Chimera Mount (first design attempt)

Hi,

So I’m trying to mount an chimera mount on the K8400, at this point I havent seen anyone else posting ideas or pictures of this hotend mounted on the k8400.
At this point I haven’t mounted it yet so I can’t tell how well or how bad it prints.
But I’ll show some pictures of the stuff I allready done and printed.
I made 3 Main pieces
[ul][]Top bracket[/]
[]Chimera mount plate[/]
[]lower fan duct (This I smoothed with acetone vapor)[/][/ul]

Complete album






Kind Regards
JeAfKe

Interesting :slight_smile:
Keep us updated!

Cheers,
Dylan

I’m very interested in this hot-end and I’m very glad you took the plunge first :=). Looking forward to seeing the first prints…
Nice idea reusing the top fan to cool the print.
Only problem : it substantially reduces the print height.

Yes at this point it’s 22mm lost in Z-height… which sucks… BUT my main goal was to keep or maybe increase X & Y movement.
Keep in mind that the nozzles are closer to each other. And the Front fan is removed completely (this should already give 20mm extra in the Y direction.)

Original Head

Custom Chimera

So now I’m actually thinking of dropping the brass bushings and dropping in 2 lm8uu bearings. Those are shorter than the bushings and allot lighter.

But tbh, I have never really printed tall stuff that was just in the maximum range of the printer. And if i would wanna print tall stuff I got a good excuse for buying a delta printer :wink:

Kind regards!
JeAfKe

That’s a nice construction, but like Raby says, it’s a pity to lose printing height. On the other side it has not only the advantage of easily changing nozzles but also an equal distance between nozzles and glass plate. Are there any more advantages?
Since the Y-carriage rod is in the way, it’s though more likely to use 2 separate hotends, so I would saw the Chimera in 2 pieces :wink: or use two V6 hotends. But the square shape of the Chimera is easier to use I think.

By the way, personally I wouldn’t use shorter bushings. It gives more backlash. Because of that I use the longer x-axis bushing also on the y-axis.

V6 have the drawback they are round and bulkey on top… You are always going to loose on x axle plus it’s harder to align them. But gaining on the y axle the total build volume is not going to be drastically decreased… Main advantage of the chimera is it can print at far hotter temperatures. Easy swapping nozzles and being pretty compact in size… Only the crossbars don’t blend well with the chimera’s dimensions as seen here.

TO bad this couldn’t work…

Kind regards.
JeAfKe

I looked at the specs of the chimera and theoretically it’s possible to drill a 9 mm hole in the center of the Chimera to let the rod pass through. Remains the problem of the cooling. Should be possible to put the fan on top with air-ducts blowing on the heat sink…

Yeah I thought of that to. But i’m not really tempted to drill into a 100€ heatsink. I don’t have a bench drill and freehanding like a boss is a bit over my head. I’m first going to see if the darn thing prints decently then afterwards if I feel I’m short in z height I could do that.

Kind regards.
JeAfKe

[quote=“jeafke”]
TO bad this couldn’t work…[/quote]What’s preventing from doing this actually?

[quote=“raby”][quote=“jeafke”]
TO bad this couldn’t work…[/quote]What’s preventing from doing this actually?[/quote]

The belts of the X and Y axis are in the way of this solution.

No belts will be fine they go underneath,


but it’s going to create play because the rods aren’t straight on the iglidur and therefore come lose overtime I think. Plus the bushings are further apart from each other and will cause enormous backlash imho because the forces will become much higher (I think)

Kind regards
JeAfKe

Jeafke : Tried to raise both the X and Y rods upward in the solution? today they are in the same height as the outer rods what if the entire center carriage get raised that way you do not have to mod the middle carriage more then you already have that way it dont matter that the chimera sits where it is under the rod sins you gain height by lifting everything. In theory that would be possible todo with the design we have now and gain 1-2 cm of Z-axis. The question thow is if the raised outer blocks will be tuff enouph to hold together for it.

// Marlark

Yeah the x axle u have the belts running over the iglidur clamps so I don’t think that will work… But my main concern is that the new block will start to wear and rotate upwards… Now the rods are straight in line with the rods where the iglidur runs on. That’s the point that is going to be stressed the fuck out imho.

Kind regards
JeAfKe

jeafke,

Drilling and threading the rods faces and then bolting it to the new pieces will prevent the upwards rotation you speak of but drilling into that rod will not be easy…

[quote=“VEL327”]jeafke,

Drilling and threading the rods faces and then bolting it to the new pieces will prevent the upwards rotation you speak of but drilling into that rod will not be easy…[/quote]

VEL327 That’s a great idea! Thanks! Didn’t think of that before! Need to find myself a drill bench now :wink:

Kind Regards
JeAfKe

Okay it’s mounted and tested and seems to work pretty good at this point…
I really like the way the nozzles are aligned and it’s lightning fast heat-up time.

Mounted with new pcb and a cable + tube fix point







First finished print without any heavy slicer changes (layer height 0.2mm and a 0.4 nozzle)


Kind Regards.
JeAfKe

Attempted to print a Marvin in black ABS
0.1mm layer height.
Shell thickness 1mm
5% infill
outer perimeter speed 64mm/s
inner 80mm/s
infill 100mm/s
Temperature nozzle @ 245°C heatbed @ 100°C
Radial fan variable between 40% and 80%
NO head lift: so in 1 continuous motion printed.

Might try again and slow it a bit down and fans at 100% so the toploop gets better.

Kind regards
JeAfKe

Turned out very nice :slight_smile:

Hi all,
are there any news on this issue?
My Legend Pack is in the house,I can pick it up tomorrow afternoon.
Would like to know if there was some progress, or some new ideas
Thanks
Frank

Long time since I checked the forum Sorry :frowning:

But this is the stuff I got going on currently…
Only renders so far… To lazy to actually take pictures I’ll do it next time the printer sees daylight :stuck_out_tongue:

YOUTUBE VIDEO

Etched a custom printhead PCB and rewired it completely.
PCB design I laserprinted on photopaper and used the DIY tonertransfer method
PCB DRAWING FILE HERE

Sketchup drawing of all parts can be found
SKETCHUP FILE HERE

Please don’t upload this on thingyverse or anywhere else…

Kind Regards
JeAfKe