Hacking the HP45

[dragonator]

This is by no means the final controller. Future controllers might have an integrated microcontroller or something like that. The V1.01 is just the next step to the breakout to replace a complete breadboard of wires and components.

If you do want to chain 4 V1.01's. You can do it with 26 digital pins. Only the primitive clear and clock need to be separate for each controller. All other pins can be shared, if at the potential cost of some speed.

I did a single nozzle test today. This function is to print with all nozzles separately to be sure everything fires as it should. The printhead I am doing this on has a few dozen broken nozzles (test function is not yet working) but the single nozzle function itself works. In the video all nozzles on the even primitives (0-12) are firing one after another for 10 times. Odd side is missing a full 5mm band of nozzles and is not shown in the video.

Nozzle check function should be done before Friday. After that I will share the code again.

[evomotors]

If you do want to chain 4 V1.01's. You can do it with 26 digital pins. Only the primitive clear and clock need to be separate for each controller. All other pins can be shared, if at the potential cost of some speed

This approach should work fine. The only issue that I won't be able to print more than one color at the same time and It will resolve to decreases print speed. But I'm okay with it.

Thanks for a great work!

[dragonator]

Got some presents today.

It is not a new version of the firmware. I have not done anything to it today. It is a kickstarter I backed a while ago.

DSC00062.JPG (453.15 KiB) Viewed 16961 times

It is a teensy 3.5 and 3.6. I am planning to use the 3.6 for Oasis. It has enough I/O's and it is more than fast enough. It has a ton of features and easy to get (in the future). My only problem now is this. Teensy 3.6 is not yet available. I do want to start using it because the 3.2 has not enough I/O's for the SD card and the parallel RAM buffer. If I start using it, others will no longer be able to replicate what I have.

I will first finish most of the functions on the current 3.2, but as soon as I run into the limitations of the 3.2, I will switch over to using the 3.6. I hope that by then it is available worldwide.

[evomotors]

@dragonator - Looks like Teensy 3.6 is available on adafruit.com for $29.95 a pop

here is direct link
https://www.adafruit.com/products/3266? ... AkOz8P8HAQ

[evomotors]

@dragonator - is it smaller than your breakout PCB for HP45?

[dragonator]

Wow, that was quick. At least I got it for a reasonable price. This will make me feel less guilty for using it.

Yes, yes it is narrower than the HP45 V1.01 controller.

DSC00063.JPG (296.16 KiB) Viewed 16954 times

[evomotors]

Is there enough pins on it to connect to HP45 break-out PCB and have full duplex SPI communication?

EDIT:
I realize that the Teensy 3.6 is an overkill, but it's small and reasonably priced.

[dragonator]

3.6 (and 3.5 for that matter) is massive overkill. The only reason I wanted to use it so badly is because there is finally a Teensy with enough I/O. That is also the answer. There are plenty of pins to connect a teensy 3.5 or 3.6 to a controller and have pins to spare for SPI. Teensy has in the 50 I/O's. A single controller consumes around 20-22 pins.

You can also consider using an SPI I/O expanded to control it. It is simpler but has less safety built in.

[dragonator]

An update with a piece of code.

The "Test nozzle" function appears to be working. Current state? Something between 45 and 55 nozzles are broken. This can be poor contact, but the nozzles that were broken on page 9 of this forum are broken now, so I know the function is working again.

That is all for now. I would share a video but literally nothing exciting happens when the printhead is being tested.

V1.01_Teensy_3.2_test_1.zip

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[evomotors]

Why do you think so many nozzles got broken?