Hacking the Xaar 128 printhead

Powder and inkjet printing
Philipp
Posts: 34
Joined: Sat Mar 12, 2016 10:55 am

Re: Hacking the Xaar 128 printhead

Post by Philipp »

Hallo Wonko,
I know the Xaar 1001 well.
The inks have a return, therefore, the nozzles do not clog as easily. It is also more expensive.
I have the problem with the printhead that I would like to have more ink per drop. But the XAAR system provides a maximum of 8 gray levels. Could your driver create more grayscale (about 16). So 16 drops to a sinle point?
Philipp
Wonko
Posts: 110
Joined: Sat Aug 15, 2015 8:13 pm

Re: Hacking the Xaar 128 printhead

Post by Wonko »

Yes, the 1001 is a whole different monster in itself. It has a completely different interface as far as I can tell, but no documentation seem to exist, and unless someone will pay Xaar for the documentation and a developer kit, I see no way to get to that information.

Is your printhead mounted in some kind of commercial printer? The easy way to double the amount of ink on the paper is to slow down the ink head advance to half the speed. Maybe you can contact the maker of your printer, or find some other print settings?

If you have built your own printer, maybe you can give me more details on the electronics used, and we can figure something out?
Philipp
Posts: 34
Joined: Sat Mar 12, 2016 10:55 am

Re: Hacking the Xaar 128 printhead

Post by Philipp »

Yes you are right,
the 1001 is a monster. For a small test printer XAAR 128 would be more interesting, and much cheaper. I am also interested in the potential that you win by an own drive.
NecDET
Posts: 3
Joined: Sat Aug 27, 2016 12:55 pm

Re: Hacking the Xaar 128 printhead

Post by NecDET »

Hello Wonko,

Do you have possibility to share details of Hacking the Xaar 128 printhead ?
Would you please add how you do with Aurdino ?

Kindly ask help about this

Thank you



Wonko wrote:Well, since we all have spent so much time on stupid print heads, I have decided to reverse engineer the protocol of an industrial printhead. Sure, it's 200 Euros for a single head in a single color at only 200 dpi, but these babies are industrial strength, giving them supposedly a much longer life span and the ability to print solvents via piezzo, and hopefully UV resin as well.

To make a long story short: yes, I made it work. I can control each and every nozzle at full speed with an off-the-shelf Arduino and close to zero additional parts. Yay!
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dragonator
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Re: Hacking the Xaar 128 printhead

Post by dragonator »

I know I am still really really interested in the Xaar 128. Not for pure powder printing, but the Xaar is better than the HP45 in a lot of important ways.

Wonko, are you still here and are you willing to share it (if not here, at least somewhere).
Wonko
Posts: 110
Joined: Sat Aug 15, 2015 8:13 pm

Re: Hacking the Xaar 128 printhead

Post by Wonko »

Hi. Yes, sorry, I am still here, but we have a medical emergency. I'll be back in a few weeks.
Kyle
Posts: 6
Joined: Wed Sep 21, 2016 5:58 pm

Re: Hacking the Xaar 128 printhead

Post by Kyle »

Hey all, I saw this thread a few weeks back and decided to try for myself. I have a working configuration, aside from daily nozzle clogs, and have started posting my notes on the RepRap Wiki here: http://reprap.org/wiki/Getting_Started_with_Xaar_128.
david
Posts: 73
Joined: Wed Sep 21, 2016 8:43 pm

Re: Hacking the Xaar 128 printhead

Post by david »

Nice work to get the xaar128 working. If you google carefully, you should be able to find a complete copy of XAAR128's user manual, by which you should be able to build your own circuit. However, for the same price of xaar 128 you can get a xaar 126. Xaar 126 was a better design than 128, runs longer more tolerant to the fluid. However, its manual is hard to find. Does anyone has detailed information for xaar 126? My apologizes for hijacking the thread. Should start a new one if there is more interest.
evomotors
Posts: 62
Joined: Fri Sep 02, 2016 5:33 pm

Re: Hacking the Xaar 128 printhead

Post by evomotors »

Kyle wrote:Hey all, I saw this thread a few weeks back and decided to try for myself. I have a working configuration, aside from daily nozzle clogs, and have started posting my notes on the RepRap Wiki here: http://reprap.org/wiki/Getting_Started_with_Xaar_128.
Can you share Arduino code and connection diagram?
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dragonator
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Re: Hacking the Xaar 128 printhead

Post by dragonator »

Now I am getting really interested. I do like the XAAR, not for 3DP purposes, but for other projects I still want to do.

@david, you said something about being able to find proper manuals? Would you be willing to share links, because I am coming up dry on google. If the XAAR 126 is better, I am interested, but I think the 128 is a good starting point.
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