Ultimaker Diamond

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The intent of this page is to describe how to upgrade the Ultimaker Original to having a three extruders and a Diamond Hotend. The Diamond mounting bracket for the Ultimaker is a little different from the one on the Diamond Hotend page (pictures and actual file is on its way).

Upgrading the Ultimaker Original for the Diamond Hotend

Apart from mounting the actual hotend you need to drill some new holes in the wooden frame in order to move the endstops a little towards the center of the machine:

  • Xmin: 36 mm
  • Ymin: 12 mm
  • Ymax: 15 mm

..and yes, this will obviously result in a slightly smaller printable area, sorry about that.

13.5% on Y axis and 18% on X axis equals to around 29% overall area reduction. You gain some, you lose some.. :)

Parts needed

  • The Diamond Hotend
  • Heater cartridge
  • Thermistor
  • 3 pcs E3D v6lite, bowden tubes, extruders etc.
  • Braided Sleeve
  • Printed Ultimaker Diamond Cooling Shield (see list on bottom of page)
  • 5015S Radial Blower Fan
  • Zip ties
  • Etc. (list not complete)

Replacement electronics

External stepstick version

An additional stepper driver could be mounted next to the existing Ultimaker Electronics. To do this, the following changes are to be made on the original Ultimaker Electronics PCB.

  • Add an extra stepstick to the vacant slot
  • Cut away a piece of the black plastic air guide
  • One of the following:
    • Soldering in the position of EXP3, attach a 8 pin male pinheader (90 deg angled) to the rear side of the PCB (on the same side as the MEGA, pointing away from the MEGA)
    • Soldering in the position of EXP4, attach a 5 pin male pinheader (90 deg angled) to the rear side of the PCB (on the same side as the MEGA, pointing away from the MEGA)


Next you will need to attach an external stepper driver to drive the third extruder motor for instance the StepperExpander (soon to be released).

  • Attach it close to the Ultimaker electronics EXP3 or EXP4 (whichever you chose in the above steps)
  • Power supply wires can be connected to the LEDs pinout or spliced into the existing cooling fan's wiring
  • Arrange the external driver so that it can be properly cooled. A small fan connected to the external driver's power supply terminals should be sufficient


Rumba version

If you are also replacing the original Control Board with RUMBA, follow the steps below:

How the RUMBA PCB is mounted How the RUMBA PCB is mounted

Note: some of the original plugs (motors and andstops) does not fit a RUMBA and needs to be cut off, then the wires should be stripped.

  • Mount the board like on the picture using 4 pcs nylon adhesive PCB spacers
  • The stripped motor wiring can be mounted directly into the RUMBA screw terminals (it is best to use ferrules on the bare wire). Alternatively mount some DuPont 2.54mm plugs, Molex KK 2.54mm plugs or similar plugs (4-pin) and plug them onto the on-board pinheaders.
  • The stripped endstop wiring needs to be mounted using DuPont 2.54mm plugs, Molex KK 2.54mm plugs or similar plugs (2-pin)
  • All the microstepping switches needs to be set at 16 x microstepping (on-on-on), except for the Z-axis which needs to be set at 8 x microstepping (on-on-off)
  • A USB-B break-out cable can be screw-mounted from the inside of the printer casing, through the hole where the USB cable would usually plug in.
  • Using thick wires, mount an external DC barrel jack receptable in one of the holes
  • Upload the Marlin for Ultimaker Diamond (RUMBA version)
  • Make a 12 volt splitter cable or join the wires from the original radial fan that cools the electronics with the wires from the Diamond Hotend cooling fan and mount them using a DuPont 2.54mm plug, Molex KK 2.54mm plug or similar plug (2-pin)

Ulticontroller adaptions for non-Ultimaker electronics

If there is a display controller on your printer:

  • Carefully pry open the EXP2 IDC plug using an X-acto knife, an awl or other sharp/pointy instrument (or just cut it off and buy a new 2x5 pin IDC connector)
  • Dismount the wire on pin 8 (when counted from the corner with the triangle symbol) from the IDC plug and reassemble the rest of the plug.
  • Make (solder) an adapter board that can convert 5 volt from the ICSP header into 3,3 volt for the SD-card reader. Then connect the output to the dismounted wire from EXP2 pin 8.

How the RUMBA PCB is mounted How the RUMBA PCB is mounted How the RUMBA PCB is mounted

BOM-list for the 3,3 volt adapter board:

  • 3x3 size or larger single sided 1-hole island PCB
  • 2x3 Dupont female PCB header for connecting with the ICSP header
  • 3,3 volt low dropout IC voltage regulator (like AP7313, LT1086-3.3 or similar in functionality)
  • Short wire to connect GND of the ICSP header to GND of the regulator IC

Printed parts

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