MakerGear Forum

So .. quick question:

Have anyone made any modification to have an RGD LED strip in the M2, that changes color when bed is heated, and extruder is warm .. (and can then be nice and white when the print is ongoing) ... or something to that effect?

Not that i know of.

As far as I can tell, the RAMBo card does not have any leads for having an external LED for status, unfortunately.

If there are any outputs available, I guess I can make something similar with a tiny arduino to interpret the signal and change it to send out proper output to, say a Neopixel strip...

Having a bit of printer downtime makes you think of crazy upgrade ideas...

It shouldn't be too hard to do. The RAMBo has extension headers that are connected directly to Atmega pins. Looking at the the RAMBo 1.3 schematic, it looks like you could put a simple 4-pin connector across the "Extension 2" header (the 10x2 one) pins 3 (ground), 5 (PG4), 7 (PG3), and 9 (PJ2). This assumes that the header isn't being used for anything else. And then there will be firmware modifications. I spent a few minutes trying to figure out how to define the pin numbers for the header in the Marlin configuration file, but didn't get very far with that. The pins in Marlin's "pins.h" don't correspond to the chip pins in the schematic, but another set of numbers that aren't defined for all pins (including the extension header pins). It would take a bit of work poking around the Arduino libraries to figure out the pin assigments, but should be doable. Adding the code to set each of the R, G, and B pins high or low at specific points in the code should be relatively easy.

first i like Tim's solution.. but it does require you to re compile the code...

i had another idea: (edit: don't do this!)

What if you attach two colored led's to the hotend and heated bed power and ground it though the Normaly Open connection on the x or y axsis switch. then.... likewise use the x or y axsis Normaly Closed switch to ground the white led's for the operational lighting, when the axis is not homed.

this would also require that the switches be wired so that ground is on the common pin, and the singnal line is connected to the Normally Closed pin

id think you can't get away with a single strip of tri color led's with this idea unless you though in some logic. but you could use a strip of color and a strip of white.
you would need to work out the right series resistance for the voltage of your machine for the led's

its a bit of a kludge... but it should work... the hotend and heated bed led's may blink as the pid controls kick in but aside from that would work ok.

if i were to do this id probably pick the switch used for the homing of the hotend as it goes back to home at the end of a print for me.

innkeeper wrote:ground it though the Normaly Open connection on the x or y axsis switch.

Don't connect anything powered from a +24 V, +19 V, or +12 V supply to any switch contact that goes into the RAMBo's digital logic or power supply. The board's digital logic runs from +5 V or +3.3 V supplies and doesn't take kindly to non-logic-level voltages and currents.

Injecting a voltage over +5 V into the board will probably kill it stone cold dead and I'd expect the usual warranties won't apply.

Ultimachine warrantied a RAMBo that I straight up knocked SMT parts off of hamfistedly installing it.

I don't know how repeatable that is though... although it definitely convinced me to stick with RAMBos.

ednisley wrote:

innkeeper wrote:ground it though the Normaly Open connection on the x or y axsis switch.

Don't connect anything powered from a +24 V, +19 V, or +12 V supply to any switch contact that goes into the RAMBo's digital logic or power supply. The board's digital logic runs from +5 V or +3.3 V supplies and doesn't take kindly to non-logic-level voltages and currents.

Injecting a voltage over +5 V into the board will probably kill it stone cold dead and I'd expect the usual warranties won't apply.

aww shoot.... yea I see that.. that's a problem... not only that but the mosfets supply ground.. so two reasons this wont fly...

What if you can source a dpdt microswitch you could still do it and keep things isolated.

insta wrote:Ultimachine warrantied a RAMBo that I straight up knocked SMT parts off of hamfistedly installing it.

I don't know how repeatable that is though... although it definitely convinced me to stick with RAMBos.

how long did you have it...before you had it replaced ... my Rambo board that came with my m2 has a problem with the temperature sensor line since day 1...but it is like a 1.1 board that I've held onto since 2013.. never considered talking to ultimachine...

innkeeper wrote:

insta wrote:Ultimachine warrantied a RAMBo that I straight up knocked SMT parts off of hamfistedly installing it.

I don't know how repeatable that is though... although it definitely convinced me to stick with RAMBos.

how long did you have it...before you had it replaced ... my Rambo board that came with my m2 has a problem with the temperature sensor line since day 1...but it is like a 1.1 board that I've held onto since 2013.. never considered talking to ultimachine...

The first one was a used RAMBo off my rescue M2 that had traces blown out of the underside from a serious short against the frame (don't run without the electronics enclosure, kids ... previous owner problems, not mine). It was a 1.1 which they replaced. I promptly knocked the SMT capacitors off the replacement and they replaced that as well.

I don't know if mine was a one-off or not ... I mean I do spend a lot of money with them, but it was still nice either way.