Replacement Controller for CubePro Trio

[TommyDee]

Interesting... that explains the missing gcode for it

- - - - - - - - - -

For anyone that wants a CubePro DUO for cheap... and NEW...

https://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-3D-SYST...S!-1:rk:1:pf:0

Not my auction! But I did snag one.

- - - - - - - - - -

This is new ...okay, new to me...

invent.PNG

Worthwhile installing?

[walrus]

cubex and the pro are very different. ;-)

[TommyDee]

I was meaning to ask about that. They have a very similar design philosophy. But they look a world apart. Would there be a preference one way or another for building a Frank'nQube? I don't see any real refinement in the CubeX app and slicer; probably since it was for a different market and an early offering.

- - - - - - - - - -

There's no heated bed, it's a heated chamber.

It's an AC heater with a 24v DC fan. I'm not sure the max temp, the would be in the individual material profiles I think.
Attachment 3091

I haven't seen any specific controls over the chamber temp in configs so this is probably F/W low level stuff.
I'll look again. But this is interesting. You could probably power a heated bed with this same power source.
Put an ammeter on the leads and see what it is delivering to the unit.

You are going for open source with this build, right? I can stop talking about Cubify in that case.

[bolsoncerrado]

cubex and the pro are very different. ;-)

Aside from the enclosure?

How much?

[bolsoncerrado]

For anyone that wants a CubePro DUO for cheap... and NEW...

Not my auction! But I did snag one.

OK next question will be:

Custom filament roller or worth refilling cube carts?

[TommyDee]

Much better than that... Custom spool holder on the right side (2 slot widths available) in the Duo.
Left side, respooled filament on a 3DS plastic spool provided in the cartridge case. Ventilate the heck out of the stock cartridge case so you can keep an eye on the wind. This one is a puller rather than a pusher. Thinking a passive push of the filament would be useful to take care of filament breaks. Something like a stand alone drive motor that maintains a constant pressure on the filament to manage any breaks if they happened. Not an issue with ABS or PETG, but PLA will certainly benefit. Biggest problem with broken filament is that PLA in particular; if you run a coiled piece of PLA and hold it straight, it begins micro-fracturing. This goes on until something gives. So in the middle of the night... snap! So for the time being, use very fresh PLA filament. The second issue I already noticed with older CubePro cartridges is the ones with cardboard spools. They get seriously stuck due to a very loose wind. The filament just buries itself inside the wind. I've tried respooling from the cartridge, even slowly, and it just binds up. The plastic spools inside are better.

- - - - - - - - - -

Aside from the enclosure?

How much?

Although I agree that the CubeX is a forerunner to the CubePro, I think the primary difference is the level of advancement in the software and likely its firmware.
The new case for the Pro is simply an evolution where the frosted glass look just didn't fit its image as a serious contender in the pro marketplace. The Pro is certainly a better look. I am also sure there is some improved functionality in several respects but this is probably more on the order of wish-list items engineering and marketing had on the back burner from the CubeX development. What would surprise me more is if the CubeX couldn't be upgraded to a Pro. If you could load the Pro F/W by altering the 2 binary files, you might have something. That is assuming these again have identical motherboards. From what I've seen and read in the history of Cubify... 3DS built a lot on the previous generations. Without looking at them side by side, it is hard to say what is really possible. Either way, these are still 45Kg beasts!

Cube 3 seems to be an interlude... an opportunity knocking through the likes of Coca-Cola and Microsoft. That "change the world with 3D printing" mantra of the 2012's or thereabouts. That means money came pouring in and all hands on deck for the ultimate every-man's printer. They really went for "product appeal" and "usability". And that, of course, is how they lost their shorts. If you glean the direction for Cube3, and CubePro, you will quickly see that they had envisioned a real future for these platforms. Laser focus on expanding material offerings is quite evident. This would be the future of Cubify. Unfortunately, the market was misinterpreted. Not everyone would put up with a noisy little unreliable printer just to replace the knob on their stove... or make the part to fix Jr.'s broken toy. Pro came out about the same time... '15(?)... so their new found funding spilled over into the CubeX development space for advanced materials. That is what became CubePro, a parallel development process with Cube3. You will find all kinds of Cube3 references in the CubePro software. At some point, the application platforms were likely to be merged as is clearly evident that development talked to both printers with the CubePro app. It was simply turned off for us consumers. Or they simply waited for the last minute to put out a consumer app for the Cube3 that again had that simplistic appeal to the everyday user.

But to stay on track with this thread, as I've always noted, these platforms at a bare minimum are professional hardware platforms. We can't affect the F/W or write a front-end to them, but we can hack into the hardware that drives them. Setting up recipes would would be simple with a little calibration knowledge. I say this with one caveat; what if the lack of a heated build plate in the Cubify offerings was the final straw that killed Cubify? Whatever it was, these liquidations of Cubify printers is the only reason we get to speculate and play with these on a budget. I look forward to seeing what else will hit eBay over the coming year for their liquidation... $500 Trios?

