So since I can’t find the box i put all the fillament sensors in, I’ve decided to revisit the extruder mount instead. So, this is officially “the mount project” until I come up with a better name for it.
The stock lulzbot mount works pretty good. it is easily removable, it holds the extruder mostly in place to a reasonable degree of accuracy for most people, it’s easy to produce, and its pretty hard to break. Where it falls down in my oppinion is that it doesn’t hold the extruder as tightly to the mount plate as it could. In my admittedly modified Taz, I can move my extruder in and out from the plate at least 0.01mm. Thats not much, but for me I think we can improve on it by adding more mounting surface. The other problem is the midpoint of the mount isn’t anchored to the structure of the back wall. Does it matter? for most people, again probably not. But what that would help alleviate is the nozzle bed drag condition where the nozzle moves in and out on Y in response to friction with the part. The upper bed anchor helps eliminate most of that, but there is a little bit that can still occur. The goal here is zero possible flex, with as little as possible additional weight.
The other area the extruder mount could use improvement is the quick release. A threaded bolt isn’t bad, but there are camera mounts that use a sliding dovetail latch with a pin on a spring to undo very expensive camera equipment quickmounts, so I think we can do something similar with the top of the mount without taking too much extra space and the possibility of adding additional interface to structure.
My final goal is to also incorporate mill max spring pins into the mount. 2 banks, one on either side about where the cables terminate now to allow for a dual extruder setup.
Here are my initial thoughts on a design. At the moment since I’m dealing with the openbuilds variant of the Taz X mount plate, and I have a big metal plate back there, I’m considering using that as the base for this. The Stock taz can utilize that without too much modification, and if i do it right it will actually result in a weight reduction over stock. I’m ignoring the Taz 6 X max limit switch entirely for now.
So i’m thinking of basically adding a dovetail in the middle and on the two sides. Those can be printed pretty easily to a high degree of usefulness, would have mounting area to bolt down to a plate up the middle, and would hold a mount tightly to the part. It may need “gun breach” style slots in it to accomodate easier mounting. Not sure yet. The surface can also be angled to allow for a better friction fit towards the bottom.
I’m also thinking that the mount can be narrower than stock aside from where it interacts with the limit switch. Even a wade extruder doesn’t need that wide of a base. I’m tempted to go with the same ring base mount I used for my nova pro instead of the stock mount plate, since I am changing everything anyways, and possibly the novapro fan duct and fans too while i’m at it. Not sure yet. The closer to stock i keep it, the more it will be utilized. But the more rigid and compact I make it, the more actually useful it will be.
The end goal is a more secure mount and an extruder package that is more rugged and less mass than the stock one. If you have any thoughts or ideas, please feel free to share them here!
mount2.stl (128 KB)
mount1.stl (8.87 KB)