180 gallon build: Modular control system, 3D printed equipment, open-source
- Thread starter jrhupp
- Start date
Yay! Hope it arrives quickly and you can get up and running with out much trouble. I look forward to seeing what you print with it.
I looked at a few different options when I was getting started with all this. For what was free at the time Sketchup looked to be the best option for me. Its not ideal by a long shot (at least the free version without solid tools) but it is quite capable. And I think a lot more capable then most think after a first past with the software.
BigDave
Premium Member
Tapatalk likes to break youtube links.
My printer shipped today as well.
Design software is one place where I'm lucky. My wife is an art teacher and as such, I have access to Autodesk software. I've been using Inventor for all my design work.
Unfortunately, it means I have to try to convert .skp files to .dxf before I can play with them which seems to be a 4 step process.
My printer shipped today as well.
Design software is one place where I'm lucky. My wife is an art teacher and as such, I have access to Autodesk software. I've been using Inventor for all my design work.
Unfortunately, it means I have to try to convert .skp files to .dxf before I can play with them which seems to be a 4 step process.
Outlets as in electrical receptacles? If so, a few different ways. Most parts have a data sheet with a dimensioned drawing of the part, and I will either model the part from that or just model what I need to interface with it. The data sheet for the electrical receptacles for example, gave the cut out needed for the part to panel mount into.
For a number of other things, like plumbing fittings or generic electrical components, there is a ton of stuff in 3D warehouse. I will use these to mock up things to see what a final build might look like. But I don't rely on them for exact dimensions.
For everything else, I just measure it and draw what I need. A good pair of calipers can be quite useful!
Awesome! This thread is what gave me the push as well.
BigDave
Premium Member
Big Dave,
ordered up the Prusa I3 Mk2. I'll be building an enclosure while I wait for 5-8 weeks for it to arrive... We will see if my sketchup skills are up to the task of making anything truly useful!
I do have to say I like it when a person and company like Prusa is able to stay ahead of the clones and keep adding value and winning. It's an easy choice to support them.
-Josh
ordered up the Prusa I3 Mk2. I'll be building an enclosure while I wait for 5-8 weeks for it to arrive... We will see if my sketchup skills are up to the task of making anything truly useful!
I do have to say I like it when a person and company like Prusa is able to stay ahead of the clones and keep adding value and winning. It's an easy choice to support them.
-Josh
Reefers4U
Active member
+1
are you uploading the STLs to a main database other than RC?
Oh BTW nice polish job on these prints - are you using the empty paint can and heat method or? I can't quite get the process down and have just taken to sanding and bondo.
Last edited:
I'm hosting everything in Dropbox and linking the files here for the time being. I hope to get around to setting up a github for it before long.
For the polish, I'm currently using an 18 or 20 quart pot on the stove (electric) with a 1/2 to 1 cup of acetone in the bottom. I bring the acetone to a boil over medium heat with the lid on. Then once I have a good hot vapor cloud I suspend the part in it and let it polish away. Before hand I sand/scrape the parts as needed (sometimes a lot, sometimes not at all) and then brush them all over with acetone. If you leave the sanded surface raw, the vapor won't condense on it very well during the polish and you won't get a very nice looking end product.
Reefers4U
Active member
electric! good to note - please take note of this - I did not take note of this and was lucky - its outright dangerous to do this anywhere near an open flame in doors.
What acetone did you use because I felt like I couldn't get enough of a vapor going - I also tried doing this on the heated bed to no avail.
What is the suspension time in the vapor cloud?
What acetone did you use because I felt like I couldn't get enough of a vapor going - I also tried doing this on the heated bed to no avail.
What is the suspension time in the vapor cloud?
Yes, near an open flame seems quite dangerous.
For acetone, it is whatever the big box store sells in the 1 gallon jug. I don't remember if it was Lowe's or HD that I picked it up at. But it shouldn't matter.
As for how long in the vapor, it depends on the part. On the short end, 15 to 30 seconds. Generally this would be a small part that had been sanded and brushed. On the long end, a minute or so for a large part. And often for really large parts I will do multiple dips in the vapor for shorter periods. With large parts I find that the vapor will condense and drip on the bottom of the part before the top starts to polish if left too long. Multiple shorter dips into the vapor seem to help with this.
Acetone vapor is quite dense, but it is also easy to disperse with turbulence. So for getting a good vapor cloud, I find it pretty important to move slowly and keep the pot covered as much as possible. Otherwise I wind blowing most of the vapor out of the pot and the remaining cloud is not dense enough to get a good polish.
Update time:
I picked up some flexible filament to play around with; Cheetah (polyurethane) from NinjaTek. First project for it was to provide some noise dampening on the surge valves. They are not loud, but are audible none the less. My dosing pumps use the same stepper and driver at the same voltage and about the same step frequency and they are dead silent. So there is some room for improvement on the valves. At first pass I was thinking the big difference between the two is the way the stepper shaft is coupled to the rest of the device: on the dosing pumps there is soft silicone tubing between the shaft and the rest of the device, where as the valves use two hard gears. So there is plenty of opportunity for vibrations coming from the stepper shaft to be propagated through the rest of the valve. In an attempt to provide some vibration dampening on the gears, I modeled up a hybrid gear with a hard ABS hub and polyurethane teeth. The two parts snap fit together.
Here are the separate parts before assembly and installing on one of the valves:
Its been on about a week and a half now and I am just watching to see how it wears/holds up in the short term. Noise wise it provided some reduction, but not what I had hoped for. I suspect that is because the polyurethane is not as soft as I expected. I may try a softer filament on this hub, or try the whole gear printed in this polyurethane.
