While most 3d printers use belt driven motion in the x and y axis to increase print speed but loses quality when more weight is applied to the gantry or carriage. The lead screw used on the Workhorse has a high helix pitch with multiple threads to allow increased print speeds while maintaining the quality provided from lead screw and ball screw motion. We designed the machine for applications that require more weight to the gantry or carriage such as materials such as clay, chocolate, plastic pellet extrusion. The increased weight is moved around which without decreased quality or reduced print speeds for a heavy pellet extruder. While there are many large 3d printers and many open source or DIY 3d printer kits, the Workhorse printer's design goal is to use a all lead screw or all ball screw drive system rather than the typical belt system found on other large 3d printer designs such as the re3D Gigabot or Modix 3D Printer or BigRep. Most of the lead screw of ball screw 3d printers are industrial printers such as the Titan Robotics Atlas 3d printer which is a commercial 3d printer with a high price tag.

Duet 2

Duet 3

12 Stepper Motors (with expansion board)

24+ Stepper Motors

Single Board Computer Connection (RasberiPi)

2.4 AMP Peak

6.3 AMPS Peak

5160 Drivers

CAN Bus

Better documentation

Plugins

More Expandability

Trinamic 5160 stepper drivers

Tool Boards

Each Z motor must be driven from a separate stepper motor output on multiple drivers with each motor having its own endstop switch for the Z axis.

1st. Auto level

2nd. Mesh Bed Leveling

The frame is made out of 2020 aluminum extrusions but the new Workhorse Pinter design uses a 3030 frame size. We use Misumi profile but most 20mm x 20mm extrusion will work.:

20mm x 20mm HFS5 Aluminum Extrusions (Misumi Band)

• 4pcs 930mm Long

• 6pcs 510mm Long

• 10pcs 570mm Long

• 3pcs 808mm Long

A thick cast aluminum tooling plate for bed with an adhesive silicone heat pad that goes up to 110-120 degree c without issues and can continuously operate at temperatures of 150-200 degree c. The adhesive heating pad on the bottom of the bed plate with a layer of insulation will be sufficient. Keenovo has a good reputation for the best of the heated print bed makers and carries a variety of pads. They also do custom heat pads sizes if needed.

Design Constraints of Large Scale 3D Printers

Large Scale 3d printers can be much more challenging to get the same performance as smaller machines due to rigidity, deflection, resonance, and smoothness of gantry or bed motion.

This relates to the typical speeds and forces applied to mechanical components while in motion.

The idea is to reinforce areas that experience more force or deflection without increasing gantry weight or over designing in a way that may introduce mechanical binds or resonance. The best thing to do is keep the mindset that the printer you’re designing is going to be built to print “X.” Do you want a printer that prints long but short parts or do you want a printer that prints tall parts. You can increase all three directions but that’s where things get more challenging for repeatability and acquiring the needed speeds and quality. It’s totally possible and the many problems that may be introduced can be designed around.