Longer Cables or Cable Extensions
Does anyone know where I could purchase longer cables or get cable extensions?
Want to move the controls and LCD outside the enclosure.
Re: Longer Cables or Cable Extensions
Search for 10 pin IDC cables. Both extensions or longer cables should be available from numerous sources.
If you're feeling adventurous then get a cable spool and the snap on connectors and make a custom length.
Re: Longer Cables or Cable Extensions
Longer cables are doable, i did them myself with some male/female 10 pin connectors and longer 10 pin ribbon cables.
Display cable works up to 1.5 meter, but the printer wont recognize SD cards anymore if the SD card cable is longer than 60-70 cm or so.
That's because of ohm's law voltage drop.
(5 volts go in, voltage wire on the ribbon cable is too thin to carry enough milli amps over a thin wire over a distance, after 60cm or so you'll only have about 3.0v to 3.5v on the same pin. )
Octoprint is the only way to print then when using long Display cables.
Re: Longer Cables or Cable Extensions
Good to know! What about the other cables? Steppers, heated bed, extruder, & etc if i wanted to move those out of the heated enclosure.
Re: Longer Cables or Cable Extensions
If you're good with a soldering iron and shrink tubes then you'll have no other problems making every other cable longer besides the display cables.
I would only put the PSU outside the enclosure, they don't take well to heat.
Everything else is a hassle, too many cables to reroute/unplug once you take the printer out.
Look up Prusa's 'official enclosure' in the mods section, they've put the PSU outside as well but printed a bracket to make the frame not wobble then.
Everything inside the enclosure should survive up to 80 degrees air temperature, the PETG gets soft then.
But it's difficult to get the air even up to 60 degrees, i've got a airtight enclosure with thick plexiglass walls and two 500watt heaters, it will take half an hour of heating to get it to 40 degrees, and one hour to get it to 55 degrees.
Add a fan to blow onto the stepper drivers.
Also fun read; NASA modified a Lulzbot to print PEI at 400 degrees
https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20170000214.pdf
Re: Longer Cables or Cable Extensions
Longer cables are doable, i did them myself with some male/female 10 pin connectors and longer 10 pin ribbon cables.
Display cable works up to 1.5 meter, but the printer wont recognize SD cards anymore if the SD card cable is longer than 60-70 cm or so.
That's because of ohm's law voltage drop.
(5 volts go in, voltage wire on the ribbon cable is too thin to carry enough milli amps over a thin wire over a distance, after 60cm or so you'll only have about 3.0v to 3.5v on the same pin. )
Octoprint is the only way to print then when using long Display cables.
What if you were to use heavier gauge wires and go from a ribbon cable to maybe two CAT3 cables which would give you 12 cables. I've been thinking of this because I don't like the way the ribbon cable is used.
The CAT5 cable twists would be good for longer distances, but you don't need to go too far. They are used to bring POE across long distances. Would either of these be a solution?
Re: Longer Cables or Cable Extensions
Voltage drop happens regardless over longer wires, but the thicker the wire is, the less voltage drops when current is drawn.
Can be explained in the comic below.
I thought about using thicker cables as well for my enclosure display, but haven't gotten the time to make them yet.
RE: Longer Cables or Cable Extensions
The length of your cables will not be an issue for an extension of 5 feet total or less unless it's a timing or noise issue. Certainly not a voltage drop issue.
The voltage drop on 28ga wire 10 foot long with a 5 volt @ 50mA draw loses .o6 volts. 1.3% drop.
I am not an engineer or an artist. I am a bit of a designer that does a little of both.
RE: Longer Cables or Cable Extensions
I found some 1m long stepper cables on ebay a while back but only ended up using one of them, for the extruder on my bear with 100mm taller Z. Be careful since I found that the connectors at the Einsy board end didn't have the key features, so it would be possible to insert them into the board backwards. It ended up actually being too long anyway, so I shortened the cable and spliced in the connector from the too-short cable that came with the stepper. Wire colors don't seem to be standardized between manufacturers, so pay close attention to wire order if you are modifying or using cables other than what came with your motors.
RE: Longer Cables or Cable Extensions
@devilhunter - Interesting article you linked Re NASA high temp 3D printing project.
Thanks for sharing.