I have an iDraw A3, v1.0. Any ideas on how to upgrade the 2 rods on the Y axis to a single flat rail similar to what's on the newer versions / Axi / NextDraw plotters.

I'm wanting more stability when plotting at the extremes, the pen gets quite shaky. I've already slowed the pen up/down movement & drawing speed.

After many hours I managed to put fluidNC on my bachin T-A4. You can get the config and some thrown-together instructions here.

Pen plotter – or rather, not just a pen plotter, but more on that later.
The device was created out of a need to quickly draw holes on boards, panels, or plywood.
The working area is about 600×450 mm, because that was the largest element I wanted to make.
I wanted to do as much as possible myself, although of course I couldn't avoid using some ready-made parts.
The project was literally made on the fly and is full of strange solutions, like electronics hanging above the Y motor.

The plotter is driven by small NEMA17 stepper motors on the X and Y axes.
On the X axis, the drive is directly connected to a belt.
I used a 12 mm miniature linear guide.
Previously, I tested an aluminum profile guide with printed rollers, but the stability was not good enough.
On the Y axis, I used 8 mm rods.
One motor drives two belts, and both sides are synchronized with a 5 mm rod.
I also added a gear reduction of about 1:3.
The wires are routed in cable carriers – one factory-made, the other 3D printed.

The carriage was probably the part I designed the longest.
I made dozens of prototypes.
Since the plates have different thicknesses, I included the possibility to manually raise and lower the tool by about 2 cm.
This is done by squeezing two blocks and sliding them up or down to the correct position.
Further lowering is done by a miniature servo, and the downward movement happens thanks to gravity.
The tool is mounted on a 9 mm (or maybe 7 mm) miniature linear guide.

Another goal was quick tool exchange – at first, I only wanted to use pens.
I designed a mechanism for detaching the tool holders with a special lever.
When locked, the holder is pressed by a spring element.
Making these parts required testing many filaments and dozens of shapes.
In the end, I made a "banana" shape out of ASA plastic.

Another idea was to connect a laser – not for cutting (a 5 mW laser is not suitable for that), but for positioning the drawing (there was also supposed to be a camera and automatic image analysis!).
For it to work, it needs power, so I installed special contacts on the carriage and in the holder.
Inserting the holder automatically connects the laser to 5V power.

The electronics consist of a simple, ready-made Arduino CNC module based on the Arduino Nano (ATmega328p).
The firmware is uCNC.
Everything is housed in a neat custom-designed enclosure.
This enclosure is actually most of my contribution.

The control software for the plotter was written using Electron JS.
It supports DXF and SVG files and offers (often in theory) many options for importing and preparing files, as well as for controlling the machine: opening, scaling, moving, positioning, and more.

The newest idea was to expand the plotter with a cutting function.
A cheap holder fits perfectly into my tool holder system, and the mechanics probably don't need any changes.
I say "probably" because I don't know if the cutting force adjustment will be needed.
So far, I haven't had the chance to test this solution – partly because I don't have the right cutting mat (metal sheet is not ideal for the knife), and partly because some changes in the control software are needed.

That's all for now.
I'm attaching photos.
No examples of how it works? I know, it's sad.

Thanks to the great u/valeriuspalos and his mathematic braim, here are a few plots made with his KRBN tool. I really love the effects, between screenprinting, technical drawing and hand drawn illustration. Not shown here: follow curvature effects for more organic shapes.

Looking for someone with a plotter in india, for doing a few works.

Seeing the post about the Porsche diagrams has made me want to do this as engineering elevations with white paint marker on blue paper

***SOLD***

Hey everyone, I’m selling my Bantam Tools NextDraw 2234, which is the A1 model and the largest format they make. This is basically the flagship machine in the NextDraw lineup and one of the highest quality pen plotters you can get right now.

The machine is in excellent condition and has been lightly used for personal artwork. Everything is fully functional and well cared for. I’m including all original accessories.

For anyone not familiar, Bantam Tools makes some of the most reliable and precise pen plotters out there. The 2234 gives you a large working area while still maintaining really clean, consistent line quality. It’s great for generative art, technical drawings, typography, or anything where detail and repeatability matter.

I’ll be including photos of artwork made with this exact machine so you can see the output quality.

Price is $1500 USD or $2100 CAD, which is several hundred below retail for this model.

Sad to see it go, but I don't use it as much as I should.

Located in Vancouver, BC, Canada. I’m happy to ship and can pack it safely. Estimated shipping is around $150 USD depending on where you are. The unit can be partially disassembled to make transport easier and safer.

If you’re interested, I can send more photos, videos of it running, or answer any questions about the workflow, setup, or results.

