help-with-3dprinting

[faint sky]

i have a nema23 but going to use it with a feather m4 or rp2040. might be overkill but i wanted something with torque to pull a heavy fabric curtain.

[balmy pulsar]

you still need a driver

[shy kelp]

and by using math, it was the right answer

I guesss that I can try to make it a little bit more untill he does it right or idk

[balmy pulsar]

O_o

nt sure what you are doing, it has to be right, there is no "little bit more"

its either right or wrong

[shy kelp]

I mean by either using calculator online or the forumula with an offline calc, I get the same result, so idk

(which is 160x, 160y)

[balmy pulsar]

ok. and it isnt moving right?

[shy kelp]

sorta of, it stops before coming to the edge, of the bed, so the area that it uses is kinda offsetted

[balmy pulsar]

home switch not in right spot

[shy kelp]

I've tried to play with m206/offset thing but nothing

I'll try to put a piece of something between end axis and the switch so it starts linear to the bed, maybe

thanks

[shy kelp]

nope it does great, but now it probes outside the bed

[empty sedge]

@shy kelp sounds like you're setting up marling from scratch. You can adjust a probe XY offset and also the min and max values for each axis.

Verify your axis move distances are matching what you expect by measuring a 100mm move, preferably with digital calipers but a ruler is probably close enough

marlin config.h and config_adv.h has a ton of settings to adjust. You can also set the probe offset X/Y positions and more

Usually I'd bounce between editing marlin config and pronterface/printrun when setting up a new printer that way

[cunning hound]

in general doing things like putting pieces of stuff between the end axis and the switches should be an absolute last resort, You're jumping to weird solutions immediately instead of trying to fix things the right way. That will just cause more issues that you then have to fix later.

[shy kelp]

I think that I found the issue
for some reason it was saving the config file somewhere else, so when compiling it was compiling the old stuff

[patent sonnet]

I have finally bought a 3D printer - a Creality Ender-2 Pro (small and portable but with a big enough printbed for 99% of things I might do). Can anyone recommend decent filament (UK based)
also - if I have larger prints - do I design them split or can slicing software do it for me?

[balmy pulsar]

best to split manually in some logical way

with registration

[cunning hound]

slicing software CAN do it for you, but it does it in a pretty dumb way.

Agree with nofish that it's best to do it yourself unless you can't for some reason

[balmy pulsar]

as for filament, i use filaments.ca (cause they are local) but i think they are also good for international.

[patent sonnet]

so the slicing software literally does a "cut it". right. will have a look at Noe and Pedros videos, etc

[balmy pulsar]

yeah. just a bounds or a plane slice.

not strictly helpful for putting them back together

[cunning hound]

it does treat the cut edges as surface, so you'll get wall thickness there. you can glue them together. It works better than nothing, if it's someone else's model, you only have the stls, and it's not worth spending a lot of time

for anything you care about or are designing youself, there should always be a better option

[shy kelp]

the warped bed shouldn't give issues with bed bilinear

?

[iron remnant]

I mean, it's still something to get all bent out of shape over.

[median iron]

Good morning

ive been chasing weird problems on my printer for weeks. i've got it tuned in pretty well, except for this one weird one

well, two.

1: when there is a sharp direction change, i get what appears to be a reaction in the opposite direction of movement,

you can see it there. I've tried an accelleration test, changing the values from 1000mm/s^2 up to 3k, by 200 increments:

but no real change in quality.

the second problem im chasing is the quality of the walls, you can see in the last image they are smooth (enough)

but you can see the reverse here, the walls are quite rough.

I've calibrated my e steps on the extruder, and it appears that my problem can be best described as:

1. on layer change, innitial extrusion is "not good", but improves with distance traveled
2. on direction change there is some kind of, "not ringing" recation to direction change, irrespective of previously traveled distance

printer is a voxelab aquilla x2 running marlin 1.3.5

material is pollyterra pla printing at 200 deg c, at 60mms , speed has not seemed to effect the print

[shy kelp]

isn't 100C too low to make a reflow?

because the sd port randomly stops reading the sd, but if I do put the board for a while under the bed at 100C , it will get back to work normally, for a while at least
then the problem starts again and I'll loop like this

[empty sedge]

Your walls look terrible. You definitely have something not great with your extrusion path.

The wave after corners is ringing. It’s partially something with your motion system like loose belts or lacking rigidity in your frame. You can spend days tracking this down or just print slower. I’d search YouTube for suggestions for that.

Back to the extrusion it’s like your filament is being pushed too hard and your drive gear isn’t round and there’s at least one more thing loose on the extrusion path.

That said I would try 210C or 215C hotend first

[balmy pulsar]

ringing is unavoidable to a point, but if everything is tight and your jerk and acceleration are tuned to something sensible, it should be minimised.

some of the rest i am not sure what im looking at

[cunning hound]

Wait... what? What precisely is 100C? What material are you trying to print? You're putting your control board ... under your bed which is at 100C? That's not a good idea. Am I just completely misunderstanding what you're saying?

[shy kelp]

partly

I mean to time to time the sd/lcd board (they are under the same piece of pcb) doesn't read the sd card, I randomly found that by heating up the bed and then placing the lcd/sd board up to it for a while fixes the problem for a while

[balmy pulsar]

the sd card issue in the anycubic machines is common. bad contacts. The heat is not likely related. however, heat can cause the board to expand and contract, causing solder joints to break. nothing is melting, just cracking.

[cunning hound]

The only reasons I can think that might happen are all reasons where the board is gonna fully fail eventually

Yeah, bad solder joints being affected by the heat was my main thought

but as they continue to shift with use it'll eventually probably stop working

[shy kelp]

so what should I try? to check up for connections and then resolder?

[cunning hound]

If you feel comfortable doing so. I don't know how hard that resolder job is. But if fish's statement is right and it's a known issue, there are probably guides/videos online about it to help you see if you're comfortable doing it

If this printer is mission critical for you I'd get a backup control board ASAP on standby

[balmy pulsar]

mine works, until some point in the print and stops. i assume it only stops for a microsecond, but thats enough to crash it

my understanding is it might be corroded

not due to the heat

but... hard to know

as everything checks fine when you go to test it

[stuck trail]

umm, anyone have any advice on handling exhaust filtering? I have a enclosure and options for exhaust fans but I don't know what would be required to filter properly, I know a lot of filaments are safe but I want to filter anyway.... I would like to filter and not exhaust out of the house by window as I rent and print on the first floor of my townhouse and I wouldn't feel safe with the windows opened up with a cutout...

idk what kind of filter I should be looking at for these types of fumes and I see a lot of clashing information online

please reply or ping me if someone responds to me, as I may not notice it otherwise

[faint sky]

@stuck trail something like this? https://www.amazon.com/WEN-3410-3-Speed-Remote-Controlled-Filtration/dp/B00LPD9BDI/

[stuck trail]

well, more like I am unsure what grade filter is needed to scrub out any gasses/fumes that are bad from filament? like I know carbon filters get smell and allergens but idk about fumes

[balmy pulsar]

i think you want a similar system to what they use for laser cutters. obviously you wont have 1/100 the fumes, but check what filter types they use.

[cunning hound]

carbon filters is what most people use. though I agree with you that the trustworthy documentation on such things is pretty sparse. You have a lot of people asserting without evidence that the fumes aren't enough to be bad, and a lot of people asserting that any amount is borderline deadly. I honestly don't know where the truth lies, except it's probably inbetween those two extremes

And definitely depends on what kind of filament you're using. I personally print PLA without any filters at all and without worrying too much. I'm planning on gettin g at least a basic setup going before I touch ABS/ASA though

[exotic echo]

@stuck trail My main concern about 3d printing plastic "fumes" is ultrafine particles (UFP) that are 0.1 µm or smaller. Which most filter media will not capture, as even Hepa filters do not capture dust particles below 0.2 µm , and carbon filters do not capture particles below 0.5 µm. Filters that can capture this small particle size tend to be prohibitively expensive for us hobbyists. As i only have one set of lungs, i have opted to vent my printer with a fume hood via a nearby window, and i suggest doing the same.

Here is my setup

[stuck trail]

thanks for the reply, this was what I was honestly thinking would end up being the case, I will setup a exhaust like this that can be placed and removed from the window I guess, currently only have been printing with PLA but I know the risks so yeah.... rather unfortunate, I may see if I can take advantage of my dryers exhaust port or something as another option to consider X/

carbon filters I know would remove smells, but the smell was never my concern after all

[bronze iron]

Im new to 3D printing world so Im looking to 3D print tmnt 1988 tmnt figure weapons. I cant really find anything in google search so May be someone can help me find a site with the proper diagrams or whatever to 3D Print them

[balmy pulsar]

etsy, thingaverse are good places to search for miniatures stl files

there should be lots though

search tmnt 3d stl or some such

its also possible noone has ever made any and youll need to do it yourself

[bronze iron]

Ahh okay thanks

Is it common to pay for a layout?

