Release - 3D Chameleon MK4 Zapp Edition
Project History
This project has been a long time in the making and i am very happy to finally be releasing this for sale.
Before buying there are a few things I want to make clear so you know exactly what you are getting!
This board is a slightly modified reproduction of Bills 3D Chameleon. After Bill decided to release the plans open source, he explained that he would no longer be producing the Mainboards. Being somone who missed out on these when they were for sale, i decided it was time to dig into the documentation provided. After several weeks of research, i reached out to Bill to ask for permission to reproduce these, to which he responded with a yes.
With this i set out to have a small run produced by a manufacturer. Fast forward a few months later after some testing and we have the finished product ready to ship.
3D Chameleon MK 4 vs 3D Chameleon MK4 Zapp Edition
The 3D Chameleon MK4 is the latest in the lineup from 3D Chameleon and packs the biggest feature set being the final revision. The Zapp Edition expands on this with some revised components and some slight modifications to the software running on the device.
I would like to express that this device can be used as a direct replacement for the 3D Chameleon MK4 in any cases where a unit has failed or an individual wishes to make their own kit. Should Bill ever release a new software / firmware package for the unit, they can be upgraded however 2 single lines of the software will need to be modified when burning to the Zapp Edition.
This may sound like a daunting task but believe me, changing the 2 lines of code is the easy part and if an individual is planning to upgrade the firmware on either of the devices, the burning process itself will be much more involved than the software modification.
The reason why you may ask? The Zapp Edition uses more precise stepper drivers which allow 1/32 micro-stepping, This allows for more precision and finer adjustments with the stepper motors. Because of this the software needs to have those 2 lines modified in order for the board to drive the motors correctly.
Apart from this, the boards are basically identical, and the functionality is the same.
I will make a number of blog posts in the future to answer FAQ’s such as flashing firmware, common issues faced with the 3D Chameleon system and such more, however I would like to also note that the 3D Chameleon forums are a wealth of knowledge in themselves, and the devices are fundamentally the same, so please feel free to have a dig through those forums because anything that has been answered there will relate to the Zapp Edition. You can find a link to the 3D Chamelelon forums below