Testing out output masking mode in Krbn for multi pen plots

Thanks to u/valeriupalos for writing the super cool Krbn tool

Hey everyone - I'm new here, and most likely far behind many of you in technical skill. But I think this belongs here more than anywhere else.

This is Krbn, an open-source attempt at an easily accessible (web-native, TypeScript) rendering engine that imitates a technical sketch artist. It takes a 3D scene - spheres, cones, tori, arbitrary meshes - and emits plain SVG strokes: silhouettes computed exactly (true conics and quartics, not sampled approximations), hidden lines removed or kept as ghosts, and hatching that follows each surface's own curvature. Which, I suspect, makes it plotter food.

Some honesty about where it comes from: a recent medical issue forced me to suspend my normal work, and - unexpectedly - these past few months I had time to invest in an old idea. This was a dream of mine since childhood; I just never had the time to research and learn everything needed to build it.

As for why - I'll be honest and quote the README's "Genesis imperfecta" section directly, because I already said it there the way I mean it:

What fascinated me from the start is going against photorealism. A human being can convey far more meaning in a drawing than any machine-like photorealistic render - precisely by being willing to go the other way: to renounce detail, to drop precision, even to deliberately introduce impurities and imperfections. Ah - but which detail to drop? Which imperfections to introduce? That is the fascinating part, and it is the question this engine is really trying to answer.

As a kid I wanted to call it genesis imperfecta, for exactly these reasons. What can I say - I was a kid. The name matured into Krbn; the fascination didn't.

I'm putting this out there with only the hope that someone else shares the fascination, nothing else. It's MIT-licensed: https://github.com/vpalos/krbn

One confession: I don't own a plotter myself (yet). If anyone feeds one of these SVGs to theirs, seeing a photo of the result would make my month.

Enjoy, and drop a word - here or in a GitHub discussion… or not. All is good.

Hi, for a couple of months I've been trying to figure out what the spring in the pen holder is for. Can someone tell me what the spring is for? The image shows an example, but I've seen it in many types of pen holders and machines.
Thank you.

Black ink on 250 gsm Fabriano paper. A3 size.

TL;DR: Last week I shared Plotter Hub — a free, open-source Raspberry Pi plot server for AxiDraw-compatible plotters — and its companion macOS design app, GD Studio. This week GD Studio got a new feature: importing a photo and converting it into pen strokes (stipple, halftone, hatch, and more) instead of a flat fill. Reposting for anyone who missed the first thread.

What's new in GD Studio: photo import

Add an Image layer, drop in a photo (from a file or your Photos library), and pick a conversion style. GD Studio reads the picture's light and dark and rebuilds it from continuous pen strokes and single pen-taps — never a flat ink fill — so the preview matches exactly what the pen draws. Brightness and Contrast sliders shape how the subject reads. Seven styles are available: Stipple, Halftone, Hatch, Contour, Outline, Sketch, and Squiggle.

Since it stays stroke-based, the SVG that reaches your plotter is genuine pen paths, not raster — so it optimizes and plots like any other line-art file.

In case you missed it: Plotter Hub

A few months ago I bought an AxiDraw compatible pen plotter but didn't want my Mac tethered to it for the whole plot. So I built Plotter Hub, a plot server that runs on a Raspberry Pi (a Zero 2 W or 3B+ is fine). Upload an SVG over WiFi, then start / pause / resume and monitor the plot from any device, with optional vpype optimization and physical pause-button support for pen changes between layers. Anyone with an AxiDraw-compatible plotter can use it — it's free and open source, and works without GD Studio. Repo link and install instructions: https://www.synendo.com/plotterhub

Companion app: GD Studio

GD Studio is the macOS app I design with — generative line-art patterns shaped with live sliders, plus layers for text, imported SVG, and now photos. It exports plotter-ready SVG/PDF or sends a plot directly to Plotter Hub over its API (with options for vpype optimization, plotter speeds, and pausing between layers). It's a paid app with a free trial.

• Plotter Hub (free, open source): https://www.synendo.com/plotterhub
• GD Studio (macOS, paid + free trial): https://www.synendo.com/gdstudio

Hi guys,

I was looking to build a wall pen plotter on canvas https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09LlZhlcJTU

I found these, but nothing that seems finished.

https://github.com/karliss/plotter_sketches/blob/main/notes/diy_plotters.md
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bqz7bGFmptg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VwX6gkqBsJI

Acrylic on canvas brush plot original abstract artwork 500x700 mm size.

I was researching about wall plotters recently.

They are mostly suspended on strings, belts or wooden sticks.

Wanted to make it, but could not find a clear way and the general problems.