[balmy pulsar]

If you can find someone. the issue is a true one off modelling job can be very expensive (100's or even thousands of dollars). You might find someone that will sell it on their own so you only have to pay a smaller percentage.

[bronze iron]

Alright

[plain bough]

On every print I do, the purge line fails to bind to the bed and gets dragged into the print area (1st pic). The prints still end up ok mostly (2nd pic) but occasionally the whole print will either shift or get dislodged from the bed because of it. What can I do to prevent this? Maybe a higher bed temp for the first layers?

[empty sedge]

And/or adjust your first layer height or brand of filament

[empty sedge]

Can you post a close up of the bottom of a print?

[balmy pulsar]

generally, this is from being too cold as it starts printing.

i get it sometimes, i just watch for it and try to clip it off (dont pull it, it will pull everything with it)

[plain bough]

Here’s the bottom of that same Benchy from my first post and a crate I printed today. The gaps are because of a dumb slicer setting I tried but you can see the stringing really well on it too.

[empty sedge]

Your first layer is too high off the bed.

[empty sedge]

It should look more like this. No gaps between beads and they aren’t buckling under each other.

[plain bough]

Thanks. I’ll get it lowered and try again tomorrow.

[subtle junco]

@plain bough which Ender printer is that?

[plain bough]

It’s an Ender 3 with a CR Touch bed level sensor.

[subtle junco]

ive got the Ender 3 Pro and my x-axis belt is meant to lay flat in the aluminum track. not sure if it's different for the Ender 3

just a thought

here's the diagram for how mine is set up

its underneath the wheels

[cunning hound]

Yeah, that belt path doesn't seem right at all. That said, the specific print issue shown is definitely height off bed.

Rule of thumb is that any belt segment that changes length must be parallel to its movement.

[balmy pulsar]

yeah that belt is wrong, but, i agree i dont think thats anything to do with the print issue

[plain bough]

I always thought that looked weird. Guess I’ve got another thing I have to fix. 🤦‍♂️ Thanks!

[plain bough]

OMG you guys. I re-routed my belt, installed a magnetic bed, re-leveled, and experimented with Z offset. And now my first layers look like this. 😍

[plain bough]

Next I need to figure out how to print faster. I typically use Prusa Slicer's built-in Ender 3 profiles, and I start/manage all my print jobs from Octoprint on a Raspberry Pi. Any advice?

[balmy pulsar]

faster is about strategy and compromises

bigger nozzles, fatter layers

at the trade of less resolution

some other things are counter intuitive as well, like walls and infills.

[iron remnant]

Yeah, there's a lot of fairly hard limits to any sort of bed-slinging printer.

One avenue to explore is nozzles.

A considerable amount of things print just fine on a 0.6mm nozzle, especially with Arachne set in the latest PrusaSlicer versions.

I've got some BondTech CHT nozzles and they can lay down a considerable amount of material quickly, it's just that you have limits on how much detail you can print.

And some folks are doing interesting stuff with Klipper which has better motion control such that it can print even faster, but that's right now a lot of setup trouble.

Also, there's such a thing as design-for-speed-of-printing. If you have a long rod sort of thing, it'll print faster on the side than it will standing up vertically.

[coarse thistle]

I'm not sure if this is the right place to ask about SLA/MSLA printing, but is there a way I can print a 0.5-1mm thick part flat on the bed and get it mostly transparent? I've noticed some parts with a flat top and bottom turn out mostly transparent when looking straight down the print, so maybe printing a thin part like that can get it almost perfectly transparent?

[balmy pulsar]

internally i think it will be clear, you might just have to polish the surfaces

[subtle junco]

very glad to hear it. Happy printing!

[hot fulcrum]

I just switched my printers bed to glass and now I cant print without the bottom of the print warping and the corners coming off the bed, any ideas? Should I turn up or down the temperature?

[cunning hound]

Sometimes up, sometimes down. There's also two temperatures, the nozzle and the bed. Is it warping immediately, after a few (3-5) layers, or much later than that?

[hot fulcrum]

much later than that

like the first layers look great and then ill get home and its a banana

[iron remnant]

That might be a case where you want to add some PVA gluestick or hairspray

[cunning hound]

I am of the opinion that gluestick is a bandaid, and you want to find the real issue. But people do have good results with it. There's a setting in your slicer that can keep the part cooling fan off for a few layers, it usually defaults to somewhere around 3 to 5. If it's well after that, I would try increasing the temp of the bed.

[balmy pulsar]

glue stick (pva) is an intermediary, it adhered to glass, and it adhered to, for examlpe, nylon

plain glass with no coating does not adhere to much

so you need an intermediary

i have anycubic glass bed with a coating. PLA sticks very well

[empty sedge]

I've pulled shards out of glass with PLA and PETG. I wouldn't recommend printing directly on bare glass.

[balmy pulsar]

ive heard this with petg on the anycubic beds. i havent seen it though.

i dont use much petg though

[iron remnant]

I mostly use PETG.

(Or nylon or TPU or PETT)

PETG on regular old glass is specifically warned against by a lot of people. I've not heard PLA doing that, but I guess I'm not super-surprised really because glass is a finicky material with catastrophic failure modes.

On a glass bed I like 3M 2090 blue tape and a little bit of gluestick, especially around the seams.

[balmy pulsar]

"plain" glass shouldnt be used at all. should be borosilicate (pyrex)

[iron remnant]

I am not taking bets on what your average glass 3D printer bed is made of. 🙂

[balmy pulsar]

i use pva glue for nylon. it wont stick at all without it

haha

fair

[iron remnant]

Yeah, I just switched to a Garolite bed.

And, yeah, nylon won't stick without some PVA.

[balmy pulsar]

alot of companies (anycubic included) and doing flex beds (pei?).

i see how they would be much more user friendly

[iron remnant]

So far G10, while not being flexy to get the things off, is actually pretty good. Although I've never tried a magnetic flex bed because it's not easy to reverse if I didn't like it.

But, yeah, I think the important advice is really that you shouldn't use PVA glue as a substitute for actual proper bed tramming/leveling, z-offset settings, and bed temperature... but there are a ton of cases where PVA or other bed adhesion additives are really handy.

[cunning hound]

Yeah, I've only ever printed on borosilicate and have had no issues with pla. Haven't done petg and have definitely heard the warnings. I don't doubt there may be times when glue stick is actually needed. I just have a reason to glue stick being the default recommendation. A lot of the time there's an underlying issue that glue stick merely covers up rather than fixes.

If you know enough to say my bed is x material and y thermoplastic doesn't stick to that, you're fine. That's going a bit further than just defaulting to glue

[half dew]

PETG was horrible on glass for me. PLA wasn't consistent either. I'm back to the magnetic plate and the biggest improvement was getting a machined bed thats actually flat

Glue on the bed is weird - its one of those things I wish the industry would just leave behind - but there are times its used to make things releasable rather than stick

[hot fulcrum]

Im using a brim now and that seemed to work well with pla and im seeing how it performs with abs

My bed level and height is really good from what I can tell

im trying to print ABS at 220 hotend and 85 on the bed

[balmy pulsar]

abs needs a heated enclosure

abs/acetone slurry helps it stick, but it will warp without an enclosed chamber now matter what

like, it will just warp the bed

some tricks you can use if bottom finish isnt important is raising it up on some supports. this gives it a flexible platform

also, i print abs with 100 bed and 230-240

220 is a bit cold

depends if its real abs though, or a "abs like blend"

[hot fulcrum]

Ugh that is frustrating thanks for the help though

[subtle junco]

Not sure what printer you have, but I had a ton of trouble getting prints to adhere to the glass bed of my Ender 3 just printing PLA. A glue stick seemed to be the only thing to somewhat work, but I ended up going back to the magnetic bed in the end. Might be worth a revisit though, I recently learned that there could be a good bit of air pushed onto the print by the extruder fan even if the part cooling fan is off for the first few layers. Enough to cause warping and adhesion issues. A strip of Kapton might be enough to block that airflow from hitting the print.

