Layer dwell?

[0JW]

Hello, I hope someone can help me. I am trying to work with a wire feed welder and need the welder to cool down between layers because of the duty cycle. Is there any way to include a g04 dwell command automatically between layers.

any help is greatly appreciated!
Jamie

[0JW]

Could I be using (Min Layer Time)? The welder is going to be triggered on by the direction of the extruder. So if its just weighting then the welding machine will have time to cool. I don't know if there is a limit to the time it will weight. Or should i use the (N [*] layer) to insert a dwell command?

Any input on this is really appreciated.

[frozen.rabbit]

Min layer time will only slow down the feed rate of your machine, no cooling time of the layer, just slower feed rate over the entire layer.

I haven't used N [*] layer personally, but with the right gcode, I believe that would be the place to put it.

I think you can insert gcode at specific layer heights, but I am not familiar with correct use or values to insert code at every layer.

[PenskeGuy]

What amount of dwell time are you needing?

[0JW]

I was going to try to set the [*] N layers to 1 and use (G04 P240) for 6 minutes of dwell time using Mach3 config set to seconds. I think the G-code might be specific to what you're using as the controller and could be different if using something like ramps.

The welder is going to be switched on by a wire feeder, set as the extruder.
But something I've been trying to figure out is what might be the best way to oscillate the welding wire as its feeding so it won't get stuck. I was going to try to use something like an arduino triggered by the extruder direction pin to constantly switch the state of the extruder direction pin or to an air cylinder. The air cylinder sounds like it would be more reliable due to it not throwing off the amount extruded, but will likely create a lot of vibration.

It would be an amazing feature in Kisslicer if it had an option where you could set some variables of how fast to oscillate the wire and the amount of time it is retracted for.

Any input is greatly appreciated.
Jamie

[PenskeGuy]

6 minutes is far more than what I was thinking of as a solution could provide. This is an interesting application of the tech. However, thinking into the dynamics, it really feels more like a better fit to a fork of the KS code. Too many required operations that are unique to a welding deposit mechanism to warrant adding all of that to the base code of an FDM slicer. KS has strayed far from its original Keep It Simple Slicer concept already. Adding in something this radical really needs to be in a separate application.

[0JW]

I agree. At the moment kisslicer is the best option for doing something like this. That would be amazing if there was a slicer that people could experiment with for metal printing! The 6 minutes is definitely an extreme situation, but id rather be on the safe side and it will also give the welds time to cool. It makes more sense to me having a long dwell considering I intend to build a larger machine than what will fit on a desk and the heat could distort the machine itself if it gets too hot.