We did it! Our MakerBot Cupcake CNC printer lives!

About a month ago I posted that we were making a MakerBot CNC Printer. Well, we’ve done it. After many evenings with a few of the more passionate robot-lovers here at Tanagram we completed the build and have begun running test prints. Building from a kit is a challenge if the instructions are vague and for the most part they weren’t but we always found 3 ways to interpret everything, as a group we worked well to decipher it. During our journey I roasted our first print head because I used an unconventional PID setting. That set us back a few weeks. We are now on our second print head and are working through calibrating the unit. It’s great to be printing things other than calibration blocks. You’ll see some photos below of some of our results.

Kim working on the chassis assembly.

Andrily working the small parts.

Plastic injection motor assembly made from laser cut and stacked plexi.

The handmade print head. A special wire is wrapped around a brass tube. When electricity passes it it heats up, it heats up FAST.

Another angle of the print head.

The body is made up of lasercut wood elements bolted together. You can see one of the Z-axis tractors bolts in the back corner.

Three motor controllers and a motherboard.

Kim inserting the X/Y axis and platform.

Build platform base.

I had to assemble and dissassemble print head frame 3 times because of a poorly glued idler wheel.

Testing the print head before mounting it. IT WORKS!!!

It spits out fishing line!!

Assembled and in its new home.

The first test print.

An awesome bear with an error (we call it poop) on his face.

Whistles that work! (the rear one was before we refined calibration)

Soon we’ll post lessons learned on this project. For now we are going to rest in our bliss as our little CupCake’s motors whirrrr away. We are dreaming of the things we will design to print.

[UPDATE - More Photos!]