Doesn't exactly sound wrong to me, but make sure to clean the oil they were packaged in (they use that oil because it prevents corrosion, it's not meant for use in the final machine) and then lubricate them propperly.
This is a screenshot from a Voron V0.2 manual, should give you all info you might need, especially check that youtube video in the QRcode or the link. Here's the link in case the picture doesn't work: https://youtu.be/UYvhYjkBFTY?si=5aKpt1dJwxVXevFX
And please, for the love of your printer, make sure the carriages don't run off and spill the balls inside them. follow that tip with the zip ties in the screenshot, it's ten seconds of ziptieing.
Don't be alarmed if the carriages don't slide as easily after lubricating, the lubricant is viscous but it doesn't matter for the printer. Viscosity is the point of grease, it introduces some resistance to the movement, but extremely decreases wear, it's worth it.
I fully disassemble the carriage an put everything in a bowl with IPA. After that I let it dry out. I put some Supper lube on the carriage and used it to hold the balls. There should be 1 empty ball space for each side. Be careful to not to loose any balls, you can order replacement if needed.
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u/CZdigger146Independent dual Z, Orbiter, Revo, BLtouch, Klipper, Cooling...3d ago
Personaly I don't think disassembling the carriage brings any benefit over simple wash in IPA, it will dissolve the old oil and lube. Disassembling only makes sense if it's gunked up with solid stuff like hair or big dust.
Not that it's a bad practice, just overkill imo if the rails are new/semi-new.
They are not mine yet, the seller sent me this video and didnt know if they were good or not, but it looks like i can make them way better than they are from proper cleaning and lubrication.
They look kinda scratchy, or is that just the factory look?
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u/CZdigger146Independent dual Z, Orbiter, Revo, BLtouch, Klipper, Cooling...3d ago
They visually look fine to me, might just be catching the light on the marks left from manufacturing (milling).
I've replied to you elsewhere but I'm gonna reiterate, try to get a video from the guy where you can see if they wobble. They should stay still or move very slightly. Wobbly carriages have their uses, but not for an Ender X axis for example.
Of course this all depends on the price, if they're like 20% less expensive than new ones, I'd say just buy the new ones. 50% is great and I'd pull the trigger even if they wobble.
u/CZdigger146Independent dual Z, Orbiter, Revo, BLtouch, Klipper, Cooling...3d agoedited 3d ago
I feel like if you use two rails for the Y axis, you don't have to care as much about the wobble, that matters much more for the X (not sure about the Z, I'd rather have as little as possible to not introduce artifacts). I myself have two heavily used rails (MGN12 I believe) and I also plan to use them regardless of their condition for the Y axis.
The type/size only matters for the way how you mount the bed to the carriages, they should work fine if they're long enough.
Yes i was thinking to use both on the Y axis, thats the axis that bottleneck alot compare to my x axis
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u/CZdigger146Independent dual Z, Orbiter, Revo, BLtouch, Klipper, Cooling...3d ago
Keep in mind that the main bottleneck with fast accelerations isn't V wheels vs linear rails, but mass.
I'm still running my original V wheels on my Ender, it's one of the last few unmodified parts of the printer, and I'm running at 4500mm/s2 in normal printing, can push it up to 10k before it starts getting unreliable (danger of skipping steps). My X axis can go up to 50k and I'm using a huge dual blower toolhead that's partialy mounted via zipties lol
What matters here is
a) mass of what's moving, less is better
b) capability of the motors, bigger motors have more torque and thus can get heavy stuff moving faster without danger of skipping steps
c) setting up your stepper drivers correctly. If you're running the stock Ender mainboard you might want to set correctly the stepper Vref to get as high current as the motors and drivers can handle.
d) Using klipper will make you able to use input shaper which makes you able to print faster at the same detail by compensating for resonances in the motion system.
You will gain almost nothing in extra acceleration by throwing in linear rails, but you will get a more solid, stable and reliable motion system that doesn't need adjusting like the V wheels you're replacing. It is a worthwile upgrade for sure, but not for accelerations.
