Bones-3D-Printer

A cheap 3D printer, with a teachable design

This project is an inexpensive, fully self-designed 3D printer. The design utilizes common off-the-shelf components and 3D printed parts in its construction. This printer is designed to be something that can become a lesson plan, where the design can be broken down into very simplified concepts so that lessons plans can be developed around small steps that accumulate into the realization of a completely working 3D printer.

You, yes, you. If you’ve received a direct invitation to view this project from me, it means you are my friend IRL who I would like to help build this 3D printer. This could mean in-person help, free spare parts, borrowing tools, etc, definitely an in-person safety check. What’s in it for me? You are my test subject. I don’t actually need this printer right now, but I do want to see that my design works! The 3D printing marketplace is constantly evolving and I want to keep up with some new developments. This new design uses the more common 1.75mm plastic filament and all FIVE of 3D printers that I use needs 2.85mm filament, meaning even if I build it, I can’t use any of my existing stockpile of 2.85mm plastic filament. But I have a need to prove to myself that I can design good 3D printer that doesn’t use expensive parts and techniques.

You know me, so I bet you already know it’ll be good. Reply back to my invitation to start.

This website is still under construction, currently it is content complete but still under review and editing.

General Design Overview

If the part list is fully followed, the electronics features are:

Click Here to compare it against some other 3D printers, such as my Hephaestus 3D printer which is very similar.

CAD 3D Model

The whole 3D printer was 3D modeled first, almost every single part, using Onshape. This means:

The link to the Onshape model: https://cad.onshape.com/documents/359ba….150f

For additional CAD lessons unrelated to this 3D printer, check out my robotics class, click here, also using Onshape

About the Lessons

There will be parts of the lesson where I take you through steps in CAD to create something, a drawing or a part. But keep in mind, I am not taking through the steps to make an exact copy of the model I just showed you. Instead, each time, I will be simplifiying something that was originally really complicated, to something very easy, and focus on important concepts, instead of exact replication.

The assembly and setup steps are much harder for me to write because… well… I can only guess at the order-of-operations without testing, and I can’t provide photographs. Instructions are given mostly via 2D or 3D illustrations. Please somebody build this printer and send me photos so we can write better instructions!

Table of Contents

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