Not connecting
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@Corexy Your power supply issue kind of got me thinking. A few months ago I fitted a DC UPS to my printer so if ever the mains supply fails, the UPS cuts in and it carries on running off the batteries until power is restored. But note - this is a DC UPS. So no mains inverter and the printer runs (24V) directly off the batteries. It just seemed a bit daft to use a conventional UPS with an inverter to convert DC voltage to mains voltage, then drop it back down to DC with the PSU. The heated is what takes most of the current but mine is mains powered so when the power fails, the bed starts to cool. But it's a big old lump of aluminium that takes a very long time to cool and even them it's only parts with a small footprint that are likely to fall off.
But the reason for all this preamble is that maybe you could do something similar. That is to say, run the printer straight from batteries and maybe use a mains heated bed via an SSR. It probably won't hurt the bed heater if the mains supply is dirty and DC supply straight from batteries will be about as clean as you get I'd have thought. Or alternatively, run the bed cold and use painters blue tape. Obviously you'd need to charge the batteries when the printer isn't running. I didn't envisage the printer having to run more than about an hour or so on batteries so I chose small batteries. But it's surprising just how long they last. Not long after I installed the UPS, I forgot to turn the mains back on and ran the printer for nearly 3 days before I got a low battery warning from the UPS. Admittedly the printer wasn't running continuously for that amount of time, but it was still many hours on (small) battery power. And I run 3 gantries (CoreXYUVAB) and 5 extruders with all the axes motors set to run at either 1.8 or 2.3 Amps.
Just a thought..............
You can read about my DC UPS conversion here https://somei3deas.wordpress.com/2019/10/22/fitting-a-dc-uninterruptible-power-supply-ups-and-separate-5v-supply/
and here https://somei3deas.wordpress.com/2019/10/27/ups-battery-installation/ -
@deckingman said in Not connecting:
@Corexy Your power supply issue kind of got me thinking. A few months ago I fitted a DC UPS to my printer so if ever the mains supply fails, the UPS cuts in and it carries on running off the batteries until power is restored. But note - this is a DC UPS. So no mains inverter and the printer runs (24V) directly off the batteries. It just seemed a bit daft to use a conventional UPS with an inverter to convert DC voltage to mains voltage, then drop it back down to DC with the PSU. The heated is what takes most of the current but mine is mains powered so when the power fails, the bed starts to cool. But it's a big old lump of aluminium that takes a very long time to cool and even them it's only parts with a small footprint that are likely to fall off.
But the reason for all this preamble is that maybe you could do something similar. That is to say, run the printer straight from batteries and maybe use a mains heated bed via an SSR. It probably won't hurt the bed heater if the mains supply is dirty and DC supply straight from batteries will be about as clean as you get I'd have thought. Or alternatively, run the bed cold and use painters blue tape. Obviously you'd need to charge the batteries when the printer isn't running. I didn't envisage the printer having to run more than about an hour or so on batteries so I chose small batteries. But it's surprising just how long they last. Not long after I installed the UPS, I forgot to turn the mains back on and ran the printer for nearly 3 days before I got a low battery warning from the UPS. Admittedly the printer wasn't running continuously for that amount of time, but it was still many hours on (small) battery power. And I run 3 gantries (CoreXYUVAB) and 5 extruders with all the axes motors set to run at either 1.8 or 2.3 Amps.
Just a thought..............
You can read about my DC UPS conversion here https://somei3deas.wordpress.com/2019/10/22/fitting-a-dc-uninterruptible-power-supply-ups-and-separate-5v-supply/
and here https://somei3deas.wordpress.com/2019/10/27/ups-battery-installation/Mate at this stage I'm over all the spending and tinkering.
Your idea is most likely excellent and thank, but I'm committed to this now and will run with it until it proves unsuccessful.
This is a pretty serious American UPS I got cheap, but it's always needed a new set of batteries. I've used this for 2 years and never had a printer that was connected to it fail.
I do wonder how power surges would even reach the board through the switch mode power supply, but it still seems the most likely.
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@Corexy, do you have DC ground connected to mains ground? I do that right at the PSU terminals. And how good is your mains ground?
Please confirm that you do not have a USB connection between the Duet and a PC - because if you did get a transient on ground, the USB ground loop would pass that to the electronics.
