Recently, I bought a new 3D printer. My 10+ year old printer was long gone. Getting it to print properly was hard, so hard that I stopped using it. Is the new printer any better?
Well, since my balancing bot from 2017 has fallen apart, let's rebuild it!
It has been interesting coming back to this toy after seven years. Surprisingly, all the electronics on the bot still worked. The soldered daughter board remains solid despite all the physical shocks from the bot falling down. An FS90R servo had a broken plastic gear, so that got replaced. The servos are now powered by 4x AA rechargeable batteries. The code is the same except for some tweaks to the PID parameters. The code did not age at all.
Redesigning all the parts took some time. I had certain changes in mind when redesigning the bot. I wanted the new frame to be bigger so that the parts are spread out and accessible. All parts, especially the batteries, must be securely attached.
Printing was the easiest part. The printer just works out of the box. I could concentrate on designing instead of tinkering with the printer to get it to work. It is a reliable workhorse, just as it should be.
So, I have been making stuff, including yet another balancing bot:
