I’m currently looking into upgrading one of my old printers with a filament cutter since filament ramming gives me headaches. It’s supposed to be controlled by the printer but I don’t find a clear answer what kind of servo or actuator to best use (which is both lightweight but also strong enough). I still have some servo pins available on my board, no stepper though.

Can someone give me a hint what to look for?

  • AliasVortex@lemmy.worldEnglish
    3·
    2 days ago

    All the cutters I’ve seen mostly rely on the printer’s physical movement to drive the cutting blade, rather than a servo. Technically there’s the SnappingTurtle, by the same guy who made the BoxTurtle project, which appears to be closer to what you’re looking for, but unfortunately isn’t available yet.

    That said, maybe take a look at the BoxTurtle project/ discord? Part of the project is the FilamATrix tool head, which is a mechanically activated cutter. There’s also the AT4 tool head and the crossbow filament cutter (which you might be able to adapt to your old printer if you didn’t want to do a full tool head conversion).

  • kayzeekayzee@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
    9·
    2 days ago

    I really like the bambulabs solution of repurposing the printer’s own stepper motor to cut the filament. Basically just a push-lever connected to the cutter on the print head. To cut the filament, the print head moves off to one side and bumps the lever against the edge of the printer.