[ryanhatfield]

You could probably power a heated bed with this same power source.
Put an ammeter on the leads and see what it is delivering to the unit.

I don't understand why. I think the CubePro heated chamber is better and removes the need for a heated bed. Having an overall temperature you can control limits the possibility of air drafts and warping during a print.

We can't affect the F/W or write a front-end to them

Well it's quite possible, but nobody wants to.
Marlin uses PlatformIO and that supports the Pic32MX chip https://docs.platformio.org/en/lates...pkit_wf32.html
so I don't think it would take a ton of effort, but doesn't sound like much fun to me.

[TommyDee]

I don't understand why. I think the CubePro heated chamber is better and removes the need for a heated bed. Having an overall temperature you can control limits the possibility of air drafts and warping during a print.

Nice... I am not a fan of heated beds. What temperature does that chamber go up to?

Well it's quite possible, but nobody wants to.
Marlin uses PlatformIO and that supports the Pic32MX chip https://docs.platformio.org/en/lates...pkit_wf32.html
so I don't think it would take a ton of effort, but doesn't sound like much fun to me.

Yea, the "nobody wants too" part is what I was referring to We've batted that around for quite some time.

So what will you be running as a slicer/interface?

[ryanhatfield]

I use cura, but the control board will be running Marlin, so anything that can output gcode for that (anything that works with reprap basically).

The heater is a DBK Cirrus 60 heater. Running on 110v, it can output 400W ... which now that I think of it is kind of crazy considering some small space heaters use around 250Watts.

https://www.dbk-group.com/us/dbk-sol...cirrus-60.html

The datasheet says it can handle 70 degrees celsius, but dang that would be toasty for air temp. That's almost 160F. But looking at these numbers, I'm interested to know if you'd need higher than that for an air temp. I know you can sometimes go higher for bed temp, but I wonder if that's to help compensate for lower air temp? Testing will need to be done.

Just a word of warning ... a bad config file could go horribly wrong with one of these. 400W of heat in that small of space could quickly ramp up out of control.
I don't think there's any kind of thermal cutoff, so I'm probably going to put a "max temp" in firmware just so you don't cook your printer on accident.

If anyone you know has a CubePro with a non-functional heater they should send it to me so I can take it apart. Anything that anyone wants to send to me, I'll make a video and put it on youtube, explaining it all. That includes anyone that wants to send me a non-functional cube 3 for measurements/teardown purposes.

- - - - - - - - - -

Also, I think heating the chamber can help with stiff filaments like PLA ... keeping the chance of snapping during a print lower. Keeping the printer at higher temp might help force out a bit of humidity, not sure. There is a constant source of fresh air coming in from under the controller, so this might work as a simple dehumidifier if the filament is mounted inside.

[TommyDee]

I certainly agree with your assessments in every case. I could see THIS LITTLE UNIT to provide certain level of backup protect on the cheap. The fact that this heater is an industrial rated device with full certifications makes me less worried about failure. But the control circuit is home grown through 3DS. That is likely the area of concern if any.

Now I understand your end goal. I was more interested in which direction you were leaning for slicing. And Marlin makes sense. I'm not up on all the various F/W out there. Nor am I up on the hardware that support what... so please ignore my ignorance in these matters.

I wouldn't dream if hacking F/W in any of the housekeeping functions. I am more interested in re-writing material files which are buried in the config files. It has everything to do with the parameters sent onto the slicer. Housekeeping parameters are not kept in these material blocks.

Sure, it has often been said that the reason for the internal spools was to keep it "healthy". So yes, you 're probably right about the PLA protection. That would want me to hack into the heater only in maintaining a minimum temperature to act as a dehumidifier. More or less a "standby" mode. I suspect the 400W is simply to get your print ready much faster. Since you've already noted that you found the thermal sensor in a remote location, it makes sense that this is managed through housekeeping code.

Is the door interlocked?

What part of the world are you hailing from? I'm furiously trying to kill one of my Cube3's but they are too tough! All the issues presented so far have been manageable. Broke a flange on the nozzle head and a simple flange screw fixed it; an axis bearing blew up, and $4 fixed that. Still haven't needed to remove the rails which I consider the one item that could throw everything out of kilter. There are still good offers out there for functional Cube3's. I've put one of mine up too to help defray my research expenses. I wouldn't pay what the total cost would be just to have a hardware skeleton yet. These Cube3's just don't ship on the cheap. However, someone was looking for a salvaged functional motherboard. Maybe some horse trading is in order now that you've freed one up.

Are you going to stay with all 3 extruders in your revised configuration?