For other printer projects, I have been working on some enclosures and a board for the main controller. I don't have all the parts for the main controller board at the moment. So I will wait to post it until its a bit further along. But here is it in its enclosure and a new enclosure for the serial switch I put together a while back:
The original switch enclosure was just a clip to DIN mount the boards and left the traces exposed. As I have been adding to the control panel where all the DIN mounted stuff is, I decided I didn't like this. So it got a new enclosure that warps completely around it. Here it is assembled and installed:
The updated SketchUp file for the switch enclosure can be found here.
I also did some modifications to the brine feeder. I had been playing around with a magnet mount version of the feeder, but have not had much luck finding a low cost set of magnets that were strong enough to provide a good hold on my glass thickness. So that project is on hold for the moment. The other part I wanted to refine on the feeder is how the shrimp are added to it. I have been using a syringe to inject directly. This requires purging the air in the line and then injecting a few syringes of tank water to flush the brine down into the feeder. Which I don't mind, but the misses finds it a giant pain. So I modeled up a mostly enclosed funnel that sits just above the water line and has a connection for one of my return line siphon breaks. This way there is a small constant flow of water down through the feeder at all times and the brine can just be injected into the top of the funnel. I also added an overflow tube near the top of the funnel that directs any overflow directly into the tank. Here is the new brine feeder setup:
There are a few changes yet to be made on the funnel. Once those are done I will post a link to the file.
The final project for now is some DIY filter socks. Nothing too exciting or printed here. But I think still worth sharing. These are made from the pre-cut felt sheets from the craft store and nylon cord for a draw string. Here is one on one of the removable inlets to the rubble chamber:
I picked up some flexible filament to play around with; Cheetah (polyurethane) from NinjaTek. First project for it was to provide some noise dampening on the surge valves. They are not loud, but are audible none the less. My dosing pumps use the same stepper and driver at the same voltage and about the same step frequency and they are dead silent. So there is some room for improvement on the valves. At first pass I was thinking the big difference between the two is the way the stepper shaft is coupled to the rest of the device: on the dosing pumps there is soft silicone tubing between the shaft and the rest of the device, where as the valves use two hard gears. So there is plenty of opportunity for vibrations coming from the stepper shaft to be propagated through the rest of the valve. In an attempt to provide some vibration dampening on the gears, I modeled up a hybrid gear with a hard ABS hub and polyurethane teeth. The two parts snap fit together.
Here are the separate parts before assembly and installing on one of the valves:
Its been on about a week and a half now and I am just watching to see how it wears/holds up in the short term. Noise wise it provided some reduction, but not what I had hoped for. I suspect that is because the polyurethane is not as soft as I expected. I may try a softer filament on this hub, or try the whole gear printed in this polyurethane.
For other printer projects, I have been working on some enclosures and a board for the main controller. I don't have all the parts for the main controller board at the moment. So I will wait to post it until its a bit further along. But here is it in its enclosure and a new enclosure for the serial switch I put together a while back:
The original switch enclosure was just a clip to DIN mount the boards and left the traces exposed. As I have been adding to the control panel where all the DIN mounted stuff is, I decided I didn't like this. So it got a new enclosure that warps completely around it. Here it is assembled and installed:
The updated SketchUp file for the switch enclosure can be found here.
I also did some modifications to the brine feeder. I had been playing around with a magnet mount version of the feeder, but have not had much luck finding a low cost set of magnets that were strong enough to provide a good hold on my glass thickness. So that project is on hold for the moment. The other part I wanted to refine on the feeder is how the shrimp are added to it. I have been using a syringe to inject directly. This requires purging the air in the line and then injecting a few syringes of tank water to flush the brine down into the feeder. Which I don't mind, but the misses finds it a giant pain. So I modeled up a mostly enclosed funnel that sits just above the water line and has a connection for one of my return line siphon breaks. This way there is a small constant flow of water down through the feeder at all times and the brine can just be injected into the top of the funnel. I also added an overflow tube near the top of the funnel that directs any overflow directly into the tank. Here is the new brine feeder setup:
There are a few changes yet to be made on the funnel. Once those are done I will post a link to the file.
The final project for now is some DIY filter socks. Nothing too exciting or printed here. But I think still worth sharing. These are made from the pre-cut felt sheets from the craft store and nylon cord for a draw string. Here is one on one of the removable inlets to the rubble chamber:
I love everything about this thread, main push for me to get my 3d printer, went with the maker select v2, love it. Just finishing making all the novelty things and getting that out of my system. Broke my paper towel holder yesterday, went to the basement and started printing one. I wanted to buy a tub drain on amazon but couldn't jstify the 12$, found one and printed it.
I'm getting to the point when I'm looking at things on/in my tank and saying "I should make a spare one of these for when this breaks"
About to start learning how to design stuff, honestly man, great work on everything. Good to see that a item like this can make such great products.
I'm getting to the point when I'm looking at things on/in my tank and saying "I should make a spare one of these for when this breaks"
About to start learning how to design stuff, honestly man, great work on everything. Good to see that a item like this can make such great products.
anders maansson
New member
Greetings from Denmark.
I love your diy skills!
Can I get you to tell more about your surge tank and how it works, maybe with a vedeo? pretty please!
I love your diy skills!
Can I get you to tell more about your surge tank and how it works, maybe with a vedeo? pretty please!
