Project: Proteus Delta, part 7

Proteus build plate

Happy New Year! Today it's all installing the heat-bed and it's supports. I'm using one of Ultibots 300mm print-bed kits, the same setup used in their D-300 design, so I needed a support that could grip the edges of the bed with minimal overlap. I'd measured the spacing on the bed mounting brackets early on, so it was mainly a matter of drawing up something that would work for 3D printing in Fusion 360. The STLs for my final design are here.

Proteus print-bed support parts ready for assembly

     The parts are all designed to fit on my Mini Kossel's 180mm bed, each wedge takes about 2 hours with 0.2mm layers at 50% infill, so about 18 hours total for a full set of 9. For fasteners, you'll need 40 M3x16mm screws, 50 M3 nuts, and 6 M3x40mm screws for anchoring the bed layers together and to the lower frame. Assembly is fairly straightforward, I just used a screwdriver and wrench for the fasteners, along with some spring clamps to hold things in place during assembly.

Assembly tools for the print-bed support

Support half-assembled, note the use of clamps to secure parts

Fully assembled bed support

    I've printed the parts in PLA, so I'm using a couple of these Pyron flame protectors for bed insulation, I've been using the same thing on my Mini Kossel for almost a year and haven't had any problems.

Cutting pattern for flame protector

Print-bed stack cross section

     Once the insulation is installed, it's simply a matter of tightening the bed clamps into place with some M3 nuts or thumbwheels, I'm using these printable ones from Thingiverse.

M3 nuts, screws, and printed thumbwheels

Bed clamp ready for tightening

Print-bed ready for final install

Once the bed clamps are tightened, the only step left is to connect the thermistor and power leads to the Duet 0.8.5 and level things so the bed surface is square to the towers.

Heat-bed connectors on Duet 0.8.5

Print-bed installed and squared

     And that's it for now, next time it'll be assembling the effector and Prometheus system.