{"id":5802,"date":"2016-11-29T14:05:20","date_gmt":"2016-11-29T19:05:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jtechphotonics.com\/?page_id=5802"},"modified":"2020-03-05T11:42:45","modified_gmt":"2020-03-05T17:42:45","slug":"reprap-melzi-board-upgrade","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/jtechphotonics.com\/?page_id=5802","title":{"rendered":"Reprap Melzi Laser Board Upgrade"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"RepRapOne of the cheaper boards for building your own 3D printer is the Melzi Board. \u00a0 It is popular among the Prusa I3 builds that a lot of shops offer in kit form. \u00a0We get a lot of requests to see if this board will work with our lasers and the answer is YES! \u00a0We are going to use the same approach that we have on many of the other electronic configurations and use the FAN connection for the laser.<\/p>\n

Details of the Melzi board are here on the RepRap website: \u00a0http:\/\/reprap.org\/wiki\/Melzi<\/a><\/p>\n

Let’s get started!<\/p>\n

Hooking the Laser up<\/h2>\n

Just like the RAMPS 1.4 upgrade, the Melzi board provides nice screw terminals for the connections. \u00a0You can either put the laser driver wires in the same screw terminals as the fan is connected and leave the fan, remove the fan, or use a switch to change between the two. \u00a0Simply connect the laser driver connection from the picture shown below to either the laser driver screw terminal H2 or using a Molex Mini Fit Jr. connector to terminal H4. \u00a0Just make sure to get the “+” and the “-” correctly!<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Software<\/h2>\n

The software is the same for all of the upgrades here. \u00a0The commands to turn on and off the laser are:<\/p>\n

LASER ON: \u00a0 \u00a0M106
\nLASER OFF: \u00a0M107<\/p>\n

Using PWM to control the laser<\/h4>\n

You can have power control as well with the\u00a0Melzi board using Marlin or Repetier firmware. \u00a0Simply use \u201cM106 Sxxx\u201d command to turn on the laser where \u201cxxx\u201d is a number between 0 and 255. \u00a0255 is full power and 0 is off.<\/p>\n