Starting my Wilson TS build

I just received my Wilson TS Stretch from Martin Rice.
I will be starting my build tomorrow evening.
It's my first build, so any advice is greatly appreciated.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/30/2015 09:18PM by Michaelj.

I have a Prusa i3 Rework, not a Wilson TS, but I have some general advice Got my printer about a year ago and I have been upgrading and improving ever since.

- Take photos. This way you can understand how you built it later.
- Make sure that you have all of the parts before starting. If you don't have some, you will be disappointed when you have to stop the build.
- Ask questions (on these forums or somewhere else) if you get stuck. Don't do something drastic.... A 6-hour wait to get a question answered is better that a 4-day wait to get a new part shipped.
- And have fun! I loved building my printer just as much as I enjoy using it.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/01/2015 01:00PM by Blue Ice.

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Blue Ice

blog at [contemporarymaker.com]

My advice is to watch all of Marty's videos on YouTube carefully and take your time while assembling your new printer. Remember, this is not a race!

If you find something is not clear don't hesitate to post in the "Prusa i3 and variants" forum below. The Wilson is a variant of the Prusa i3, in fact you could almost follow the instructions for a Prusa i3 to assemble the Wilson.

Good for you. I am new. Currently debating between Folger prusa and wilson ts would you mind tell me how much is the total cost for your printer? I don't see mjrice listing his printer on ebay, did you contact him to place your order? I am sorry if this is off topic

Thank you for the advice will be starting my build today.

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dx3Prints
Good for you. I am new. Currently debating between Folger prusa and wilson ts would you mind tell me how much is the total cost for your printer? I don't see mjrice listing his printer on ebay, did you contact him to place your order? I am sorry if this is off topic

I bought directly from mjrice. Do a search for him on github and drop him an email.
I basically saved the cost of shipping by buying directly from him.
I believe he usually charges $480.00 for the Wilson TS and an extra $60.00 for the stretched version.
I received mine quickly and extremely well packaged.

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Michaelj

I bought directly from mjrice. Do a search for him on github and drop him an email.
I basically saved the cost of shipping by buying directly from him.
I believe he usually charges $480.00 for the Wilson TS and an extra $60.00 for the stretched version.
I received mine quickly and extremely well packaged.

Thanks for the reply. One last question, what is the stretched version?

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dx3Prints

Thanks for the reply. One last question, what is the stretched version?

The bed is 300mm x 200mm instead of 200mm x 200mm

Good info. I, too, follow MJRice on ebay and haven't seen his printer listed in a while.
Good to know one can contact him and buy one.
I'm assuming this way one can have a kit tailor-made to include/exclude stuff
you want/don't want.

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BoriSpider
Good to know one can contact him and buy one.
I'm assuming this way one can have a kit tailor-made to include/exclude stuff
you want/don't want.

Yes, Marty is very accommodating.
Excellent person to deal with.

If you have any question, you can PM me anytime. I finished building mine about a month ago and been using it almost 3-4 time a week.
Assembly is quite easy and the reward is epic. Hope you have as much fun as I do

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andreq
If you have any question, you can PM me anytime. I finished building mine about a month ago and been using it almost 3-4 time a week.
Assembly is quite easy and the reward is epic. Hope you have as much fun as I do

Thank you for the offer. I was planning on getting started this weekend, but things came up. If I have any problems, I will PM you, thank you again. - Michael

Well I got a late start. Actually started today. Took out the parts and started with the Y-axis. My luck, one of the y-axis ends was broken.
I tried Gorlla Super glue it didn't work at all. So, I emailed Marty (he responded within minutes) and he is going to send me out a new piece.
So just gonna have to wait till it comes in. mjrice seems to have excellent customer service, from my experience I would recommend him highly!

I am also building a Wilson TS Stretch. In the couple weeks since it arrived I haven't had an opportunity to work on it much. I finally got a couple hours tonight to get into it and I got the Y axis done! No major problems so far and the parts organization and build videos that Marty provides are great. Keep us updated on how you're build process is coming along. If we're at about the same point in the process we can help each other out. I'm sure I'll have a question or two as I go along.

Here's a picture of what I've done so far and my messy work area, haha.

Well after my first hiccup, a bad y-axis end, which Marty quickly replace I built my y-axis. Only things I found were that I needed to place the linear bearings 87mm from the back on the motor side, otherwise the bearing holders hit the y-axis end before tapping out on the end stop. Also it sounds a bit load and feels gritty, but otherwise moves pretty well. I am guessing better bearings are in the near future. Next I started to build the frame, but my next hiccup, one of the rear frame brackets is broken and the tab is off. I'm waiting to hear back from Marty. I am also ordering some extra M5 x 10 mm screws and t-slot nuts for future upgrades.

