Anyone tried vesconite yet?  

Re: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

I have Drylin bearings on my Mk2 printers, but when I tried them on the Mk3 X axis, they deformed badly and created very high friction; the X-motor was unable to move the extruder 🙁

So I reverted to the standard PR bearings.

Peter

Re: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

I just heard back, apparently they are very temperature resistant. the material won't melt until 260 C and doesn't soften until 150C... so you'd be fine even if you were doing crazy stuff like PEKK... and they do have a postal shipping option that is free if you're willing to wait a month. So I may just pull the trigger and buy a set regardless; for X and Y the lack of shipping drops it below my slush fund "ehhh, whatever" price 🙂

It'll be a while but I'm happy to share my results here when they arrive.

Re: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

It'll be a while but I'm happy to share my results here when they arrive.

Please do. I'd definitely be interested even though I just ordered Misumi rods and bearings. After using the Drylin's for a while I really came to appreciate how quiet they are. If the same could be achieved without the slop, I'm all in.

Re: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

It'll be a while but I'm happy to share my results here when they arrive.

Please do. I'd definitely be interested even though I just ordered Misumi rods and bearings. After using the Drylin's for a while I really came to appreciate how quiet they are. If the same could be achieved without the slop, I'm all in.

Yeah, it makes a world of difference when doing high-rate infills and fast X/Y moves. Grease helps dampen the stock bearings well but it's still metal on metal transmitting vibrations. For the most part I like the option because it eliminates the risk of rod damage over time from a sketchy bearing.

Re: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

I have 3 of each of their bushings (hilube and superlube-impregnated) on the way. The latter are supposed to be higher performance so I'll probably stick those on Y since it has more weight than X. They should be here in a couple of days.

Re: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

Interesting. I can’t wait to see how these workout.

Re: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

I ordered a full set of 12 to replace mine. I'll give a full write-up after i put them through some tests.

Re: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

I placed an order last night! I asked @yourdailymicron about it on Twitter and he sent me in the direction of Juan the Vesconite sales guy. I bought 10 to replace all my stock LM8UU, but Juan threw in a few of the pink hyper lube ones too. I cant wait to try them out!

Re: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

Mine arrived today. Three guesses what I'll be doing this weekend once I finish up a spool holder print. (And the first two guesses don't count!)

Note the very familiar items in the marketing brochure... 🙂

Re: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

Also, I did speak with Juan on lubrication. They are, of course, self-lubricating, but I asked in regards to cleaning off old lubricant. His reply was that you do NOT need to expunge every last trace (assuming it is compatible, e.g. you have used superlube on your rods and bearings already). Simply wiping them off with a cloth is sufficient and probably even beneficial to longevity, as it will leave a thin film behind that the bearing does not first have to supply from its own impregnated amount.

Re: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

Installed this morning and running a print.

First impressions are good:

- they fit well (there is a minor amount of play, but in a "good" direction - i.e. it is such that the bearing won't bind if it's a touch out of alignment with its cousin. It is not loose on the rods.

- Slide smoothly. Definitely don't leave a visible amount of lubricant behind when wiping off your rods; it will stick slightly in that area until it spreads it out.

- You can clamp them down reasonably without fear of binding. I'd made some PLA bearings before by hollowing out some cheap LM8s from Amazon and printing the inserts; those could not take any degree of tightening without binding.

- Deliciously quiet. My printer is currently in a LACK enclosure which would tend to amplify the noise of high-speed infills. Currently all I hear is the motor sounds. My print is currently running in Silent mode; the next one I do will be in power mode. I don't mind making a short video if people want, but I do not have any particularly good quality audio recording gear so I doubt it would be representative of what I actually hear.

Will also follow up with surface finish photos when the print finishes. My Mk3 has the following changes:
-> Einsy side frame brace
-> PSU replacement brace
-> Front Y belt tensioner
-> Hard feet with felt furniture pads
->Printed bearing holders instead of u-bolts.

I am at a point where VFAs from motor steps were the main visible surface imperfection on the print prior to this upgrade, so I while it stands to reason these bushings should help with bearing-related artifacts, I don't think I'll be able to offer much insight in that regard. I'm printing with shiny black PETG; it'll definitely make any issues visible.

