2 on your Windows 10 system… but… If I told you to do that, I’d be a hypocrite. I tried several versions of 2.6.xxx on both of my Lulzbot printers, and finally gave up, and reverted to the original Cura version and the matching firmware.
If you decide to do that, you’ll want something newer than 17.10 – follow the link I posted above (http://download.lulzbot.com/Software/Cura/Packages/Cura_21.08/) and download 21.08 (that’s the last version of the original Cura. Once you install that, it’ll also have installed the matching firmware, and the necessary stuff to install the firmware… it’s really pretty easy.
After you’ve uninstalled 2.6.xx (so that you avoid the possibility of problems should you or someone else fire up the wrong version of Cura!), install 21.08, and fire it up – make sure it can see your printer (shows connected).
You want the “Preferred Firmware Method” – it’s dead simple. But before you do so, please record your printer’s e-steps and z-offset, as the tutorial suggests. If you don’t record that, you can figure it out, but it’s a pain to do - much easier to just get it from the current firmware. Once you have the e-steps and z-offset recorded, just follow the procedure – Cura knows how to reflash the firmware, and it’s simple.
(Edited to add: Oh - you asked about the numbers in the leveling matrix – those are very good. Basically, they show that your bed is within about a millimeter of level from all corners, way inside the ability of the printer to auto-correct. No adjustments needed, it’s all good.)
