RepRapMicron V0.04 - micron accurate 3D printer

RepRapMicron is the next small thing in 3D printing, brought to you by The RepRap Project. The idea is to create a micron-accurate 3D printer than uses common, cheap parts, and that can be built by the average 3D printer or CNC enthusiast. These files hold all the printable parts needed to make one, and they print without support. See the GitHub wiki for printing minutae and version changes including a print-in-place version called PIKA.

The printer uses a 3D axis system based on flexures, which can achieve precision of a few microns - possibly better with some calibration. Technically, there's a difference between accuracy and precision, but that's a subject for elsewhere. It is controlled by standard 3D printer or CNC electronics, and everyone has their own flavour so the project does not constrain which type you use.

It builds things in UV resin (and other materials) on microscope slides in a 4mm x 4mm x 4mm build volume. It achieves a tiny feature size of 10μm-20μm by using a fine probe tip (easily made by a clever electrolysis trick). The “FAB” image in the photos section has a human hair on the left to show you the scale, and that is at nowhere near full resolution. As the things it makes are so small (a) you need microscopes to see what you're doing, and (b) the probe tip can also be used to manipulate the objects that you have made.

Note: There is a V0.05 in development, and is a great improvement over V0.04 with a linear mechanism and larger working volume. It is quite functional but the documentation is incomplete, and design is ongoing. See the V0.05 Axis Driver model https://www.printables.com/model/1577934-reprapmicron-v005-micron-accurate-axis-driver

The details on making and operating V0.04 are a bit beyond the scope of a Printables summary. The design files can be found on https://github.com/VikOlliver/RepRapMicron and the build documentation is on the wiki there.

Be aware that this is the beginning of a new field, so software to control this new process is in early stages of development. There is no operating manual as such. There are utilities to print in 2D from PNG files, and a very alpha driver for PrusaSlicer.

If you build one, pretty please join the blog at http://blog.reprap.org (yes, that is HTTP) and at least let us know how it went so we can improve the documentation where needed - or post a make here if you prefer.

It is an adventure. Ride the lightning.

Note: Using the V0.04 XY Flexure Table is highly recommended if you've built a V0.03 as there is a fix for an unwanted vertical displacement of approximately 10μm over the working area. Full details of V0.04 updates on Github Wiki