Duet WiFi hardware designer and firmware engineer
Please do not ask me for Duet support via PM or email, use the forum
http://www.escher3d.com, https://miscsolutions.wordpress.com -
@dc42 said in Not connecting:
@Corexy, do you have DC ground connected to mains ground? I do that right at the PSU terminals. And how good is your mains ground?
Please confirm that you do not have a USB connection between the Duet and a PC - because if you did get a transient on ground, the USB ground loop would pass that to the electronics.
Cheers David,
I just put a meter on it, and mains power earth to the Meanwell PSU chassis is zero resistance, but the earth to the aluminium printer chassis is not so good.
I do not have the DC and AC earths connected...is that a thing? I've never seen that before but if you say it's the way to go I will.
Not sure what you mean about "do not have a USB connection between the Duet and a PC", but if you mean during a print, no never. I absolutely never hook up to the computer other than events like this. Everything I do is generally via the DWC.
Do you want me to connect the AC and DC earths to each other?
**EDIT.
Sitting here right now and we just had a large surge event of some sort...lights dimming, appliances making noises.
You could be forgiven for thinking I live in a 3rd world country with this sort of power supply, but this is a newish subdivision which supposedly had all the good gear.
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@Corexy Out of curiosity, whereabouts in the world are you?
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@deckingman said in Not connecting:
@Corexy Out of curiosity, whereabouts in the world are you?
I am on the lovely mid north coast of NSW, Australia, just out of Port Macquarie and about 70m from a patrolled surf beach.
It's absolutely beautiful except for 3D printers it seems.
I also lived in your country (if you are in the UK) for 2 years.
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@Corexy said in Not connecting:
@deckingman said in Not connecting:
@Corexy Out of curiosity, whereabouts in the world are you?
I am on the lovely mid north coast of NSW, Australia, just out of Port Macquarie and about 70m from a patrolled surf beach.
It's absolutely beautiful except for 3D printers it seems.
I also lived in your country (if you are in the UK) for 2 years.
About half way between Sydney and Brisbane? Getting way off topic - I'll PM you.
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@deckingman said in Not connecting:
@Corexy Just PM'd you - no point in cluttering up the forum with personal stuff.
Copy that, I just deleted my post for that reason
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Yay! I'm back up.
Thank you to Roland with helping me out behind the scenes, and again I'd like to offer to send you these 2 blown (or just screwed up by my programming skills) boards at my expense so you can have a look at the effects of 2nd world mains power supply and sub tropical lightning storms on your gear. I don't want anything else, this would be on me as you've been a great help.
I will say that I had no trouble setting up my new board. I just run the configurator and uploaded the whole ZIP file, then copy/pasted my old config.g etc in there. Didn't even need to set the Z offset again.
It's all plugged into a full isolation UPS now, with brand new batteries and will never be plugged into an unprotected supply again.
I'm open to the possibility that I've done something wrong with the old boards, but given the properties history for blown up electronics I doubt it.
I do not think it has anything to do with the Duetwifi product itself, for the record.
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@Corexy Glad you are sorted. Fingers crossed that's the end of your probs.
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@deckingman said in Not connecting:
@Corexy Glad you are sorted. Fingers crossed that's the end of your probs.
You've seen my track record...you should be more careful with your fingers lol
Straight back into it though. I've got a Micro Swiss all metal kit for this model (Zortrax M200) and a very high temp build plate with Printbite on it. My plan is to get this one running some high temp PC prints, ABS and Nylon in this one. It really works well and I've got a good temp controlled cabinet on it.
In the meantime I bought this little Ender 3 Pro, but I'm kind of enjoying it anyway and it's an intro into V slot printers.
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@Corexy said in Not connecting:
...you should be more careful with your fingers lol
Yes, I know - already mangled the little one .....
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@deckingman said in Not connecting:
@Corexy said in Not connecting:
...you should be more careful with your fingers lol
Yes, I know - already mangled the little one .....
I'd be calling that "my backup" for reasons I won't be explaining.
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@Corexy It's surprisingly useful sometimes to have a finger that size and shape, but I'll leave that to your imagination......
It kind of matches the lump on the back of my other hand caused by a badly set "boxers fracture" but I won't be explaining how I got that either.........
