New Design: Open Source Pick and Place Machine

My newest machine design!

Sticking to my usual folded sheetmetal methodology:

See https://github.com/openhardwarecoza/PickAndPlaceMachine

 

 

Resurrecting the OpenCNC-ZA with the help of SMW3D.com

A few weeks ago I released the old OpenCNC-ZA files on here – since then renewed interest in the design has exploded in a rather massive way!

SWM3d.com approached me to say they want to commercialise the design in the US and EU, so I have started revamping the design to bring it into 2016!

Follow me on Patreon or Google Plus to stay up to date on this one!

Adding Raster support to LaserWeb: progressing nicely!

 

 

For more details, see https://github.com/openhardwarecoza/LaserWeb/issues/32

 

Wifi 3D printing / CNC / Laser with ESP8266 / Bluetooth with HC06

A friend of mine (or am I being too forward?) suggested in the comment thread on Google Plus that adding Wifi/Bluetooth to SmoothieBrainz would be a good idea:

So I added it:

Two-in-one footprint allows you to solder on either a HC-05 bluetooth module, or an ESP12 Wifi module.

For the Wifi module, preprogram it with ESPLINK firmware:

https://github.com/jeelabs/esp-link

 

 

 

Raspberry Pi Zero 4 Port USB Hub – Open Source PCB Design

Github link: https://github.com/openhardwarecoza/Rpi-Zero-USB-Hub

Buy a Pi Bundle? CHEAPEST PRICE HERE! CLICK PICTURE

In line with my other projects I need to make a USB hub attachment for the Pi Zero.
Seeing as the community figured out that the Raspberry Pi Design team was clever enough to leave us D+  and D- test points at the bottom, I came up with this design above.

See those pads for D+, D-, gnd and 5v?  Yip, the ide is that you can acually reflow this board onto the back of a Pi Zero!

Where’s the Gerbers?  I haven’t uploaded the gerbers to Github yet, since I only finished the Eagle drawing a few mins ago. Eagles are off to DirtyPCBs.com, and once I tested the board, I’ll upload.

This is a 4 Port USB2.0 hub designed around the TI TUSB2046B

• Directly solderable to Pi Zero USB+PWR pads
• Cutout for GPIO pin bottoms
• Screw holes match Pi Zero

BOM:

Part     Value           Package

C2       0.01uF          C0603
C5       15pf            C0603
C6       15pF            C0603
C7       1uF             A/3216-18W
C9       22Pf            C0603
C10      22Pf            C0603
C11      22Pf            C0603
C12      22Pf            C0603
C13      22Pf            C0603
C14      22Pf            C0603
C15      1UF             A/3216-18W
C16      1uF             C/6032-28R
C32      22Pf            C0603
C33      22Pf            C0603
IC5      LD117AS33TR     SOT223
JP1      USB-JST-2MM-SMT S4B-PH
JP3      USB-JST-2MM-SMT S4B-PH
JP5      USB-JST-2MM-SMT S4B-PH
JP8      USB-JST-2MM-SMT S4B-PH
Q2       12MHz           CTS406
R1       15K             R0603
R2       15K             R0603
R3       10k             R0603
R4       22              R0603
R7       22              R0603
R12      15K             R0603
R13      15K             R0603
R14      15K             R0603
R15      15K             R0603
R16      15K             R0603
R17      15K             R0603
R18      15k             R0603
U$5      TUSB2046B     LQFP-32

As always, design’s yours to do as you please, if you do end up getting rich selling these, remember you owe me a few beers (;

If you like the work I do, please consider supporting me by donating to https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=KC92Q2BJL4S7U&source=url

 

 

SmoothieBrainz! – Update on CNC controller project

Click for Larger version

Took about a whole weekend of work, but Arthur Wolf and Jim Morris had me convinced by the end of the comments on https://plus.google.com/u/0/+ArthurWolf/posts/jiatQbJoHe2

SmoothieBrainZ! That won’t be the final name, but for now it’ll do, is a little test-bed platform me to develop more hardware around the Smoothieware ecosystem

Some important notes:

• No, this is not a smoothieboard / azteeg replacement
• It fits in a 100x80mm PCB so even Eagle Freeware users can take my work and base off that.  Not everyone has Eagle Pro (;
• Its still a two-stack PCB design – this board houses endstops, logic, microcontroller, USB + SD, that sort of thing.   Another board will stack on top with the stepper drivers, mosfets, relays, laser control, feature X, Doodat Y and Whatchamacallit Z… Easy expandibility…
• More than 3 Axes and Thermistors.  During the posts on Social Media about my Trinamic/Grbl work, I got a lot of requests for these features, and Smoothie has it, so added to the board
• In the name of cost, ease of assembly, etc I removed the Ethernet support that a real Smoothieboard has. Useful for sure, but most of us probably drive our machines over USB anyway.  If you still want ethernet, I put a pinout compatible header onboard for one of these WaveShare LAN8720 Modules – if you need/want ethernet, its only an $11 upgrade later

