MTvplot (vertical plotter)

thingiverse

After stumbling upon the amazing vertical plotter created by rincey12 and his outstanding DIY manual on makerblog.at, I decided to design a similar model from scratch, aiming to improve certain known issues by incorporating bearings. For the gondola arms, I printed them at 100% infill and drilled small holes for the cord and set screws afterwards to increase weight and stability. My whiteboard markers are approximately 17mm in diameter, so I used a 20mm aluminum tube as the gondola core and some set screws to accommodate smaller pens without adjusting the mid-point. Between the bearings, I employed a printed 0.5mm spacer (with additional sizes included). As I sought to test it on my existing whiteboard, I created 'front-side' holders for the stepper motors to quickly attach them to the wall of interest. The gears are sized for a roller blind cord with a sphere diameter of 4.5mm and a distance of 12mm between mid-spheres. To operate it, I utilized the excellent polargraph code developed by Sandy Noble. Here is my parts list: * 5m roller blind cord (4.5/12) * 2x deep groove ball bearing 6004 2RS (20x42x12 mm) * 2x stepper motor - NEMA-17 (200 steps/rev, 12V 350mA) * 1x Geekcreit UNO R3 ATmega328P Development Board for Arduino * 1x Motor Drive Shield L293D For Arduino * 8x set screws M4 (10mm) * 1x aluminum tube (20mm outer diameter, 1mm thick) * Some M2/M3/M4 screws to secure the motor holders, servo, and gears All these parts plus shipping to Germany cost me approximately 80€ in total. I would like to extend my gratitude to all previous makers and coders who provided outstanding ideas, manuals, and software. This project was a thrilling experience, and I'm happy to answer any questions or remarks you may have.