RE: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

Got a quote back from Juan this morning but also the Misumi rods and bearings showed up at my house this morning.  I think I'll order a set of these to keep on hand for the next tear down or when I can no longer stand the noises from the linear ball bearings.

@vintagepc, I know it's only been a few day but is there anything else or new to report?  Push me over the edge to order these 🙂

RE: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

So far so good - Print surface finish looks about the same or better to my eyes; VFAs are still the main dominant visible item. 

However... I'm actually running my printer in power mode now when it was previously in silent mode. I don't find the fast motor move noises anywhere near as intolerable as with metal bearings (they have always been pretty bad on the Y because of resonance through the rods and frame), best I can tell all I am hearing is the motor itself. I really should post some print pictures tonight when I get home. The initial print I'd planned to post suffered from other issues (Sliced layers thicker than it was designed for so overhangs look like crap) but I've done a few round-surface prints since then. I'll see if I can get lighting to cooperate to show surface finish. 

I have a planned whole-day print coming up, we'll see how that holds up and it's a vertical litho so it'll definitely suffer from wobble if there are motion irregularities. But these bearings have already outlived my PLA liners that died after one higher-temp print in an enclosure. 👍 

I've also noticed no immediate difference between the pink and white; fit-wise they feel about the same and I can't say I've noticed any visible difference in x vs y print quality. I'm guessing the difference would be apparent in their longevity... but given our application is incredibly light load, I'd wager that's effectively the life of the printer unless you do some really crazy stuff or you get grit on your rods that causes abrasion. 

RE: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

Ordered a set of 10 Hilube bushings with slow, free shipping.  If the noise from the Misumi's I'm about to install gets on my nerves these will be installed immediately once they arrive in a month or so.

@vintagepc, thanks for starting this thread; options are always good!

RE: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

Glad I could help. At least for me it offers peace of mind; I've had one bunk bearing and one scored rod already and to my disappointment I thought I saw fine scratches on my X rods again after minimal time back on the stock PR bearings when my PLA ones failed and before the vesconite ones arrived. 

On the bright side though, these sorts of bushings should work just fine even on a rod that has a score mark on it; unless it's abrasive and burred or galled up, the contact surface is the remaining 90+ percent of the circumference instead of just 4 narrow strips. 🙂

In the meantime... I've become quite fast at X and y carriage disassembly for bearing swapping with minimal teardown. I did the nylock bed mod so I switched to Y bearing clips where the screw head is on the bottom and I won't need to re-level the bed after every service. On the extruder I've found that undoing the back plate, zip ties, and fin lets me easily swap the top two, and with the fin not secured you can rotate the back plate enough to tilt the extruder and extract the bottom one. Of course you still need to remove an X-end to get them off the rods. but at least you don't have to completely disassemble your X or Z. 

I should note that I did sort of get a break on my bearings in the interest of disclosure (This came about after I'd posted I was going to order but before I got a reply confirming my order with an invoice), but this was not in exchange for any sort of promotion or review. I was completely prepared to pay for my bearings and have them shipped on the slow boat and post here regardless - but Juan offered to send them as samples if I paid for the UPS shipping option instead, which came out to about the same as what I was prepared to pay originally. I got sidetracked yesterday but will try to get some preliminary photos up tonight and maybe make a video this weekend so folks can judge for themselves.

Personally I don't see a benefit yet to putting bushings on the Z axis. That's something I'd be interested to hear other folks' take on; there is virtually zero load on those bearings as-is and unless your bearings are sloppy or bad I suspect that will fall under the law of diminishing returns.

RE: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

Here's a picture of a part I had at hand on my desk. Please ignore the zits, it's at the end of the roll and my PETG could probably use some drying 🙂

RE: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

Here's a video. This is in *POWER* mode. It's a bit noisier in the video than it is in reality since I had my phone inside the enclosure door for this. According to a sound meter tool it's somewhere around 65 db with spikes to the 70s during fast moves. 

The rattling you hear is the enclosure, not the printer itself. 

RE: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

Thanks for letting us know about this.  I've just ordered a set of six for the x and y axes.  I'll be installing in slow-time 🙂

Cheers

RE: Anyone tried vesconite yet?

Three weeks in I've noticed a bit of play/slop on the left side of my Y axis. I can't be certain it wasn't there before, but I'm in contact with Juan and will follow up once we've reached a conclusion.