5. Paul - 0, 3D Printer - 4

Over the last week I have spent multiple days trying to work the 3D printer in the college department and had no luck. The printer inside is a Rep Rap Pro printer and the model is the Omerod 2

G-Code

The format that the Omerod 2 prints with is gCode. And this is created by converting an still file using the Slic3r software. I made this little nut-shaped peg that was 2cm wide and 2cm high to use as a test print with the machine.

The Printer

The Omerod 2 is an older generation style of printers that was built-it-yourself kit. So unlike the more modern ready-to-print printers there was a lot of steps to take and a lot of material to read before printing.

A summary of the steps without going into detail are Commissioning, Calibration and Printing. And it is in Calibration where I think i was going wrong. Whenever I tried to print either filament wouldn't come out or I would scratch off the Kapton tape from the printer bed. I tried multiple steps over and over to try and make a print. This included levelling the bed, calibrating the z-probe and going through the entire set up two times. The two possible issues I eventually think was the cause of the misprinting was either the z-probe not giving correct reading or either the heated extrusion nozzle or the bed not getting as hot as it was reading.

Eventually after 22 hours of trial an failure I surrendered to the Omerod 2 and looked at the possibility of printing through a 3D Hub in Cork.