Hi guys,
New to 3d printing here and running a taz 6. Apologies if this has been answered before, but I couldn’t really find any answers on the forum specific to taz 6.
Printing primarily with ABS and running into plenty of warping since my parts are pretty big (car parts, ABS due to lowest cost & higher glass transition temp than PLA, please correct me if I’m wrong)
Has anyone done a heated enclosure (or just an enclosure) for the taz 6?
How did you set it up?
Did you build an enclosure around the print area only like this? https://printedsolid.com/products/lulzbotenclosure
Or did you enclose the entire printer?
I also heard that you should vent the electronics in order to avoid frying the rambo board, how do I go about doing this for the Taz 6?
How about the stepper motor? I heard that they will fry if its too hot in the enclosure too.
Would prefer not to split the print into separate parts as much as possible in order to avoid incurring additional labor cost.
I heard from #reprap IRC that the optimal enclosure temperature is 60 degrees celcius, whats your thoughts on this?
Is it necessary or will just an enclosure heated by the ambient heat from the bed and hot end be enough?
I also wish to install Octoprint with a Raspberry Pi 3 with the camera module, how should I go about doing this?
I’ve got a Taz 5 and was running into the same problems with warping on large ABS parts (I also require the higher glass transition temps). I have bought some Nylon to try but I built an enclosure anyway. I really like some aspects of the Hotbox enclosure (https://grabcad.com/library/hotbox-diy-enclosure-for-3d-printing-1) - the documentation is great, but I’m not keen on the hinged door as I often want to stick my hand in to clean any mess off the nozzle just before printing starts, for example, so I decided a sliding acrylic front door would be a better bet, as it doesn’t pull the hot air out as you open it.
I can upload the CAD files too if anyone is interested - I got it cut from 6mm MDF and it went together nicely. They CAD is done in Inventor.
Otherwise it’s doing a good job. There’s no heater - it just relies on the thermal input from the bed and extruder and gets to around 58°C. There are some drafts getting in, mainly around the door and electronics box, and more insulation needs adding in a few places. The warping has almost all disappeared, but isn’t perfect. I’m not sure whether that’s to do with the average temp not being high enough or occasional drafts in there.
Other things:
It has a sliding opening for the filament to feed through to keep a reasonable seal around the filament as it enters the enclosure.
The idea for the cut-outs at the top is to allow for springs to counter the acrylic door but I haven’t printed them yet.
Other issues:
Basically, I should have made it slightly bigger internally, as I designed it for thinner insulation than I ended up using. I think 25mm foil-covered celotex is ideal, whereas in places I’ve had to use foil/bubble wrap insulation.
The hole on the left-side for the electronics is slightly too high too - I had to print some feet to raise the printer by 6mm.
I haven’t finished designing a lock to hold the door up yet.
You might want to try using petg for larger parts. I use esun petg on my taz, and now only run abs on smaller parts as petg can be a little gummy on them.
Interesting, for me on amazon, it’s $4 a roll more for the PETg (esun to esun) for me that is made up in the lack of failed prints but to each their own. I’m sure the hotbox (which I have on one for one of my taz 5’s) can be adapted for the taz 6.
but to each their own. I’m sure the hotbox (which I have on one for one of my taz 5’s) can be adapted for the taz 6.