Hi Folks, I have decided to take on building a delta from scratch and

3D Printing
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Hi Folks,
I have decided to take on building a delta from scratch and was wondering how the community felt about some of the available features. I’ve seen arguments for and against each of these and I was hoping to get some feedback from actual users before committing myself to one over the other. So here it goes:

  1. linear bearings on rods vs v-slot track or some other alternative?

  2. Belt driven vs some other alternative, I’ve seen something that looks like string or fishing line.

  3. Frame: is a frame of aluminum extrusion sufficient, or should it be braced with something more stout.

  4. I’m aiming for a build envelope XY of about 200-250mm, square vs round build plate? Does it even matter?

  5. Bowden vs direct drive?

  6. Electronics: I have the arduino mega 2560/RAMPS 1.4 combo that I was going to use for this, any thoughts on alternatives/drawbacks to this combination?

I welcome any other insights you might be able to offer someone preparing to transition from a traditional Cartesian bot to a delta. Any tips or tricks you might have seen in your own build that I could be forewarned about would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

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  1. I prefer a carriage with delrin wheels that slide directly on the extrusions. You can also go with linear rails, but those are expensive.

  2. Spectra line works, and was used on the Rostock. However it seems that most people have gone back to using belts. I would recommend belts.

  3. Alu extrusions are sufficient.

  4. Round. You won’t be able to use the area of a square build plate on a delta.

  5. Bowden.

  6. RAMPS on mega 2560 works fine.

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Thanks @Thomas_T_Sorensen ! I appreciate the info. Do you have a source for your delrin wheels? Is the carriage an open design that can be printed? Thanks again for your input.

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@Luke_Brane
I bought my delrin wheel carriages here:
http://www.builda3dprinter.eu/shop/kossel-kit/rails-to-wheels-conversion-kit/

The design can be found here if you want to 3D print it yourself:
https://github.com/ninjinx/Franklin-Delta/blob/master/vertical_carriage_base.scad

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Perfect! Exactly what I needed. Thanks again @Thomas_T_Sorensen

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Hi Luke, I would suggest to start with Bowden setup then once you are comfortable experiment with direct drive. Issue is that direct drive adds so much weight to the end effector it can cause problems, also Bowden almost doesn’t work with 3mm only 1.75.

For belts if you can afford high tensile steel reinforced belts then get them, the difference is worth every penny, it doesn’t have to be GT2. I was blown away by the difference :slight_smile: