3D Printer yet?

[Zucca]

annnd I am back....

Finally my Ender5 is back up and running after the relocation to USA.

A few updates.... and gotchas....

remember this problem I had?

My cooler part fan sporadically does not work, it has nothing to do with the new fan installed.
I saw the problem also before.

well this is why...
It drove me crazy for months... now it looks like it is fixed.... double finger crossed....
I had to deactivate the speaker function in Marlin....

If you design a part cooler fan holder.... like I did... see here... print TWO copies... so if one melts down (other story)... then you have a spare to continue to print.

[Zucca]

BTW we made it... we are famous!

https://teachingtechyt.github.io/calibration.html#steppers

in the middle of the page



link to here

[mnementh]

I recently had a forum member ask aboot a 3DP part for the Datalogging IR Transceiver for the Fluke 87-IV/187/189; in response, I whipped up this quick little universal bracket to fit my Benchtop Meter Stand and updated my post in the Replacement Knobs, Feet and Fittings for Test Equipment thread. It provides a 30mm x 50mm flat plate one can use to attach either the OEM IR Module or your own homebrew module with double-faced foam mounting tape or adhesive-backed Velcro strips.

It is bundled together with the correct version of the meter stand in the zip file linked here:

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/replacement-knobs-feet-and-fittings-for-test-equipment/?action=dlattach;attach=1298407

For strength, both parts should be printed 0.20-0.16LH, laying flat on largest flat surface (back of Meter Stand, front face of IR Adapter bracket), and with infill set to yield a grid pattern with 1-1.5mm spacing. Both parts will print well with no supports.

Cheers!

mnem
*3DP-ily*

[mnementh]

annnd I am back....

Finally my Ender5 is back up and running after the relocation to USA.

A few updates.... and gotchas....

remember this problem I had?

My cooler part fan sporadically does not work, it has nothing to do with the new fan installed.
I saw the problem also before.

well this is why...
It drove me crazy for months... now it looks like it is fixed.... double finger crossed....   I had to deactivate the speaker function in Marlin....

If you design a part cooler fan holder.... like I did... see here... print TWO copies... so if one melts down (other story)... then you have a spare to continue to print.

Or a spare printer.     Huh... so you found a actual bug, ehhh?



Nice; you designed your own 'fang. But uhhh... what are the two little rectangular nozzles side x side?

mnem
 

[Zucca]

Nice; you designed your own 'fang. But uhhh... what are the two little rectangular nozzles side x side?

mnem
 

hi mnem, honestly no idea. I tool one 'fang that I liked and fittted to my needs. It prints well PLA. Done for now.
Hoping that TPU will als obe no problem. I will cross the bridge once I'll see it.

[beanflying]

Another whole level of insanity to take your 3D printing further 

[CatalinaWOW]

In my list is doing investment casts using 3D printed forms.  Hasn't made it into this years actual action.  That wall hook is a beautiful piece of work.  With quite a bit of emphasis on work.

[RoGeorge]

A chicken egg is a 3D printer.   

[beanflying]

Contains Naked Naomi 

Depending on pricing per item it might make a lot of sense for me at least to not buy into a Resin printer with all the downsides of DIY mess muck and pong. Nothing I have FDM printed so far has needed more detail or a finer finish but it would open up the option if needed and there is a few jobs that have had to be split into parts to make it FDM printable.

[mnementh]

Boring Mundane Everyday Print #288: Keyboard Tilt Feet   



Been using my Tevo Tornado since we landed stateside in Hartford, CT for all sorts of everyday prints. The latest was for this old HP keyboard stuck in the bottom of a bin forever since one of the rear tilt legs broke. Well, right now it's the only standard keyboard I have to throw on my laptop in the living room; so its time has finally come.

Took me a good 30 minutes to draw this up; I had to figure out how to do those compound fillets. Turned out perfect first iteration, though; even the recesses for the silicone rubber feet. 

Printed on my Tevo Tornado in Inland Brand Purple PLA+ (From 2018!!!), 0.20LH, 60mm/s, 200°C/70°C Bed, no adhesion/supports, hairspray on mirror tile for sticky assist,infill set manually to 3mm grid, 1.2mm top/bottom, 1.2mm wall thickness. Otherwise all Cura defaults. Print time: 38 min total.

mnem
Ehhh... the boi is gaming on my laptop. I'll get you a Frustion360 screencap when I can get to it.

[Bassman59]

Along this line, here are some risers for the Apple Magic Keyboard. I started working from home and the Das Keyboard is way too clicky when someone else is in the room, so I started using the Apple keyboard. It's way too close to the desktop, so these little risers (with rubber bumpers on the bottom) work well.

[RoGeorge]

JWST's mirror actuators are AMAZING!
Breaking Taps

[mnementh]

Boring Just for Fun Everyday Print #312: Sword Gamepiece   



           "Congratulations son; you just printed a... pubic hair."   

I recently unpacked my Creality CR-6SE and have been putting it to work for myself and my son. I recently set up my son's gaming rig as well; so the obvious thing to do was put Frustion360 and Cura on it and start teaching him a useful skill. 




So the other day he decided he wanted a Claymore sword as a gamepiece...     Took me a good 30-40 minutes to draw this up; I had to figure out how to make the handle and quillion. The boi did design the base, but I pretty much had to take over after that. Lots of sketches in weird places. 

Because it is small (base diameter 30mm/75mm height), and I wanted it be sharp-ish looking, and I knew I'd need to get some infill grid inside the blade itself, I decided it was time to get into the finest setting available on the profile for 0.40 nozzle: 0.12mm LH. That's 625 layers!   

So came about a fair bit of work tuning and tweaking the CR6-SE... After reassembling it post-move, I was having accuracy issues and problems with random "missing layer" print faults eventually determined to be under-extrusion; I went through and cleaned/adjusted every roller and tensioner on the thing, as well as tightening up the self-alignment mechanism on the Z-axis leadscrew nuts, and I finally had to go through the extruder as the drive cog had worn a bit dull... 




But all that work paid off... 3rd iteration (first one failed a couple mm above the base; next one completed, but several void layers made it fall apart during removal) printed beautifully. I enabled Tree Supports, then tweaked the TREE settings such that the base and contact areas are a bit oversized.

Note that this can make Cura automatically change from a single largish tree to 2 smaller ones as seen here! hmmmmm...!   



   
And here it is after post-processing. My son and I are both dead chuffed with the results. Honestly, I'm amazed we can get this level of precision from a V-roller build at all. 


Printed on my CReality CR-6SE in Inland Brand Grey PLA+ (From 2018!!!), 0.12LH, 60mm/s, 210°C/60°C Bed, BRIM adhesion 4mm, TREE supports EVERYWHERE, infill set manually to 1mm grid, 0.8mm top/bottom/wall thickness, Bridging Modes Enabled. Otherwise all Cura defaults for CR6-SE profile. Print time: 2 hours 28 min.

mnem

[devflair]

What are peoples thoughts on the Anker 3d printer? I've had all sorts of printers in the past, but seem to be slightly attracted to this one.. not sure I'm going to do the kickstarter though... not got much faith in that!

[Bassman59]

What are peoples thoughts on the Anker 3d printer? I've had all sorts of printers in the past, but seem to be slightly attracted to this one.. not sure I'm going to do the kickstarter though... not got much faith in that!

There's no point in giving them cash now and hoping they'll delivery a good product at some point in the future. Even though Anker is an established brand, why would you want to fund their R&D?

Wait for the products to ship and see what the (hopefully unbiased) reviews have to say before buying.

[mnementh]

My reaction to this is:

It looks like a more polished version of my CR-6SE. All of Andy's usual gripes (and mine) about the "not yet ready for prime-time" nature of hobbyist-grade 3DP were answered by the CR-6SE. 4 bolts and a few cables plugged in and I was literally printing 30 minutes after opening the box. It has fixed bed height with a reliable integrated self-initializing head that needs no "first-layer" zeroing and does automatic 16-point auto-leveling. It has great print quality right out of the box and continues to do so even after oodles of all-day prints. I love the printer; and in all honesty, it already delivered a year and a half ago the "ready for an average non-techy user experience" that the Anker M5 promises now.

What I hate about the printer is the same thing Andy hates most about the M5: KICKSTARTER. And how the company can take advantage of you; because of the terms of the site, they can literally take your money and never deliver jack-shit.

I was an early backer on the CR-6SE, and CREALITY fucked us all. HARD.

They did eventually deliver our printers, but not until AFTER delivering the first several dozen or so containerloads of printers to their wholesalers, and certainly not in the timeframe they promised, by at least 2 months.

We who bankrolled the production of their "new hawtness" languished for 2-6 months while watching other people show off their printers in their hot little hands for about $50 more than we paid via the Kickstarter... sometimes, even less than we paid in cases of "Lightning Sale" customers who got in on a promotion.

In short... Fuck Kickstarter, and fuck any company releasing a 3DP on Kickstarter.

 I watched Alex's review on ShortCircuit; I like his generally leery attitude towards new gear and MFR claims, and I know he knows a fair bit about 3DP, but this was a very cursory examination, not a in-depth analysis of the whole ecosystem. Also, as with most of LTT, his idea of what is a "reasonable price" for things tends towards the upscale end of the market.

While I do like direct-drive hotend & strain-gauge leveling, and the promise of 250mm/S printspeeds (I am highly dubious that it can actually deliver this for any large portion of an average utility-object print) and AI camera print defect detection, this printer is pretty much made entirely of bespoke parts. I see maintenance potentially being a closed-ecology nightmare, and I would damn sure not just throw money at a company who knows they don't have to deliver as promised, especially to supposedly save $60 over retail.

Wait and buy it retail. After real 3DP gurus like Andy, Thomas and Chuck have a chance to use production models firsthand and pass judgement.

If I had the money to spend and they say it delivers, or even mostly delivers on most of its promises, I'd buy it.

Or, if you're in the market for a 3DP right now, or can't justify the $700-800 pricetag, or have a deep abiding dislike/distrust of any closed-ecology tech widget, I'd say buy the CR-6SE. it's about half the price and is mostly made of easy-to-acquire and cheap standard parts.

Here's Alex's vid; he does take the bottom off and you get to see the insides and the milled casting of the base:



mnem
*inspecting some linear actuators for future... projects*   

[mnementh]

Boring Mundane Everyday Print #307: Bed Leg Riser   

      AutoDesk Online 3D Viewer

Simple problem; easy fix with 3DP. We have these beds that are designed to be used without boxspring; they're awesome in that they're just tall enough (~12.5"/320mm clearance) to slide a full-size 57L Sterilite storage bin under. Except when they're not... like on carpet where the bed sinks in a little.

So I designed these polygon block risers to go on the 30.5mm square tube legs; they'll lift the whole bed up 25mm to make up the difference, and will also allow use of some other bins we have that are ~6mm taller than the Sterilite ones.

As these are supporting 2 people, I made all outer surfaces 1.2mm thick, and to ensure good layer adhesion with old, unknown condition PLA filament in .3mm Draft Print Profile, I've dried the filament in my air fryer/dehydrator at 40°C for 4 hours, and set up the print at 210°C hotend and 110% feed rate. These are a pretty high-density print and 65mm tall, so I broke the job up between two printers.

   

Here you can see my Tevo Tornado set up in the basement; for sanity's sake I watch the print using a video baby monitor when I'm upstairs.  Yes, yes, I know about OctoPrint. Not worth the PITA to me when this just works and consumes zero bandwidth.

Printed on my Tevo Tornado in Inland Brand Purple PLA+ (From 2018!!!) AND on my CReality CR-6SE in Inland Brand Grey PLA+ (also from 2018!!!), 0.30LH, 60mm/s, 210°C/70°C Bed, no adhesion/supports, hairspray on mirror tile for sticky assist, infill set manually to 1.5mm grid, 1.2mm top/bottom, 1.2mm wall thickness. Otherwise all Cura defaults. Print time ~15 hours with both printers running, ~625 grams filament total.

mnem

[mnementh]

And of course, no successful project comes to term without something going wrong; in this case, I ignored one of the cardinal rules of enginerdery, and drew up my plans from memory, resulting in a design that was 5mm too effing big.   

Remember boizz and grrlzz... ALWAYS write down your measurements!

Of course, I will find some good use for the reject part!


mnem
This PSA brought to you by angry pixies running down a wire.

[georges80]

I tend to use anderson powerpoles for most of my vehicle 12V stuff, charger cables, water transfer pump, mobile ham chargers, LED lighting etc etc.

So, to that end I've made a bunch of different things to allow easy use of the powerpoles.

From vehicle power outlets to inline switches to powerpole 'expanders'. They get used when I'm out camping in my 4wd.

cheers,
george.

[mnementh]

APP/Sermos connectors... Ewww, yuckyputz! 

mnem
Nice panelwork, tho.

[georges80]

^ Actually, the powerpoles are great for temporary power connections. Since they are genderless and mate with each other, you can easily configure extensions, switches, port expanders etc. Self wiping, high current in a small package, fairly rugged, easy to field maintain if necessary with minimal tools. I used the SB50 stuff for higher current and they are pretty common for 4wd usage.

Powerpoles are common in the HAM area.

For my temporary usage, 12V drill, water pump, camp lights, charging cables for various 12V stuff etc., they are perfect compared to cigarette lighter plugs that are designed to push/fall out

I've used powerpoles on many camping trips out bush and have not found a downside in how I use them.

For more permanent connections, Deutsch/delphi/weatherpack etc are clearly a better choice, especially if subjected to 'weather'.

cheers,
george.

[mnementh]

I have extensive and intimate experience with them; I used to use them racing RC on carpet oval, dirt oval and scale drags. Too fragile, too easy to eff up the leaf-springs inside and then the wiper surface has inadequate tension against the flat of the contact, then their much-vaunted low contact resistance goes to crap.

The one thing I did like about them was being able to stack them and make a permanent multi-pole connector with just a dot of CA on each shell.

mnem
 

[mnementh]

   

Starting small... very small.

As in ~8mm x 19mm x 9mm tall. 



Why is this something new...? This is my first part in TPU with my CR6-SE; actually my first time printing TPU on any printer I own. This is a replacement for missing rubber snubbers in the drawer glides in my big effing toolbox.

Hmmm... this is a very firm TPU; I'd guess Rockwell 90A, maybe harder. Really good for rubber bumpers; I might even use a belt printed of this stuff. Not a cogged/timing belt, but like if I needed a loader belt for a VCR or tape deck... yeah.

The detent action with the new bumpers is excellent... and now I can start sorting all my tools back into my box. 

Printed on my CReality CR-6SE in Priline Black TPU from Amazon, 0.20LH, 20mm/s & 15mm/s, 230°C/45°C Bed, no adhesion/supports, 100% infill, 1.2mm top/bottom, 1.2mm wall thickness, Flow rate 110%.  Otherwise all Cura defaults for CR-6SE profile. Print time ~15 minutes/copy, 1 gram filament.

mnem
*toddles off to sort some tools*

[thm_w]

Yeah amazon says "The shore value of our TPU filament is 98a." So that is quite high, but, also would be easier to print. I used some 95A and it was good for a hard shoe rubber.

Incorrectly assumed all TPU would be the same stuff, obviously not. It looks like the lowest available is 60A: https://all3dp.com/1/flexible-filament-tpu-tpe-tpc-best-brands/

[metrologist]

Did I miss where we are printing our PCB traces by now? I know conductive filament exists but last I read it wasn't a suitable replacement for copper traces.