top of page

Wallace G1

Parts for this section

The Print Bed
 
This is the surface upon which your prints will be made. The print bed can take serveral forms but our experience is that printing of a sheet of glass (ideally borosciliate) works very well and is simple to build using common materials.  
 
Borosciliate glass is the same kind of glass that is used to make laboratory glass and is easy to find (including our at our webshop) where it's desireable property is it's low coefficient of thermal expansion (it doesn't break with tempurature changes).
​
Several heatbeds exist on the market, we like the one designed by RepRap. The main types we've found are PCB heat beds (MK2) variations, silicone heatbeds, and aluminium heatbeds (MK3).
​
  • The bed mount           ... the skeleton for the print bed 
  • The heatbed                ... helps prevent curling of printed parts as they cool and helps prints stick to bed 
  • The carriage                ... supports the bed mount and allows forward and backward movement
 
 
  • Plastic parts:
    • New Bed Mount TF Left
    • New Bed Mount TF right
    • New Bed Mount TR left
    • New Bed Mount TR right
    • New Bed Mount TF lower
    • New Bed Mount TR lower
    • 4x New Spring Top  
​
  • Thermistor
  • 4x springs
  • 4x M4 x 35mm screws
  • 6x M4 nuts
  • 2x M4 x 10mm screws
  • 2x M4 washers
  • MK2a (or MK2, MK2b) 200mm x 20mm PCB Heatbed
  • Sheet of borocilicate glass 200mm x 200mm
  • 4x medium bull clips (to hold glass to heatbed)  
Take the "New Bed Mount TF left" , "TF right", "TR left", "TR right" plastic parts and remove the print suport materials which look like a grid on the right hand side of the pieces in the picture. This can be done using an exacto knife or a box cutter. 
Assemble the "New Bed Mount TF left" , "TF right" plastic parts, using an M4 x 10mm screw, an M4 washer, and an M4 nut. 
 
Repeate the assembly with the "TR left", "TR right" plastic parts and an M4 x 10mm screw, an M4 washer, and an M4 nut. 
​
The pcture on the left depicts the the TF assembly, the TR assembly would look similar.
The assembled part looks like this.
Place two springs and two new spring tops, one in each corner of the TR assembly  as shown in the picture.
 
Repeat the exercise with two springs and two new spring tops, in each corner on the TF assembly. 
Insert the M4 nut in the hexagonal hole found on the underflap of the "TR right" plastic part such that it will hold when the M4 x 10mm screw is inserted from the opposite side.
Place the TF assembly and the TR assembly about 200mm appart from each other to place the PCB Heatbed.
Insert four M4 x 35mm screws in the hole in each corner of the PCB Heatbed, and through the spring tops. Push the screws through until the reach the underside and then fasten using four M4 nuts.  
Once assembled the heat bed would look like the picture on the left.
Now take the [ print bed rack ] which was assembled in the mechanical section.
Flip the Heatbed upside down and position the heat bed rack on top of it to align the holes from the Heatbed frame with those of the rack.  
Use six M4 x 35mm screws and insert them from the top of the Heatbed fram through to the rack and then tighten the screws all the way through.
​
Finally, place the sheet of boroscilicate glass on top of the PCB heatbed and then clip the glass in place using four medium bull clips.
​
Your Print Bed is now complete !
​
bottom of page