[fading viper]

Curious if anyone here has the capability to convert .f3d file to .stl? I'm interested in using an STL of this featherwing to design a case for it and a screen.

https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CAD_Parts/tree/main/3632 Joy FeatherWing

[balmy pulsar]

fsd is a fusion file. install fusion, open, then export as stl

[fading viper]

Is it free to use it for that? I've never used fusion before

[vestal thicket]

@fading viper Fusion360 is free for hobbyists

You can have 10 active / open projects at a time, than you have to archive one to create a new one, etc. That's the only catch

[balmy pulsar]

theres more catches, lots of disabled features. but still fine

[cunning hound]

Yeah, the disabled features is the hard limit. The active files thing is just an annoyance since you can toggle between active and archived at will

But the disabled features are mostly more advanced stuff. Your average user will never need the advanced stuff

[balmy pulsar]

disabling colab was the big one. disabling rapids for cnc another.

i mean, you get what you pay for, so you cant complain

[gusty shuttle]

does anyone have experience with Tungsten Carbide nozzles and PLA?

[elder oxide]

Sounds expensive

[gusty shuttle]

there's some 50 usd nozzles, I want a buy once and forget nozzle

[balmy pulsar]

im skeptical

nozzle are consumables, youre just goin gto throw it out like all the other. just maybe in a longer time frame

[cunning hound]

colab I don't personally have much use for and it mostly seems like a feature you'd use once you got large enough to where paying makes sense. rapids on cnc is something I didn't know was disabled. that one might suck.

[balmy pulsar]

colab is sharing projects. it wa skinda most of the point when fusion fist came out

[cunning hound]

I can export as f3d and share it through a variety of means if I just want to share. Collab is more for having more than one person doing work seamlessly, right?

[balmy pulsar]

no

i mean, it could be used that way, but no, mostly it is to simply share. you make shared folders and other people can access. like for example my mchinist

[elder oxide]

I mean, tungsten carbide would degrade at a much slower rate than brass or stainless steel nozzles would.

But I’m not sure if justify spending $50 for one

[balmy pulsar]

it also has lower thermal conductivity so will probably clog more

[elder oxide]

Most of what I’ve seen is it works as well thermally as brass

[cunning hound]

So collab is functionally similar to just throwing the f3d file on github, but a lot more conveinent and built in. Don't have to remember to commit on my end, and update on their end

[elder oxide]

I personally don’t print enough to justify a $50 nozzle that will get used maybe two to three times a month. Especially when I can buy a pack of 50 assorted brass nozzles for like $10

[balmy pulsar]

kinda yeah

i bought a steel nozzle and it just clogged on the first print and was ruined

petg

[elder oxide]

I haven’t replaced my nozzle in maybe a year so if that tells you anything

Stainless steel requires different heat settings to work properly

[balmy pulsar]

not stainless

[elder oxide]

Even steel would too, so regardless you need different PID profiles

[cunning hound]

I haven't seen compelling evidence for nozzles beyond the cheap ones and the slightly harder ones for abrasive materials. The ruby ones for example, last I saw someone do a deep dive, seemed to be mostly hype and expense

[balmy pulsar]

if all you print is pla you might go years on one nozzle. switching mats especially petg and nylong will just ruin them

for abrasives, thats a dfifferent topic

[elder oxide]

I’ve heard that tungsten nozzles are great if you print with nylon and similar materials.

But I don’t because I don’t have good enough ventilation for that

[balmy pulsar]

nylon clogs constantly with brass nozzles.

biggest issue

every 2nd print its ruined basically

(taulman bridge)

[cunning hound]

longer lasting nozzles might be a valid thing to chase if you have a print farm and have like 20+ printers constantly running. for a hobbyist though cheap nozzles last long enough it's probably not worth worrying about

[elder oxide]

That’s what I’m saying, I print too little to make it worth while, and likely most people couldn’t justify it

[iron remnant]

I mean, I guess the "get it and forget it" aspect is kinda lost on me because my hot-end (Slice Engineering Mosquito) makes it easy to swap nozzles, but I've pondered the $50 tungsten carbide nozzles.

[elder oxide]

Just like all metal hot ends usually are not worth the upgrade

[iron remnant]

I need to actually finish the blog articles I have on 3D printing based on my present experiences before I'd pay $50 just to try one out.

I have noticed that the Slice Engineering Vandium nozzles are not as good as brass for non-abrasive filaments, tho.

[elder oxide]

I might get one if I built the ventilated enclosure I have planned

[balmy pulsar]

all metal is necessary for high temp, but is otherwise a terrible choice

[elder oxide]

Because I want to try nylon and carbide PD

[balmy pulsar]

bridge nylon is at the border for teflon

[cunning hound]

makes sense, the hardened nozzles cannot use the materials that are best for thermal conductivity, as they are either too soft or WAY too expensive

[balmy pulsar]

245

[cunning hound]

it's a tradeoff and you aren't gonna get the best of both

[elder oxide]

Indeed

[balmy pulsar]

hard anodised aluminium would be the most heat resistant slippery thing.

[cunning hound]

if you want endless bling, why not pure diamond? /s

[balmy pulsar]

ha

[cunning hound]

diamond is VERY good for thermal conductivity, actually

[balmy pulsar]

cause at elevated temps diamong gives off carbon to steel and plastics

so its actually not good

[cunning hound]

oooh, I didn't know that.

I figured it was just a cost thing

[balmy pulsar]

thats why you cant use cnc diamond tooling on steel

now, im not sure if 250c counts as elevated really

cnc cutting interface is more like 1000+

i always find if funny to think that at 20c (room temp) aluminium is all soft and weak cause it is too hot. it's like 3x stronger at -60c

[iron remnant]

Yep, isn't that the cold hard truth.

[cunning hound]

such dad jokes

[balmy pulsar]

....

[iron remnant]

taps the "Master Punner" role on this Discord server.

[tall osprey]

https://www.championx.com/products-and-solutions/drilling-technologies/diamondback-nozzles/

Also like
If you're printing pretty much anything with additives you'll wear out nozzles pretty fast

[cunning hound]

Wow. Also, I'm watching some critical role right now and I hope your name is a reference

[tall osprey]

No it's just a common username

(also as a broad note pfte lined hotends have a worse time with heat creep issues because the gradient changes slower)

Whereas with good modern heat breaks have extremely tight thermal gradients

[hot fulcrum]

If i use a gluestick for adhesion should I clean the bed between each print or can that surface work a couple of times?

[empty sedge]

You don’t need to clean it off each print. Leave it alone until your prints don’t stick well enough, it gets dusty, or the glue looks too thick then wash glass with soap and water in a sink

[balmy pulsar]

you might find the print tears off the glue after removing it, so you'd need to reapply a bit and remove and lifted areas.

[heavy surge]

Hey can anyone point me in the direction of a file for 3D printing a 64x64 front lattice for the 3mm pitch matrix? Similar to the grid shown in this link (but for 64x64) I've searched but can't find anything online.. Any help appreciated 🙂
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4812805

[half dew]

Which version of the 64x64 do you have? There is one t hats 128mm with 2mm pitch and one that is 160 with 2.5mm pitch and one thats 192mm with 3mm pitch

[half dew]

I made all 3: https://www.printables.com/model/252635-adafruit-64x64-led-matrix-grids Fusion 360 really didn't like the geometry and it was slow - also these have very thin walls so you need to make sure "Detect Thin Walls" is on or that you're using an engine with arachne

[heavy surge]

You legend! Thanks heaps, mine is the 3mm pitch (192x192) Appreciate your work 🙏

[silent veldt]

Somebody please tell me that setting up a Prusa Mini is as simple as I think it should be?

Finally have a flat surface where I can set mine up and I'm having Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt.

[vestal thicket]

You can do it! A good friend of mine did his a few months ago, and I would not describe him as tech savvy

[subtle junco]

I know its overwhelming opening the box and looking at all the parts, but even my ender 3 ended up coming together even though it took me about 2-3 hours 😂

[half dew]

Let me know how it prints and even better post a make if it comes out well! I think its probably a little trickier to post than the standard adafruit ones

[heavy surge]

Will do! I've sent it off to the local 3D printer shop to get printed, still need to build a wooden frame and wait for a few more parts to arrive but once it's all up and running I'll post something here 🤙

[half dew]

Sweet - I haven't printed it myself since I only have .2 nozzle on my printer right now and it would take days. If the shop comes back and says its unprintable let me know and I'll do my best to fix it

[half dew]

ourch, this takes a day to print because slicers are horrible at optimizing the print path... I think a solid cube and setting the infil to match the parameters would be way way faster

[tall osprey]

full control gcode would be the best option odds are

[half dew]

Yeah, it would be slightly better than just using infill... did a test and infill only makes the print time around 3 hours (on a slow printer)

[heavy surge]

No clue how my 3D printer dude plans to print it (my 3D printing knowledge is next to none) he says he has a sneaky workaround that he's trying out, am going past there today to see what he's done. Will keep you posted

[half dew]

Sweet. I'm doing the infill hack now - I can give exact settings if you need them. You'll need a completely different version of the model

[jaunty bough]

I have the 64x32 matrix and was hoping to find the legs from this. Has anyone seen it? (Or have a better recommendation.)
https://youtu.be/BkwFRK6I3fg

[half dew]

Not sure about the 3d printed parts but I recognize some generic camera parts on on there

[jaunty bough]

Interesting... Definitely don't need any camera parts, or the arm for the jackpot, just the legs. I could design it myself but it almost certainly won't be as good as what's been designed already.

