A note from our 3D Printing Steward:

I have great news.  The Type A-printer upgrade is complete!

It now sports automatic-bed-leveling just like the Prusa.  Just slice, transfer the gcode the SD card, and print.  No fiddling with leveling screws. I’ve done some testing and am confident it’s ready to go.  Please let me know if you discover otherwise.

I’ve updated the Type-A wiki page and 3D printing 101 docs.  Unfortunately I hit a snag trying to update the files on our wiki. Until we sort this out, please use the 101 doc and printer profile uploaded below. (This new profile is already installed on the 3D print computer; you only need it if you slice from your own laptop.)

You will need to read the updated 101 PDF; the filament-change interface is amazingly stupid.

This was a team effort.  Huge thanks to Mark Wells and Austin Young.  They answered the call a couple weeks back to help out.  Austin made the new aluminum bed, while Mark figured out the wiring for the inductive probe.  I updated the firmware, and learned a great deal in the process.  It was more confusing than I’d expected.

Thanks for your patience during the down-time.  I think you’ll find this is a huge step in usability, and well worth the wait.

For more on 3D printing, join the #3dprinting channel or contact @mkeveney on Slack.