Benbox Laser Machines/CO2 Lasers/3D Printers

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I am moving this entire forum to a VPS (Virtual Private Server) in the cloud, on July 27th 2020. I am doing this to improve the performance of the site. The cost to operate and maintain the site will remain about the same.

It would be wise to not post or reply to any messages that day. The move should only take an hour but the custom domain name servers must be updated across the entire internet and that is what takes time.

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In order to be able to 3D print, what you print determines where you got your file from. 3D printers use a file format called .stl. stl files are exported out of 3D CAD programs. So most likely you will have to learn a 3D CAD program.

Thingiverse has lots of pre-made .stl files that you can download (most are free) and send to your 3D printer and print right away. But I think for most of the parts or objects you will want to print, you'll have to create them yourself using some kind of 3D CAD program.

I use Sketchup online which is free. Recently I've been learning openscad (open s cad) which is free and to use it, you write script-like statements to define your 3D parts or objects. Being a programmer I was comfortable with that way of working.

FreeCad is a great free 3D program and I spent some time looking into it recently. It works more like traditional CAD programs but it is buggy. Everyone admits to that. You'll want to try both and see which one you like working with. If you use FreeCAd, save your work often!

Fusion 360 does have a free version. Be aware that while it is a capable program, it is a massive program and over kill for most 3D printer hobby projects. It will work and do the job but it's like someone learning to fly using a Boeing 747 instead of a traditional two seat propeller airplane.

Your 3D printer will come with a Slicer software program which is what you use to load in the .stl file. You'll do a 'slice' operation which will produce a .gcode file. You run this .gcode file on your 3D printer to accomplish the actual 3D printing. You can connect a USB cable to your 3D printer and run your slicer program on your PC and send the .gcode file to your 3D printer. Or you can load the file on an SD card and insert the SD card into a slot on your 3D printer and interact with it using a LCD screen to get to print.

I recently bought my second 3D printer, an Ender 3 Pro from Creality:

https://www.creality3d.shop/collections/ender-series-3d-printer/products/creality3d-ender-3-pro-high-precision-3d-printer

It's a very popular 3D printer with lots of support online and Youtube, etc. I find the quality of its output to be extremely high. Much better than my first 3D printer which was a Prusa type printer.

How do you remote control it? Have you written a mobile app to do that?

I use to do mobile app development under iOS until Apple made it just too difficult (and too expensive) for me to continue. Now days all I develop mobile apps for is Android.

The difference between developing code and getting your app to market between Android and iOS is like night and day. Android development under their license agreement is 100 times easier and 100 times cheaper than iOS. Apple is really a massively arrogant company, who thinks they know it all. Sort of like Microsoft used to be before Google cut Microsoft down to size. Apple someday will fall, but for now, they like to think and behave like they are the 800 pound gorilla in the mobile development world.

Arduino boards (there is a large family of different microprocessors as you know) are usually developed using the Arduino IDE and the C language. I have done a lot of that kind of development. There is a lot of online help for you as a developer. I'm guessing you could use another language but C is the Arduino core development language.

You would be much better off to learn how to use a CAD DXF program and create your drawings that way. Using a program that has to convert data over to a DXF format is prone to errors.

You have to manually select the drawing objects you want to group together for a given toolpath.

Let me know if you need help with how to select drawing objects/elements.

I'll have a look at this.

That sounds about right. BCL has not had any updates in awhile. BCL laser can be used for cutting as well as engraving. Just like T2 can. Both have trial versions. Use both and then decide which one you like working with.