[half dew]

Found them: https://learn.adafruit.com/rgb-matrix-slot-machine/3d-printing

[jaunty bough]

Ahh thank you, but now I remember why I bookmarked this, I can't find the corners they used for the mount in the video. Vs. the full frame.

Sorry for the confusion

[half dew]

ahh, yeah, no idea where those are. I have a feeling they just cut up that bigger frame and added the screw parts

[jaunty bough]

I really hope they didn't do that 😂

[half dew]

I meant in the CAD software - not print and cut 🙂

[balmy pulsar]

anyone ever order an aluminum printed part? (DMLS etc)

[jaunty bough]

I have no idea why I read that differently than the obvious way that you meant. Especially in a 3d printing forum.

[half dew]

I do love the idea of someone spending the extra time to print stuff they don't need though.

[vocal pilot]

okay how could I make Case mounts like for the pi I was thinkin' to use cardboard and make my own mounts

[arctic dragon]

Well, if you're mounting it to a 3D printer, chances are you already have a working 3D printer so you could start by looking at 3D printed designs?

[vocal pilot]

Only Amiga 500 were made no one tried making ones for the amiga 1200

[vocal pilot]

500 and 1200 are different in the back of the case

[arctic dragon]

Mounting to amiga 1200?

I guess you could make a prototype with cardboard if you aren’t comfortable with CAD

It probably isn’t the hardest thing to design a mount for if there are 3d models online to use as a basis

[night tapir]

hey guys my ender 3 does this really weird thing where it seems to under extrude but only at like the top half of prints, it didnt use to do this but now its doing it on almost every single print even if its a short one.

I know I have some bed adhesion issues on this print but it also happens when i get really good adhesion

[cunning hound]

First thing that comes to mind is a partial clog

[strange ledge]

Or bad feed to the extruder

[half dew]

Does the hotend fan kick in to turbo mode at the layers where that start by any chance?

[balmy pulsar]

yeah, nozzle clog is feeding slipping. Maybe the spool isn't unrolling cleanly.

[night tapir]

Hmmm okay that gives me some ideas of things I can try! Thank you all

[balmy pulsar]

hmmm. is there a service for metal printing that is more affordable than shapeways?

[winged helm]

Metal printing, every time I look into it, is just absurdly expensive for anything cool

[elder oxide]

There’s a metal filament you can get and then send off for final processing that’s apparently fairly affordable.

[balmy pulsar]

no, i need real structural parts with predictable precision. the shapeways part is perfect, but, the price is about 2-3x more thn i can justify (need 7 or 8 different parts)

someone is doing it already, so i know it works. they cant be paying $340 though, cause the whole bike is only $4000 inluding a hefty profit margin haha

i assume they own the printers

ah, they are also usign titanium on some of the models

[iron remnant]

I mean, based on my limited time with them, metal 3D printing is just ridiculous.

[balmy pulsar]

it's coming down a lot. used to be that a tiny little titanium bolt was $500. now it's $10

[iron remnant]

I mean, even if they aren't owning their own printers, there's a bunch of fixed costs there so if they're doing a batch of them they might get a discount.

[balmy pulsar]

they make 100's

so yeah, should be as streamlines as possible

i expect they pay under $500 for the printed parts per bike.

[faint sky]

If you’re talking about the broken bike part why not find a local welder that can fix it… unless it’s some weird alloy a weld job so do fine.

[iron remnant]

Oh, no, for any metal bike worth repairing you need to go to a bike frame person. Way too easy to get a bike that comes apart on the road otherwise.

[faint sky]

Ahh so zip ties and duct tape it is then.

[balmy pulsar]

O_o

the broken part is sacrificial, cost 32 to replace.

im talking about a whole frame

the bike is already fixed

but, you cant weld on a 6061 frame if it was broken. you would need to heat treat and reset the geometry

which would cost more than just buying another

and need to be repainted as well

[empty sedge]

@balmy pulsar dude at work tried a chinese printing service for a stainless part. Price was good but they didn't clean up all the supports on the inside. Unfortunately I don't know the company

[balmy pulsar]

ah

[empty sedge]

it was kind of a weird tube with small holes on the outside so there wasn't a great way to reach inside.

[balmy pulsar]

ah, yeah. the trick is to design in a way there it wont need supports.

that cant be reached

[shy kelp]

why not use a subtractive method?

I don't remember if it was protolabs or xometry, but they had a cheap metal printing service, but my part was pretty small so...

or even binder things are more affordable

[balmy pulsar]

cant cnc the inside of a hollow tube

with closed ends

🙂

[cunning hound]

xometry wasn't cheap for me, but I think I had some issues in my design that made it more expensive than it should be. The nice thing about xometry is that they take just like a single model and then tell you what it would take to make either subtractive OR additive and you can choose the better of the two

I wish they were better at telling you the why of big prices though. Like, I'm pretty sure with mine there were some tool changes necessary for radiuses that aren't critical dimensions and I could have changed if I knew which ones

[balmy pulsar]

anything cnc i can do myself. just some things aren't well suited.

ah, yeah. setups and tooling can change dramatically on 2 parts that look basically the same

[cunning hound]

if I had more experience running a cnc it was probably an obvious mistake ... but if I had experience running a cnc I probably have the capability to just do it myself 😉

[shy kelp]

then can't you like get a tube and then solder it with the other part?

[balmy pulsar]

cant find the pic, but i have spindle clamps on my machine. i made them universal (1 part used in 4 places). i wanted a rounded corner, and my machinist was like "yeah, thats like $400 cause i have to reclamp it 3 times." changed to a chamfer and $80

anything is a 3d surface gets very expensive for just time.

[balmy pulsar]

this is titanium, you dont solder titanium 🙂

stuff like this is not really viable in any other way than printing

you can of course cnc something that performs the same function from aluminium, but it will be heavier and probably cost a lot more unless you have your own cnc (which i do, but, still),

[cunning hound]

Yeah, I would love to have a machinist say "cause I have to..." but xometry just spits out a price via some software. If i cared more I would probably post the model somewhere and ask for feedback. the part I'm thinking of though I just ran through to get a rough idea if xometry was potentially reasonable when I have real parts

figured out, I think it IS, I just gotta put work into optimizing the model because 5 minutes can save a lot of money

[balmy pulsar]

the main think to keep in your head is "how would i hold this?"

if you use fusion, you can program it yourself, and get a handle on how it actually would cut, tool sizes, speed.

so like that print above, youd quickly find A no tools fit inside and B you need many setups and C the surfacing would take hours

plus custom fixtures to hold it

ten you go backwards from there.

the cheapest things are ones that fit in a regular vise with 2 sides (top and back) from standard stock

cut one side, flip, cut the other, done

most expensive part on this machine was the Z axis back plate, cause it had 5 setups.

even though the table and the base beams are much larger parts with more metal

[scarlet field]

Is the ender 5 considered a good 3d printer? Beginner friendly?

[vestal thicket]

The Ender 3 series is more beginner friendly. My boss has a 5 and i can't really recommend it

The 5 also has a much smaller community and it's harder to get help or find resources, imo

[scarlet field]

Ok, and it's cheaper. Even better

[cunning hound]

I thought the 5 had a bigger bed area, but a quick google says that's not true. What's the actual selling point of the 5?

[balmy pulsar]

ha, protolabs says $1400 for that print shapeways said $340

and i want it to be like $100

:

x

[vestal thicket]

I think Creality just wanted to build a CoreXY for the heck of it sometimes

[cunning hound]

oh, it's corexy, so jumping on the hype train

[iron remnant]

Naw, the 5 is not CoreXY.

It's a cubic-frame, I think Cartesian?

If you get a good one, it should print marginally better because it's not a bed-slinger, but some folks have been complaining that the 5 has worse QC.

[shy kelp]

I don't get it
why doesn't bed leveling marlin, compensate for high measurements?

[empty sedge]

beyond a mm or so you have something wrong

[shy kelp]

some points have like 3mm of distance
like -1.5 to 1.5

[cunning hound]

if that's from corner to corner, you should get it closer using the hand dials. If there's that much variation in the middle of the plate, that plate is considered too far gone to fix with auto bed leveling

You might be able to tweak a setting in the code to make it not refuse, but that's why it doesn't by default

[half dew]

Some companies ship with really inconsistent beds that can have that variance when heated up

best bet in those cases is to shim the middle with foil

[balmy pulsar]

unless my memory is wrong, its a glass bed laminated to aluminum. theres not much you can do if it really is warped

[empty sedge]

It could also be something other than your bed, like the rollers aren't round or aren't properly tensioned

[balmy pulsar]

doesnt use rollers

[primal pulsar]

what's a good sandpaper grit for 3d print finishing?

[balmy pulsar]

what material?

[primal pulsar]

pla

[balmy pulsar]

wet dry from about 80 or 120 grit, up to 400 does well if you are paintin

[primal pulsar]

cool, i'm not painting. my prints come out with a 'base' i think it's called and i can cut it off with a hobby knife, but i want to clean up the sharp edges as i like to print things for my young newphew 😅 appreciate it, i'll get something in between

[balmy pulsar]

ah, yeah. by 400 grit it is nice and mooth

smooth

ive take some prints up to a polish

they trick is to keep them wet

so the paper doesnt clog and print doesnt get too warm

[subtle junco]

just want to throw out a PSA - I was having bed adhesions issues with my Ender 3 Pro using the magnetic bed it came with. I was having to smother it with a gluestick. Couldn't get the tempered glass to work at all. I bought a spring steel PEI bed plate and I'm blown away by how good it works printing PLA so far.

[elder oxide]

Which side of the tempered glass bed did you use?

I use the smooth side

Print adhesion quality is pretty great

[subtle junco]

I had tried both, with every setting you can imagine

different temps, print speeds, glue, no glue

[elder oxide]

Interesting

[subtle junco]

yeah. I think at one point I was able to get a print or two, but it was a very fragile process I couldn't replicate easily

[half dew]

glue on pei?

[subtle junco]

No glue. I'm saying the PEI plate solved that problem for me

[shy kelp]

he might not be that wrong...

[elder oxide]

Might run down a spool if filament for the first time ever

Usually I get down to like the last 10-20m and don’t have any prints that use that little lol..

[half dew]

I wanted sneaker skates that were "smooshed" so I designed and printed adapters in PA-CF to let them keep their natural shape (and also give it a slight 5 degree wedge for more comfortable skating

[iron remnant]

A deburring tool is great for cutting off fringes of 3D prints.

[iron remnant]

That's seriously neat.

Given that my feet are annoyingly large and shoes annoying I kinda want my own pair of sneaker skates.

[placid grail]

sorry but I normally don't chat here, but textiles can be 3d printed now?!

[balmy pulsar]

um

isnt the definition of a textile to be made of woven fibres?

[placid grail]

I don't know with these synthetic things maybe it doesn't need to be woven anymore or can be simulated by dropping small balls of textiles on a matrix (like they do with metal balls to 3d print automotive parts like from 1956 porsches)

[balmy pulsar]

thats not a textile though that is a composite

[half dew]

There are companies that list things like 3d printed insoles that seem to be textile but I'm not sure what they're actually doing. Just to clarify though - I didn't 3d print the shoes, just the plate adapaters

[balmy pulsar]

3d printed insoles are just rubber

tpu

[cunning hound]

something to keep in mind is that (unless legally restricted from doing so) companies will often use words incorrectly to make things easier to understand for users

They might CALL them textile without being technically textile

[balmy pulsar]

ah yes true

i have a bike seat that has "316 titanium" rails.

316 is stainless steel

with 0.5% titanium for high temperature corrosion resistance

so its mostly a lie

but they get away with it somehow and charge more even though it costs the same

silver carbon fibre is a good one too.... its just fibreglass

[cunning hound]

I was trying to be generous and talk about when they do it to avoid confusion, but yeah, somtimes they do it to create confusion, too

[balmy pulsar]

ah ok

ha

like tremolos on fender guitars. he got the word wrong, and now thats just what we call it

60 years later

70 actually, wow

i feel old

hehe

[cunning hound]

I had to look up the tremlo thing. Yeah, that sounds like a good example. It was probably originally called a tremelo as a way to trying to explain what the thing did in a way the audience could understand since they are somewhat similar in effect

[balmy pulsar]

i think he just confused the terms. he wasnt a musician. i forget the story. its is technically a vibrato.

turbo's are another one people mix up a lot. they see an impeller and just assume its a turbo.

[half dew]

I've seen companies with cloth ones specifically

[balmy pulsar]

link?

probably misleading.

maybe a cloth surface over the printed foam

or a printed mold/pattern

[placid grail]

Saw an article on Adidas using textile 3d printing machines but I guess it was PR buzzwords or something

[half dew]

I don't have it anymore - it was when I was looking at custom shoes the other day - they were definitely a fibrous cloth-like material. I assumed they were doing some sort of felting to make them based on how they looked

[balmy pulsar]

adidas makes 3d printe dmid soles, but they are plastic, not a woven textile

[half dew]

Also, polyester is plastic and still a textile

[balmy pulsar]

when its a woven fabric, not a solid sheet.

[placid grail]

yeah I threw my polyester clothes in the trash when I found out

[balmy pulsar]

....

nylon is also plastic

[placid grail]

what? they are cheap, don't breath and stick on a very hot day

I never liked them to start with

[balmy pulsar]

acrylic is plastic

99% of your clothes ar eplastic

lycra, elastane,

all plastic

anyhow

[half dew]

I don't think this is what anyone is doing but you can 3d print plastic that is the same geometry as woven fabric

[shy kelp]

if they are 100% or close to it, you sweat like a pig in hot weather and don't keep your body heat in cold weather
they suck

[balmy pulsar]

you can hypothetically "print" a woven material, but its a lot easier to weave it

[placid grail]

imho the best textile is lexan/aramid/kevlar. Really handy against canadian hail in the winter

[balmy pulsar]

lexan is polycarbonate. kevlar is aramid

brand names

[shy kelp]

yeah there are other methods, but I feel like those companies are just exploiting the hype

[balmy pulsar]

yes

[placid grail]

kevlar helmet are used for artillery and hail is a kind of artillery so works well

[balmy pulsar]

ha

[strange ledge]

So.. what calibre of arty shells can a Kevlar helmet deflect?!?

🤣

[balmy pulsar]

coconuts

[strange ledge]

Hahahaha

[half dew]

@balmy pulsar Ahh, found it - you're right - its TPU with fabrics applied after... maybe I'll have to 3d print some of my own insoles

[shy kelp]

anyway there's any cheaper sd/display module that uses the same pins?
shorturl.at/dpsV2

I checked up each display into marlin, and there wasn't so I guess not

[strange ledge]

Mortar-launched coconuts, yeah?

[placid grail]

I feel that's off topic, but it's for the fragments, not a direct hit

[balmy pulsar]

kevlar is abrasian resistan and highly elastics. thats why its good for impact. but to actually stop bullets it needs to be super thick

[placid grail]

and winter hail are kinda fragments of ice clouds

in a way, right ?

[strange ledge]

I know, but I thrive in ambiguity. 😁

[balmy pulsar]

there we go. makes sense now. and yes you can do it yourself. i mean those adidas shoes if you knew how to design a shoe you can print at shapeways for $50

[strange ledge]

Just had a thought... When I get moved back to my local office, I can use some of the money I'd be using on train fare to build my 3D printer. 👍

[half dew]

Heh, I'd rather sew shoes from fabrics and leathers. I'll stick to 3d printing rollerskate parts for now... next up: Printing and annealing PC for standard quad plates and comparing their strength to ABS plates

[placid grail]

ah I was wrong, it's not 3d printing but basically a robotics textile machine with computer vision

nvm

[half dew]

Eh, its all additive manufacturing - companies just use the term 3d printing too broadly

[shy kelp]

I wouldn't ne surprised if they were only marketed as 3d printed, when in reality they use cheaper manufacturing processes for their batches 🙈

[placid grail]

I mean not surprised, electronics are often advertised with semi-magical properties especially the health-related stuff

[strange ledge]

Big question is... Use the Sanguinololu boards I already have, or work on a Pi Pico based printer?

[balmy pulsar]

there was something recent that was advertised as printed but was clearly not. forget what it was

pi pico?

[strange ledge]

Yarp

It's doable, but... Not so easy.

At least with the Sanguinololu, the board is already done.

I just want to build it as cheap as possible, really.. so I guess the Sanguinololu is the better option.

[placid grail]

bah I wish I can have a 3d printer one day 😦

[strange ledge]

What's stopping you?

[placid grail]

don't know enough about electronics

I can't even fix a table fan

[balmy pulsar]

buy one

they are cheap and easy ish to use

[shy kelp]

just annoying to level

[balmy pulsar]

ha

[strange ledge]

That's not so much a blocker as an impediment..

[placid grail]

I'll have to repair it if it break or know electronics to tweak/mod it. And the cheap one are kits you build yourself

otherwise they are like 1 month of my salary after tax and charges

[strange ledge]

That is the best way to learn....

😁

[shy kelp]

well a good occasion to start

ninjed

[placid grail]

It has to be doable though

[balmy pulsar]

nah, you dont need to know any electronics to use a printer

[placid grail]

Not doable for me, not smart enough etc

[strange ledge]

Eat my inb4!! Lol

[placid grail]

I still don't understand capacitors after years

[balmy pulsar]

nothing to do with printing

load file, hit print. wait 6 hours. done

[strange ledge]

Would it make you feel better knowing that my *ex-*colleague was fired today, for being too dumb for a babysitting job... ?

[balmy pulsar]

(ok, not quite)

oh dear

[placid grail]

but surely a mars 3d printer or a 3d printing kit has capacitors in it ?

[balmy pulsar]

why would you have to touch the capacitors?

[strange ledge]

You don't. Lol

[placid grail]

well if I have to build it myself in a kit

[balmy pulsar]

even then

no

[placid grail]

I don't even know how to plug them so they don't blowup and splash me with acid

[strange ledge]

You touch the non-zappy bits...

[placid grail]

Last time I tried the capacitor lifted off

[shy kelp]

it doesn't matter
have you even had or use a 2d printer?
well that's the same (more or less)

it's like not wanting to buy an hammer because you don't know how to make an hammer

[balmy pulsar]

no acid in a printer

[strange ledge]

Electrolytic capacitors.

[balmy pulsar]

i am so lost again hahahha

[placid grail]

well I don't buy hammers because of that, is that a problem? I don't know what materials make a good hammer and I feel that at the current price of 155$ per ton for iron I'm getting scammed paying 45$ for 1.5 pounds of iron

[balmy pulsar]

if you are afraid of using a 3d printer, maybe this whole computer thing isnt gonna work out

j/k haha

[strange ledge]

Generally, metal hammers are good for knocking in nails.. and knocking out teeth... 🤣

[shy kelp]

it doesn't matter, that's all market differantion
any hammer can do the job

[placid grail]

nah that's fine I have a comptia

[strange ledge]

Me too. Lol

...from 2010

[placid grail]

Still surprised when I build my own computer and it works though

[balmy pulsar]

i have a compy from 2015

with some amount of ram

and cpus

probably a hard drive

[strange ledge]

CompTIA = IT certs

[balmy pulsar]

ahh

ha

[placid grail]

got a comptia because I was sick of asking tech questions on the internets and it would devolve into 300 posts of a flame war and threats instead of helping me with my problem

[strange ledge]

At least I think that's what he meant

There ya go. 😁

[balmy pulsar]

haha

[strange ledge]

I did the A+ in 2010, scored 98% on both exams.

Easy cakes.

[placid grail]

Is there a similar thing for the circuits inside 3d printers or electronics ?

[strange ledge]

Not sure

[shy kelp]

don't
waste of money imo

[placid grail]

I didn't do the exam, I read the books and did practice exams, that's enough for me

[balmy pulsar]

inside a printer is basically an arduino mega (or arm system on newer ones) with some stepper drivers and very little else

[placid grail]

I don't really want to get hired to fix computer or do financial planning

it was just for personal use

[balmy pulsar]

i cant imagine there is a useful certification for them

[strange ledge]

Mine was purely for self-gratification... I've never seen any value from the A+

[placid grail]

same for jewelry I mentionned in another channel, don't want to make stuff at tiffany, just something I wanted to learn...

and thanks for understanding usually I get confused looks and endless questions

anyway I disgress, also what are smells/fumes like ?

[balmy pulsar]

for pla not much fumes

[strange ledge]

The only time I'm confused is when someone says they don't eat pork... 🧐

[balmy pulsar]

mmm 3d printed pork chops

[placid grail]

well.... we can talk about it in general-chat if you want

[strange ledge]

Haha

[balmy pulsar]

thats my dinner tonight. pinapple rice and pork chops.

anyhow

resin printed have fumes

[placid grail]

no pineapple either for me because they burn like acid for me (because of the enzyme in them and/or allergy??)

[balmy pulsar]

abs has bad fumes.

nylon smells a bit like anise (licorice)

[shy kelp]

no matter if they are officially toxic or not, I wouldn't have them close, put them in a ventilated area

[placid grail]

Yeah my 12 sprinklers and 3 smoke alarms would probably not like that

and I'd risk drowning

guess I'm going to renew my maker lab subscription

[strange ledge]

Liquorice and anise are not related, fyi. ☺️

[balmy pulsar]

anise is the flavour in licorice candy

i dont think real licorice is used in anything

[strange ledge]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pontefract_cake

It has to be proper liquorice.

And, sorry... I have to continue using the British English spelling, of course. 😅

[shy kelp]

those things are nasty

you can buy liquorice sticks
they are yummy

[placid grail]

does it matter what software I use to select a 3d printer ? Or should I just pay my sub because the maker space has 4k-5k$ machines that I never could afford ?

(I use solidworks maker if it matter for the 3d printer, I'd rather not have to convert anything in another software and have it works directly)

[subtle junco]

you can get an Ender 3 Pro for 100 dollars with a coupon if you have a Microcenter around you - https://www.microcenter.com/site/content/specialoffer3dprinter.aspx Otherwise they normally go for about 200 online. Best printer to get started with IMO. You don't need to know the first thing about electronics to use it. Only thing you need is the patience to put it together

I'm almost tempted to pick up a second one, 100 dollars for arguably one of the best <1k printers is crazy

[placid grail]

guess not (Is Micro Center planning to extend into Canada? No, they are not. Micro Center stores will not be expanding anytime soon.). Can't really buy in the US anyway

Seemingly the best option I have that come assembled(?) is an elegoo mars but it seems to be a unique printer that doesn't work like other printers at all

[subtle junco]

200 is still a great price for what it is. That's what I paid for mine

[placid grail]

ah they seems to have it on the am-word canada. thanks I'll check review and take a look

[subtle junco]

The Mars looks like a resin printer. You load up a vat with liquid resin and a laser hardens the resin on the print bed

the Ender 3 Pro is an FDM printer, prints from a spool of plastic layer by layer

[placid grail]

how does it compare to Printrbot / Tevo Tarantula and Sense3d ?

And are too a grade way above what one can have for 200$ ?

I mean the size of parts the ender 3 pro can do seems fine to me

I know some of these I wrote can do 1 cubic feet parts but that's not what I'm looking for

[subtle junco]

I don't have any personal experience with other printers, but I did alot of research before buying the Ender 3. The reason I went with it was mainly because of how much support there is online for it. Lots of room for upgrades, plenty of people that use it and can help troubleshoot with it

[placid grail]

possibly the biggest pieces I do would be a 90o joint that is like 5 inches by 5 inches

[subtle junco]

the print bed is about 9.25x9.25"

but I'll be honest with you, if you're setting out looking for a fully assembled printer, the Ender 3 was about a 4 hour assembly job

[placid grail]

ah at first glance it doesn't seem like I'll have to solder electronic component and pcb to each other and smd

just mechanically assembly and tighten stuff

[subtle junco]

exactly. no electronics knowledge required

just patience

[placid grail]

I lack this and I suck at assembly but I'll check the video from the company carefully first

[subtle junco]

its a pretty popular printer, so what the instructions might lack, there are tons of assembly vids you can find on youtube

but I dont remember having any issue with the instructions. was a big printout with color pictures

[placid grail]

last thing I tried to assembly was a deluxe for my rpi 2+ and the touch screen and I ended up with a diagonal case 😦

I even had to tape the wires inside and one of the screw to hold it in place while I assembled it because my fingers were too big to reach them

[subtle junco]

it's been a few years since I put mine together, but I think it would be difficult to assemble incorrectly

it's very well engineered. You'd know if you put something together wrong

[placid grail]

I just need some space when I assemble something

I'm not a mouse and I have big fingers

[subtle junco]

but yeah, I'll stop shilling for creality 😂 whatever printer you go for, I would just check and see what kind of community exists online for it. every printer is going to require maintenance and if there is a big community of folks that use the same printer you can rely on them for help when the time comes

[placid grail]

the maker lab I go to is in an high school and have old stuff, require us to help often, it is open to anyone who pay for a member card.

and since it's a school as well they often restrict the choices of solder/rosin/3d printing spool etc because of laws/regulations/etc and we share the computers

and they aren't open often, so if I do my own things at home unless it's a task that my gear can't solve I'd rather do those 2 main tasks(soldering/3d printing) at home. Also if it rain or snow I can't risk losing my electronics (as they don't like water) so there is very little time to be able to go there. Also 3d printing require supervision from home of the peoples who run the lab so you can't arrive 1 hour before it closes, you have to be there at the beginning, possibly have told them ahead of time.

[vestal thicket]

If you don't want to go the Ender route, check out the Prusa - great starter printers, high quality and have the option of coming assembled. I have an Ender 3v2 because I have more time than money, my best friend bought the Prusa. Both great entry level-ish printers

[subtle junco]

yeah I've heard alot of good things about Prusa as well

[tall osprey]

I would recommend strongly against an e3 in current year due to the ever decreasing QC and the existence of other printers

There are a number of relatively similar price point printers that lack many of the flaws of the e3 and include a number of substantial features

See the artillery genius, anycubic Kobra, etc

[shy kelp]

wasn't already there some 2040 based board in the wild?

[strange ledge]

Yes.

SKR Pico V1.0

[molten arch]

Not sure whats causing this 🤔 ...

the top layer specifically (first image)

[empty sedge]

Looks like you’re over extruding

[sleek crag]

Basically, more plastic is being squished out than is needed, so it gets pushed around by the sides of the nozzle instead of just the tip. With the correct amount of plastic, the flat tip of the nozzle will mostly smooth it out instead of pushing it around. Possible fixes:

1. Adjust the extrusion multiplier. This will take the ideal numbers generated by ideal measurements and apply what is essentially a fudge factor to get the fed amount to be more in-line with reality. I typically do this because I'm lazy, but the pedant side of me knows it's not really the "proper" answer.
2. Measure your actual filament and feed rate and adjust your slicer settings. Even though filament says it is 1.75 mm, the manufacturing process is not perfect and some manufacturers meet better tolerances than others, but it's basically never quite right. If you get your calipers out and measure the diameter in two different perpendicular directions at several places along the filament and average the measurements, you'll get more of usable diameter for calculating the real volume that will be extruded per length. Then you have to double check that the feed mechanism is actually feeding the length of filament it thinks it is, and adjust the feeds steps as needed. Then when you put the actual diameter in the settings, the slicer will more accurately calculate how much plastic to feed. This makes the pedants happy, but the downside is that you essentially have to do this every time you change a roll, and if the tolerances are way out, you may even have to do it several times for the same roll.
3. Unusual, but possible: The particular filament you are using is expanding in volume during the printing process. While this is technically true due to the heating, most filaments will quickly revert to their former volume upon cooling, but some may not. In particular, there is "light weight" PLA that does this intentionally. I just put this option here for completeness, and it has nothing to do with your specific problem. It's also nice when a list has at least three items.

Even if you don't do all of item 2, you should still calibrate the feed rate. It's basically as important as calibrating the X, Y, and Z axises.

Another side effect of over-extrusion is that your perimeters will be wider than intended, throwing your X and Y calibration off. You'll want to re-calibrate those after fixing the over-extrusion.

[half dew]

Rollerskate plate printed in Polymax PC. Next step is to anneal it and then compare its strength to a standard quality non-toy ABS plate

[balmy pulsar]

how much does it distort

[half dew]

I haven't annealed it yet - waiting until I'll be out for an hour or 2

[faint sky]

I’m thinking of getting the Creality Ender 3 S-1 pro based on adafruits highlight on. NPI. https://youtu.be/76AB3UVME84

My workshop is regularly above 60% humidity and 90F in Florida. Is that a big problem for a 3D printer? I’ve never owned one before. Is it a better idea to put it inside where’s there is air conditioning?

[half dew]

Its only a bad issue for filament types that absorb a lot of moisture. most PLA will be fine. Best bet is to get one of those filament dryers by sunlu or similar (get one that can go up to 70-90 degrees if you can). You can dry the filament in them and feed directly to the printer

[subtle junco]

indoors in the AC is definitely better since you have more control over temp and humidity, but like nlapenn said if you're printing with PLA I wouldn't worry about it too much. I've left PLA spools sitting outside of a drybox for over a year on end and they still print fine without any kind of conditioning.

I mean I don't recommend leaving them out because PLA is still a hygroscopic polymer, but just an example of my own experience to give you an idea

[balmy pulsar]

petg is bad in humidity. nylon slightly less bad. pla doesnt seem to care much. nor does abs.

that said im always in AC, so humidity is always at least a little controlled

[iron remnant]

Yeah, I had a roll of PLA go brittle after being out for too long, so it can happen.

[empty sedge]

nylon foams up during printing after it absorbs water. It needs a dry box all the time

[faint sky]

nice, thank you all for the advice. will probably pull the trigger on it in the near future.

[solemn estuary]

hello and i'm working with this model but after i put it into Cura it became solid

i wonder how it happens and how i can solve it 😩 is there any settings about this?

[balmy pulsar]

what software? it is possible the solid to mesh conversion is capping the bottom (removing trims)

[half dew]

Normals could also be flipped

[sleek crag]

Yeah. That looks like a screenshot of Sketchup. That light blue color is is the inside while the white is the outside. To get a proper manifold in Sketchup, all of the outsides need to be white. Select all of the light blue faces and reverse the normals.

I gave up on SketchUp years ago because of a variety of reasons. Normal handling with complex constructive solid geometry was an annoyance, but the complete lack of parameters was the killing blow. I'd spend hours trying to adjust a single dimension by a millimeter.

[balmy pulsar]

sketchup is horrid. art departments love it but the geo it makes is always corrupt

[cunning hound]

sketchup is good at getting an absolute beginner from zero to very crude basic models. that's where it stops.

[balmy pulsar]

does that mean i can call the halo art department crude beginners?

cause, i kinda want to

😛

[cunning hound]

There's no way they're using it for more than rough box mockups, surely

[balmy pulsar]

entire set designs

massive ones

most productions use it

we keep trying to ween them off of it

they did that, as one file, with interior

then we had to actually make what you see there, only using theirs as a visual guide cause all the geo was corrupt and would make maya crash

it was easier to rip all the games assets 😛

[cunning hound]

that sounds like a nightmare for both parties, tbh

not sure why they do that to themselves

[balmy pulsar]

no idea

they are set designers. having them on computers at all is a relatively new thing

:x

for superman returns i was given drawings on paper. like... done with pencil

[iron remnant]

OOoooooH, OK, so I was visualizing a trade of people who went to art school where they could have learned Maya or something like that but instead they decided to do everything in Sketchup.

That at least makes... more sense?

[faint sky]

I like sketchup, used it for years for quick mock-up designs. I’d never try to use it for anything other than super basic stuff. Plus they sold off the entire community and started charging for access to assets that everyone in the community made in the first place. It killed all momentum of sketchup overnight.

For 3D printing guess I’m going to have to learn a real modeling program like fusion 360. Wish the Ruiz brothers would make more layer by layer videos. I’ve learned a lot from those and I don’t even have a 3D printer yet.

[patent sonnet]

my biggest issue since getting my 3d printer is getting measurements exact. need a 2mm pin support for a board? no problem. getting it in exactly the right place - nightmare. Just finishing a case for Pimoroni's Lipo Amigo Pro and am printing my fourth iteration. 3 mounting holes. got one right, then got another right and now the third (fingers crossed) - fortunately having someone like CHEP produce "Hyper Fast" profiles means I can iterate pretty quickly

[iron remnant]

The way I describe it, I taught myself Blender, FreeCAD, and OpenSCAD so that I could prove Naomi Wu right that we should all just get over ourselves and use TinkerCAD.

(Then again, I did learn Maya in ages past)

@patent sonnet Are you trying to print the final part each time or have you tried making fast-printing fit-check surrogates before trying to get the final part right? If I'm making a board mount, I'll just make a printable faux-board as the first step.

[patent sonnet]

That might be a better idea actually. The times I have gone "oooh, could have used an extra couple of mm there"...

[balmy pulsar]

O_o

measurements with pla usually come out pretty accurate untill you get to much larger items

i made a drilling jig that was 14" long and it was out by about 2%. enough to mess up the positions.

scale in the slicer, reprint. all good

[iron remnant]

Today in 3D printed bike lug news: https://bikerumor.com/new-no22-bicycles-3d-printed-titanium-dropouts/

(Apparently Silca in Indiana does 3D printing but doesn't advertise it? This makes me wonder because most bike-stuff brands are at least semi-illusory aspects of large conglomerations)

[balmy pulsar]

they could have least smoothed them.