Cool. I wasn't sure where to attach the bearings on the mdf so I emailed Marty and he updated the github with a new image showing the mount points and dimensions for the stretch. Mine is fairly loud and gritty feeling as well. I will try to start part 2 tonight or tomorrow.

What upgrades are you planning?

First thing will probably be the bearings, and some supports to better stabilize the printer itself.
After that I'll decide maybe a better extruder or aluminum build plate.

This topic probably belongs in the i3/variants forum. Is there a way to move it?

anyways, I had the same feeling about the bearings and the grittiness. It doesn't get better but it actually doesn't matter once everything is together.

the first things I'm doing is printing all the printed parts so I have duplicates

The only big mistake I made was that I widened the x idler thinking that the bearing holder had to go in there, forgetting that in the update there is an x-idler tension piece that goes in there. But it didn't effect anything.

I had to use my solder station to melt in a few of the nuts but that actually made things much better IMO.

I have been meaning to create a "tips" page on the wiki,

1. on my build the stepper drivers are actually stepsticks and not standard pololu drivers. And they are really low current to start with which is TOTALLY fine because the motors he uses are great. I did adjust the extruder current up a bit but I actually don't think I needed to do that.
2. the bed cooling fan may cause your tip to cool too much. Mine came with the j-head extruder and the fan that blows to the bed and the upper part of the extruder, and it didn't work well. I had to tape over the part blowing on the bed because it was over-cooling the tip. If you have the e3dv6 you should have two fans. you may not want to run the bed one, or run it really low cause it will cause the tip to get cold and filament will stop extruding making you think your motor is not powerful enough. that was a difficult lesson to learn.

I have completed the Y axis and the vertical frame. Now I'm working on the x axis. My main issue is that the bearing holders are far too tight. It was impossible to force the bearings in. I put a file in my drill and filed the inside down a bit and was able to get them in but apparently I should have kept going. I noticed a couple very small cracks between a layer once I finally got them in. I'm going to continue because they are very tiny and I don't think they effect anything.

I had the same problem. I dremeled them out a bit and it helped but it won't hurt anything. I actually ended up wrecking a ball bearing and it didn't hurt anything. It actually spins around the bolt and doesn't really engage the ball bearing anyways.

Klundry how is your build going? Just got my replacement parts from Marty, hope to resume my build tomorrow.

It's going pretty well. I just finished assembly and plugged it in. The fan comes on and the lcd backlight comes on and I get a beep when I push the knob but there is nothing on the screen.

Marty helped me get the lcd figured out. The contrast was just turned all the way down apparently haha. Everything is working correctly now.

It's alive!

nice! so this is the stretch? you get an e3d lite6 or a jhead?

it's big. at least, seeing that board and such. did he send it to you with computer PSU?

Wow, that's awesome, I can't wait to get mine up and running. Good luck

Yeah, it's the Stretch. Kit came with the jhead hotend and a generic psu that has screw terminals to attach wires. Not a computer psu.

I manually fed some filament through the extruder and it looked fine. It was late so I didn't attempt a print yet. I will do that tonight. I'm not sure how close to the bed I'm supposed to get the nozzle though. Anyone have any suggestions for a good bed leveling walkthrough. Marty's videos are great but he doesn't go into much detail about how much distance should be between the bed and nozzle or how to measure that.

Edit: I apologize for my stupidity, I just realized there seems to be a pretty through step by step in the reprap wiki! Hahaha

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/19/2015 12:06PM by klundry.

My first print!

I have to say, I was surprised at how good it came out. It took a few readjustments of the z axis ems stop and compressing the bed springs almost all the way down before it started adhering, but once it did it worked well.

I have found that the glue stick (fresh each print) on top of anything works well, but you actually want the first layer to be pretty close. i calibrate by sliding a piece of paper under the nozzle which i just heard from a friend. So i dunno. I did watch some calibration stuff too.

anyways, my prints were nice out of the box too.

My one suggestion, start printing a second copy of some of the less durable printed parts:

1. extruder idler / filmaent tensioner
2. nozzle clamp (mine broke after a couple days but I was messing with the nozzle).


I am slowly working on a full replacement set of printed parts "just in case" i break something. But I did have to replace both the extruder idler and the nozzle clamp and now have 1-2 duplicates of both.

I leveled the bed with a piece of paper first but it still wasn't close enough. Eventually I tightened down all corners of the bed until the screws were just about fully compressed, then adjusted until the paper was fairly difficult to pull out.

You aren't kidding about printing replacements of those parts. I broke my extruder idler a little bit before I even attempted my first print. It's still functional but I only have one bolt of the two installed to tension the filament. It works but that's first on my agenda to print a replacement for.