More importantly, you probably have some questions (especially if you read my previous posts in this series)

• Where’s the stepper drivers?  Those awesome Trinamic’s you were talking about
• What about GRBL now?
• Pi Zero? Hello, I thought thats what we were donating toward (;

Well, hold on to your hats (:

Here’s the updated project schedule:

1. The Smoothie – brain board is now done
2. Next I copy the previous board shown here to the same base template as the SmoothieBrainz board.  Allows the stepper daughter board to be interchangable with the two boards (so if you like Grbl+Pi Zero, make that, If you want Smoothie, make that instead )
3. After that, come the daughter boards:  Here I also plan to have a few versions (trinamic TMC2660, DRV8711, DRV8825, THB6064, these are all viable options for stepper drivers. I could also make all 4 versions if budget allows…
4. The daughter boards will also have the extra components like hotend/heatbed control, OR laser PSU control, OR CNC Spindle control (0-10v for VFD, as well as Mosfet for DC spindles)

Pi Zero?  Well, since the community discovered that the USB pads are exposed, I am waiting to get one in hand (or if you have one, please help me out with a vernier) to measure where exactly these pads are.  I am thinking of making a space on the brain boards. where I can solder in the Pi Zero.  Sort of like reflowing it onto the board (but not quite) by having a large throughhole in same spot as those two pads. You can then solder the D+D- from the bottom by holding Pi Zero against the board and soldering into those throughholes, wetting the Pi Zero’s pads too.
If you’d like to donate, you can do so from https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=KC92Q2BJL4S7U&source=url

CNC Controller Update

The community has spoken! With their Wallets!

Note the change in title, from the previous two… clearly the words “grbl” and “raspberry pi zero” are now missing from the title.

Thing is, over the last week a lot of new information came to light:

• The media is now calling the Raspberry Pi Zero a failure, a missed shot, and a design abomination.   The lack of networking support (and no, despite the hype around that post on raspi.tv, an ENC28J60 is not better than sliced bread. Its an old, slow ethernet Phy interface chip that I played with two years ago and still hate… that said, its fine for IoT, not fine for fast streaming websockets to drive a CNC), the need for adapters by using a OTG port, all those left the Favourite Pi, quickly becoming the “it may still have a use case in IoT, because it’s cheap…” Pi…
• The community wants 4 axis. This had to be the most-replied to comment on my social media this week! Grbl only supports 3 Axis…
  The second complaint in regard to Grbl came from one of my biggest supporters, Mark Carew (OpenBuildsPartstore.com) in that Grbl slows down in small cicles (8Bit is so 1980’s right?)Lastly, my own complaint against grbl is the pin and ram limitation of the ‘328p (and then the cost of 2560’s as an upgrade option).  While coding in support for the Trinamic into Grbl (see https://github.com/grbl/grbl/pull/859 I had to drop the Enable Steppers pin, to have enough pins for the SPI Chip Select for 3 drivers. sigh. That, and though I have the Trinamic driver in there, I doubt I have space left for the DRV8711 Driver now…
• Stepper driver support. One of the developers of another project told me that one of the other players is working on a board with SPI drivers too. I know who, I know what. But I am not telling. Point is, a little competition means a) we need to hurry up and get the open design out there asap and b) that firmware support becomes easier – the more players there are, the more boards support the same chips, the more the end user will win (more developers working on code, example settings, etc)  –  it also tells me that the work I started on in Jul 2015 (github log to prove) – was relevant and I saw this coming (;

So what does this mean now?  No more Pi Zero? No more Grbl?

NO.  But it does mean some diversification…

Watch this space! Looks like we are going to support at least

• Drivers:  DRV8711 AND Trinamic 2660 (and if budget allows DRV8825)
• MCU:  8bit Grbl, AND 32bit (Smoothieware) (low cost version, and a bells and whistles version)
• Connectivity: Pi Zero, (Smoothie: USB and LAN8720a Ethernet), AND (ESP8266 Wifi with ESPLink Firmware)

Update on Donors

If you’d like to donate, you can do so from https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=KC92Q2BJL4S7U&source=url
Having a few more boards in the queue means prototype costs just went up, a lot!

Here’s a list of all the donors on this project so far:

• Samer Najia – $50
• Casey Coward – $5
• Brain Bland – $10
• Klemen Zivkovic – $10
• Frankie Graffagnino – $25
• James K Rivera – $10
• OpenBuilds Part Store – $250
• Manual Conti – $5
• Jeremy Francois – $15
• Fred LaPlante – $50

Raspberry Pi Zero + Grbl + TMC2660 Controller – Update

Wow, I have to admit the community has overwhelmed me with their support over the last two days!

