I'm the guy working the "Deltesian" design. I didn't expect it to work.

3D Printing
,
1

I’m the guy working the “Deltesian” design.

I didn’t expect it to work. It started as “reconfigure a cheap Kit Delta into something usable” and got stuck halfway to a Cartesian.

None of the donor Delta hardware was modified. I used all the extrusions as is. Even though I have the setup to machine/cut aluminum, it wanted to see what I could do by forcing myself to reuse the extrusions, linear rails etc.

I think there’s something interesting in taking a $300 Delta Kit, 1kg Spool plus (2) 220x220 build plates and ending up with a 220x440x250mm build volume. Inaccurate, sure, but its big and it’s cheap.

I’m interested to hear what people think.
https://gfycat.com/@bornity/albums/deltesian_project

2

Looks really cool! Very creative!

3

Cool. Interesting. Also … not really the right factoring.

Motion in X and Y is frequent, irregular, and fast. Motion in Z is regular and slow. If you are going to move the (massive) print bed, and print (of uncertain structure), then only move the print bed in Z.

Deltas are interesting as the print bed (and print) do not move. Deltas are more complicated when you want direct and multiple extrusion. So Deltas make partial sense.

Here you are merging the undesirable traits of old RepRap style printers with the undesirable traits of deltas. Kind of cool as an exercise. Really not the right choice for the larger world.

4

@Preston_Bannister You’re talking about relative decisions as if there are absolute right and wrong answer.

You should check out this paper from 2007 http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=6076213 where the Chinese used a similar 2-DOF design with a single axis bed and a 2-DOF tool head, for 5-DOF, to machine blades and guide vanes for a hydraulic turbines. They found the design successful enough, they built a second one. And that was on a scale of 8ft between the towers a machining area of 63"X and 39"Z.

The main benefit of the Deltesian, it the large Y axis and and the cheap build cost. I don’t know of any machine on the market that can print 400+mm in the X or Y dimension for under $400.

That’s what I see as the niche for Deltesians: reuse readily available hardware to allow a low cost machine for large dimensional flat prints. Tubes, frame rails, rod arms, structural sheets etc. All those long parts that you can’t print in one go. Okay it’s only accurate to ~0.1mm. Who cares? The prints are huge.

Also, don’t sleep on the fact, you can mount the base on a wall, turn the extruder 90deg to face the floor and have your moving Z-Bed…
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=6076213where

5

@Rob_Stuart_bornity Will admit my focus is entirely (perhaps excessively) on an FDM printer, in size just on the larger end of usual for desktop 3D printers. A different use might be call for a different approach.

Also I have made a series of judgment calls, which might prove wrong, when building a printer. Will see.

If I ever get to the point of using a belt as a print surface, and multiple extrusion (with changeable tool heads?), might well find your approach is better.