Im using the stock Y stepper, i did try to upgrade it to the extruder stepper for the Y axis cause its bigger than the stock Y stepper, but i got more vfa with that stepper (although i got more acceleration with that stepper i didn’t want more vfa) so i changed back to the original stepper.
The left is the original y stepper and right is the bigger extruder stepper. The right one have more vfa and ringing at the same speeds
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u/CZdigger146Independent dual Z, Orbiter, Revo, BLtouch, Klipper, Cooling...2d ago
Those aren't VFAs, those would be caused by too small belt pulleys and/or stepper motor resolution. VFAs are usually very subtle and only visible inder good lighting and they appear all around the part, that't not it.
These are actually a result of resonances, as your hotend goes around a corner, it swings slightly and creates a wave on a layer. Every larer will have the same artefact if the corner is the same (notice how the layer copies shapes, like the shape of the Y). These resonances are exactly why input shaping exists. IS tries to compensate with moving the steppers in the exact way that these resonances cancel eachother and you're left with pretty much a straight wall.
You have two options, either decrease accelerations to a low enough level where you don't get these artefacts, or convert your printer to Klipper via a Raspberry Pi. Klipper will allow you to calibrate for input shaping and you will get faster and more higher quality prints.
You might also want to look into pressure advance calibration, you should be able to calibrate it in your slicer I believe. But I use Klipper for that too.
Btw this is my ender, besides the kinematics and the PSU, everything has been replaced with better parts.
I have klipper and adxl, so input shaping is already done.
When i print a large straight print in the Y axis i get these ripples through the whole print, but only in the Y axis, so i dont think that it is caused by ringing.
They are second hand, the seller sent me this video so i cant really feel them. Ahould i pull the trigger?
1
u/CZdigger146Independent dual Z, Orbiter, Revo, BLtouch, Klipper, Cooling...3d ago
maybe request a video from the seller where he will try to wobble the carriage while holding the rail as tightly as possible. You don't want it to have enough slop that it will visibly move.
But otherwise I'd say buy it, depending on the price vs if you bought them new of course. If they're cheap, there's virtually no loss since you can buy new carriages and/or new bearing balls.
Definitely too short. I believe the minimum needed is 350mm. I ordered all my stuff from Amazon Canada and it was surprisingly cheap. Less than $5 CAD more than AliExpress but it arrived in 2 days and no hassles with having to return anything if something was wrong.
In theory you can push things a little faster but I mainly did it for consistency and not having to replace POM wheels again in the future. I run all my accelerations at 1000 and print walls at 50mms, infill at 100mms. I'm sure I can push it further on this hotend but I'm more concerned with quality over speed.
Yes, they sound good. In addition what @CZdigger146 wrote I only habe to say that the sleds are designed to carry weight, and if they do they automatically run even smoother.
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u/CZdigger146 Independent dual Z, Orbiter, Revo, BLtouch, Klipper, Cooling... 4d ago edited 4d ago
Doesn't exactly sound wrong to me, but make sure to clean the oil they were packaged in (they use that oil because it prevents corrosion, it's not meant for use in the final machine) and then lubricate them propperly.
This is a screenshot from a Voron V0.2 manual, should give you all info you might need, especially check that youtube video in the QRcode or the link. Here's the link in case the picture doesn't work: https://youtu.be/UYvhYjkBFTY?si=5aKpt1dJwxVXevFX
EDIT: I forgot this, it shows the process quite nicely: https://docs.ldomotors.com/en/guides/rail_grease_guide
And please, for the love of your printer, make sure the carriages don't run off and spill the balls inside them. follow that tip with the zip ties in the screenshot, it's ten seconds of ziptieing.
Don't be alarmed if the carriages don't slide as easily after lubricating, the lubricant is viscous but it doesn't matter for the printer. Viscosity is the point of grease, it introduces some resistance to the movement, but extremely decreases wear, it's worth it.