Since my posts on Google Plus on Friday, a lot of people has stepped forward offering their help and support.
I’ve received donations from:

• Samer Najia – $50
• Casey Coward – $5
• Brain Bland – $10
• Klemen Zivkovic – $10
• Frankie Graffagnino – $25
• James K Rivera – $10
• OpenBuilds Part Store – $250

After paypal’s fees that means I have $343 left to start ordering parts!

Since most of the BOM consists of parts from my parts/circuits library, I don’t need to wait for the full PCB design to be complete to start ordering.

So will get that done this week. Local tax laws means I cannot just spend straight out of paypal like my US buddies can, so it takes couple of days extra to first withdraw it to my South African bank account, additional fees as well…

In the meantime, work on the design has continued:

First I had to draw up a Eagle LBR for the Pi Zero (Seems I was the first oke to make a shield for it hehehe) – I posted it to the Raspberry Pi Forum on Saturday.  (today there are more results, on Saturday morning when I searched I couldn’t find any)

Next, I started the process of consolidating the “building blocks” onto a single board:

So far on the board from top left to bottom right:

• LM2596-5   %v 3A Switchmode Buck converter
• 3 x TMC2660 Stepper Drivers with 3.5mm pluggable screw terminals
• 3 x Endstops (pluggable 3.5mm terminals)
• 1 x Z-Probe connector (3,5mm pluggable)
• Pullup resistors and reverse baised diodes for the endstops/probe to allow you to use any NPN type Inductive, or Normally Open switch as a endstop/probe.  The onboard circuitry filters noise and blocks high voltage from the MCU
• Raspberry Pi Zero
• Atmega328 running Grbl
• Screw terminals for Spindle Enable, PWM signals

Keep the donations coming, there’s always more projects that could use funding…

Paypal:
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=KC92Q2BJL4S7U&source=url

Raspberry Pi Zero, Grbl All in One CNC Controller

So, yesterday the Raspberry Pi Foundation, released a new Pi!  The Pi Zero!

So what happens when I am bored, sitting in a guesthouse, armed with Eagle, a crazy idea, a community encouraging me, and a handful of parts in my parts bin just itching to be used?   Mixed in with a passion for CNC? Yip exactly that what you were just thinking!

Couple of points to plan in…

USB Hub

So, first off: USB.  The Pi Zero is great right?  Except it doesnt come with proper USB Ports ):  Sucks right?

So first problem I want to tackle is a board on top, or on the size, with a 4 port USB hub.  To connect to the Pi Zero, instead of a small cable, I want to have a small PCB soldered on at 90 deg to the main board, holding a PCB mount USB Micro socket:  I just received a few hundred of these from Aliexpress a few weeks back….

This allows a clean, slot on adapter – no messy wires.

Next, for the USB circuit, I will go with my old trusty building block circuit, the TI TUSB2046: (already open sourced it on my Github, here:  https://github.com/openhardwarecoza/OPBS-PROJECT_ALPHA/tree/master/Research/Modular%20Tests/USB-Hub)

Grbl and TinyG – yes both

So what else does a RPI ZERO CNC CONTROLLER need?  Grbl! The old easy favourite, although, John Lauer of http://chilipeppr.com/tinyg just asked me on Google Plus (thread on https://plus.google.com/+PetervanderWalt/posts/dtGv42CSVxV) if I can make it work with TinyG too and I said, sure, why not! So two versions in the pipeline!

High powered Stepper Driver stage

I’m going to need a good stepper driver setup.  And again, I already have a building block in my github from a design I was working on before the Zero came out:  The TMC2660, capable of 4A per motor, 256 microstep!  https://github.com/openhardwarecoza/OPBS-PROJECT_ALPHA/tree/master/Research/Modular%20Tests/Stepper%20Drivers

Wifi

So what about the lack of networking on the Pi Zero?  Well I am already working in a USB Hub, I wonder if I can add a USB Wifi Adapter.  But lets make it super cool and add a footprint for one of these:  http://www.aliexpress.com/item/wifi-module-RTL8188EUS-RTL8188-NEW-ORIGINAL-2PCS-LOT/32240202795.html?spm=2114.031010208.3.20.STJZAx&ws_ab_test=searchweb201556_6_79_78_77_80,searchweb201644_5,searchweb201560_8  – a surface mountable Realtek Wifi NIC module?

PCB Design coming this Sunday!

I will post up preliminary board design by Sunday (On the road today and tomorrow, so being brief with this post to get it done rather quickly, instead of blogging…) – in the meantime, as always, I will open source the whole thing, including BOM so you can go ahead and make it for yourself or some friends. If you sell it, just remember you owe me some beer (:
If you would like to help with paying the prototyping costs, you can shoot me a donation on Paypal if you wish:
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=KC92Q2BJL4S7U&source=url – would be great since I need to order those USB Wifi modules, some TMC2660s, and a Pi Zero (;

#cnc, #grbl, #pi, #raspberry, #tinyg, #zero