FT-5 upgraded to Core YX

thingiverse

This has been a long time coming, but it's finally here and totally worth the wait! The backstory goes like this: three years ago, I got my first 3D printer as a Christmas gift, a REPRAP Prusa clone that was a solid printer. It could have been better if I'd known what I know now, but at the time, all I wanted to make was the Hypercube, thanks to Tech2C for an incredible design! Next, I needed a bigger print volume, and a friend suggested the FT-5, which they loved. So last Christmas, I got one of those, too. I hated the linear rails, but the Z axis was amazing. That's when it hit me: why not combine the best parts of both printers into one? And that's how the FT Cubed came to be. To make this happen, all I did was swap out the linear rail system from my FT-5 and use the Hypercube to print the XY components. I also made some changes to the firmware and had to set it up as a Core YX - not sure if that was necessary, but it works perfectly for me with homing starting at the front left corner. The result? A 300mm by 300mm print area, plus an extra 200mm of height without needing to go any bigger. And the two best things about this upgrade are a whopping 50% reduction in printer noise and the ability to print at 80mm/sec without worrying about the printer flying off my desk!