/SplineTravel

G-code post-processor to make 3d-printer travel moves along Bezier curves

Primary LanguageVisual Basic

SplineTravel

A g-code filter to smooth out 3D-printing process

What does it do?

It processes G-code programs for 3D printing and replaces straight-line travel moves with smooth curved moves, aimed to avoid the extruder coming to a complete stop before and after the move.

Also, it features a seam prevention technique, similar to Slic3r's "Wipe while retracting", but more comprehensive

How to use

Slice your model with a slicer of your choice. Write g-code to a file. Feed this file to SplineTravel. SplineTravel will write its output g-code into another file. Use this file for printing. See more in Wiki.

Installing

There is a pre-built executable right in the repository. It is more-or-less stand-alone (provided you have VB6 runtime libraries, which are included in most versions of Windows). There is no installer, so far.

  • Download SplineTravel.exe from the repository
  • in the directory you downloaded SplineTravel.exe, create a directory named "presets". This directory will be used by SplineTravel to store preset files. If the directory doesn't exist, SplineTravel will fail to do anything at all (you'll get 'Path not found' errors; to be fixed..).

Building or running from source code

SplineTravel is written in Visual Basic 6. To use the source code, all that is needed is a working installation of VB6 IDE. SplineTravel has no dependencies on external libraries other than VB6 runtime.

Links

Documentation on GitHub wiki: https://github.com/DeepSOIC/SplineTravel/wiki
project page on hackaday: https://hackaday.io/project/7045-splinetravel
Slic3r, the slicer this project is mostly tested with: http://slic3r.org/