Showing posts with label picocom. Show all posts
Showing posts with label picocom. Show all posts

Monday, 31 December 2018

Speaking GCode directly to your 3D printer in Linux when it requires a custom baud rate

I recently impulse bought a 3D printer from Aldi. The Cocoon Create Model Maker HE170707. It's a rebrand of the Wanhao Duplicator i3 Mini. I'm slowly learning how to use it, and how to interact with it.

To date, I've been slicing in Cura and then exporting to SD card, then loading that into the printer, but today I started playing around with sending GCode directly to the printer. Eventually I want to update the version of Marlin it's running, but before I do that, I want to see what settings/version etc. the printer is running.

Cura can see the printer, and can send it basic requests - but it won't show me the printer's responses to particular GCodes, which I want to see. The inbuilt USB to serial adapter the printer uses is locked at 250,000 baud and this isn't supported by minicom.

I did some Googling, and in the end, I found out that I could instead use picocom. It's a very simple, cut down serial terminal package.

WARNING: Don't send commands to your printer if you don't know what they do. Read the instructions first. You change things at your own risk!