After spending two days soldering up connections to RAMPS because I got the wrong opto-end stop connections I finally had all 3 axis and end stops working. After testing the axis I realized that they were stuttering. Kliment, CodeRage and other helpful IRC chatterers determined that my RAMPS stepper motor driver chips were overheating. Not having any 10mm x 10mm heatsinks on hand, I had to get creative.
I began by sawing off one of the corners of the heatsink. Cutting just that corner into quarters would be the perfect size (say that 3 times fast).
Now, trying to quarter this small piece proved most difficult as the Dremel would throw the pieces all over the garage floor to be lost forever. So, I had to tie the pieces down with twine. But, even this proved too much work for the Dremel and I began to just chisel straight through the pieces and clean up the sharp edges afterward.
Now, after all that was done, I used some thermal grease to attach the heat sinks to the ICs on the RAMPS. But, I had too much grease which squeezed all over the circuits on the driver board. I had to clean it all off with isopropyl alcohol. I ended up using painter's tape to protect the circuits.
Now that the heat sinks have had a night to dry, they still aren't fixated well to the circuits. As I was starting to reattach the the driver boards to the shield itself, I noticed that the jumpers which control the micro-stepping were missing! For real utlimachine?! Not only did you skimp on heat sinks which are basically required for the operation of these drivers, you couldn't spare a few cents on jumpers to get the most performance out of my motors? Now I have to wait for a few days while a dozen 6 cent jumpers come in the mail.
Stay away from RAMPS, you will waste too much time trying to fix its shortcomings.
