Design Changes and The Future

       OM90 is rapidly progressing. All MDF is cut and all of the dimensions are correct. Portions of my design are now 0.75" MDF and some are 0.5" MDF. I cut 28 aluminum angle brackets to bolt the frame together, these need to be drilled still. I printed out the X-End-Idler today, which was about 40% successful - the print detached from the bed, ruining itself and nearly munching my thermistor in the process. I was able to check several dimensional things with my design - namely the 8mm rod channel, since the lower one was about 80% done when the print failed, enough to check, and I was able to check the size of my M8 nut traps for the Z lead screw. Both are OK! I also achieved the best surface finish to date with the MakerGear Prusa at school. Printing these parts is helping me to solve all of the teething problems associated with building and using any FFM 3D printer. The MG kit is a beautifully put together machine, and I have had ZERO problems with it that were the printer's fault. It's a great kit to start with, since everything is included. One order, one box. It also comes with clear instructions - on where to find clear instructions.
       In other news, OM90 is going to progress to a "version 2" of sorts soon. One of the big things I've been seeing as I work on my build is that there is a good deal of interest in the community, and people ask often for various features, and make suggestions, which I love. In light of that, to make it easier for the community at large to play with my design, I'm going to begin migrating OM90 from a SolidWorks designed machine to OpenSCAD, which will be quite the transition, as it's my first real play with OpenSCAD. I'm hoping that having a real design target will guide my learning curve. I am NOT going to just give up on SolidWorks OM90 - I'm going to print all of those parts as-is, for the most part, and I'm going to provide pinaise, a friend from #reprap on irc.freenode.com, with a set of STL files for LM10uu bearings based on SW-OM90. Then, I'm going to take the lessons learned from those parts, and use the hopefully functional SW-OM90 to make the new upgrade parts for "O-OM90" (OpenSCAD-OM90). That's it for now. If you want to see some pictures of the failed X-End-Idler in progress, or of the OM90 designs and work to date, check here.