[tardy juniper]

I designed & printed this vent replacement for my car and I believe it took me 8 iterations to get the geometry right https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:5412726

[balmy pulsar]

yes but that could just be bmws fit and finish :x

[tardy juniper]

That too 🤣

[balmy pulsar]

This is why I stick to bikes. no glove boxes and cup holders to break off 7 times (thanks vw)

[iron remnant]

If it took me 8 iterations to get it right, I'd be venting about it too.

[iron remnant]

Like, how accurate are you trying to go?

[vestal thicket]

A lot of the headers do have datasheets though, is there a specific one you're looking at that doesn't have one?

Cool

[iron remnant]

Yeah, glad you fixed it but I was going to point out that there's a lot of different 0.1" headers but they are all mostly the same... so you can frequently just pick one (And NopSCADLib has the OpenSCAD generics for things like that), but if you wanted something that precisely fits a part, that's different.

[iron remnant]

NopSCADLib is great, BOSL2 is great, never really played with the rest.

One of the downsides of OpenSCAD is that it's not really got language support for libraries in enough of a way so it ends up that you can't always use multiple libraries in the same project.

[iron remnant]

Yeah, I think BOSL2 makes a lot of things a lot more ergonomic.

But... yeah, I think that a sufficently motivated and poorly regulated person or group of people could make an even more awesome OpenSCAD like language.

A lot of the BOSL2 things become first-class citizens of the environment and stuff.

[topaz viper]

Just got a ender S1 pro, got most of it working but I am unsure on a step in the leveling process. When you stick the paper under the head assembly to calculate the distance between head assembly and bed should the paper slide easily or have a slight resistance when you move it.

Also my first test print with pla worked up to about 50% then came unstuck from the bed, not sure why. this model uses the magnetic plated stuck to the bed vs the glass bed.

[iron remnant]

So, the paper test is not accurate.

It's just the best thing you've got with that which you have at home.

(Feeler gauges are, arguably, better)

So, the point generally is that there should be some resistance, it needs to be the same amount of resistance at each of the points, and it needs to be the amount of resistance you've determined tends to mean that it'll stick properly to the bed.

(I didn't wait long before getting a BLTouch)

If the bed is not level or the bed needs to be a little bit closer to the nozzle, that can cause it to come unstuck.

[half dew]

Also, when you're leveling - make sure the nozzle and bed are heated to temp... you probably want to retract the filament as well to prevent oozing.

Also, the machined beds on Creality printers tend to be concave. I used to shim the middle of mine under the PEI sheet with some aluminum foil - even a BLTouch and mesh levelling wouldn't compensate for how bad it was. I eventually replaced it with a custom machined bed

[topaz viper]

ok I will check and yes I did the preheat step while leveling

[half dew]

Yeah, what you'll see if you have the same issue many many others have with creality printers is: In order for the head to be low enough in the center it literally collides with the corners.

[topaz viper]

ok I will check again

[tulip night]

Preheat and wait/check that the temperatures have reached their point -> Use the paper with the material configurations that came in the box, it's the right thickness -> Do auto leveling and then the offset for the middle point first -> Then in aux the various corners should barely grasp on the paper

I learned it the hard way. Did them in the wrong order, so the extra offset scratched my magnetic plate. And always had it grasp too hard on the paper. It's really about the bare touch to get it right. I have the rabbit and XYZ cube printed on my S1 Pro now. Still need to make it slightly more loose as I saw the XYZ cube had a just slightly larger bottom layer...

[placid grail]

Didn't realize it could take several day to 3d print something with an hobbyist grade printer...

[tulip night]

There are various factors that contribute to extra time. You can do some improvements on that to shave off some time. But it'll take time indeed...

[placid grail]

I guess I won't get one at home then since it's not really suitable (don't want to sleep while something is heating/melting plastic and leave it without supervision)

[tulip night]

For small objects or enclosures for small electronics the hours are reasonable. But if you plan on bigger volumes that sounds reasonable

If you can somehow divide your model in parts it might still be feasible

I'm considering to print my case enclosures side-by-side and have some way to mount them perhaps...

[strange ledge]

I'm considering a DIY build myself, but my current starting points are either a Sanguinololu board or a Pi Pico.
I've got no idea where to go from there, except stepper motors, yadda yadda, other parts. 😛

I want to build one as cheap as possible, because my budget is horrendously limited.

[placid grail]

I can rent one for basically 70$ a year membership card(access to the electronics lab) + 3$ per day of use but it's annoying going because I have to prepare things and it's not really all-weather(rain could infiltrate my backpack & electronics case)

[strange ledge]

I don't do rentals, ever.

I mean, sure.. if there was a makerspace or something like that local.. I'd get some stuff done, but only to the end goal of building my own.

[placid grail]

yeah it's a makerspace

the other one is in a school and open like 4h a week so probably not enough time to 3d print something like a thick 100x100mm panel (but they do have several 3000$ 3d printers, which I assume are faster)

I guess my best guess at this point will be to order them over the web or something

[strange ledge]

I might have to do something like that.. or see who I know that can sort out some parts for me.

Working at a big IT company, there's bound to be a few people with 3D printers.

[cunning hound]

are the $3000 3d printers actually faster than hobby ones? They have a support contract. They often have bigger print volumes. They at least claim to have higher quality parts, but I didn't think they were appreciably faster.

If anything, I'd assume probably slower than a tuned home printer, because they want their safety margins.

[shy kelp]

g35 what does this mean? marlin

[strange ledge]

What does what mean, specifically ?

[shy kelp]

all three lines, front right, I do suppose it's the location of the screw like thing that do hold the bed; But CCW and CW? by X turns, alright, but by X minutes, what does it mean?

about by turns and 28 minutes, for example, I can count 3 turns, but 28 minutes? roughtly one third of a turn or what?

[strange ledge]

"CW" = ClockWise.
"CCW" Counter ClockWise.

[outer narwhal]

minutes of arc? (60 minute per degree) though if you're turning by hand, that seems difficult to achieve

[strange ledge]

Personally, I'd rather have torque settings.. lol

[outer narwhal]

could mean like minutes on an analog clock face, so 6 degrees per minute. but i think that's a confusing terminology and should be avoided

[strange ledge]

28 minutes will be just short of half-past..
11 & 13 will be short of quarter-past.

[strange ledge]

Yeah, seems odd.

[shy kelp]

thanks, I'll try ; I still don't get minutes, but I guess that I can try by tentatives...

[outer narwhal]

i think if you want to give angles relative to a clock face, it's better to give hours: "3 o'clock", etc, though you only get 30-deg increments 🤷‍♀️

[cunning hound]

minutes is a unit of measurement similar in concept to a degree, but much smaller. not commonly used by average people.

it has the same name as a unit of time, but no real connection to time

[shy kelp]

I had a reprap smart discount controller, it failed to read the sd card by giving media initialization fail

just in case I bought another display mks mini 12864 v3, and it gives the same issue, so I don't think it's the display/sd reader
what could be wrong?
I tried other sds and they gave me the same issue

[tardy juniper]

Hey guys, I'd like some advice on something

So I am making a reflow hotplate for smd soldering stuff

And I am planning on 3d printing the enclosure...

The aluminum plate at the top gets to ~220C, so I used 60mm standoffs to attach it to the enclosure. I also left a 4mm gap between the plate and the walls of the enclosure. If I print this out of petg, will there be any issues?

Since petg is usually printed at 260 I was thinking it should be fine as long as it isn't in direct contact

[sleek crag]

Both derived from "minuta prima", or "first small part". Both are one sixtieth. There are also seconds ("minuta secunda" or "second small part") of arc that are one sixtieth of a minute of arc, similar to time seconds. No one talks about tertia and quarta anymore, because those just get crazy small, and decimalization is usually used at that point instead.

[topaz viper]

Just a update, I have done the firmware update to my new Ender 3 S1 Pro, trick is do the screen first then the main board. This fixed some menu issues I had in the touch screen. Also one video I watched the person had the same issue as me with small objects and found the new PEI plate shipped with the pro was causing the sticking issues, he changed it to the plate used by the Ender 3 S1 non pro which is a different plate and everything printed fine. So I am waiting for the different plate and will try again.

[iron remnant]

What you want to be careful about is not the printing temperature but the heat deflection temperature, except for nylon which doesn't deflect as much

[tardy juniper]

Thanks, I'll look into that

Jeez, looks like its 70-80c for petg 😅

Hopefully that air gap is large enough then

[cunning hound]

air is a pretty good insulator, but with enough time heat will spread in anything but a vacuum

[iron remnant]

Might just get some thermal insulation sheets.

[cunning hound]

some of the cheaper thermal insulation sheets are barely more than stagnant air, tbh

[tardy juniper]

It'll only be running for a few mins at a time

So I'm just gonna see what happens

If it turns out that the gap is too small, I can always reprint with a larger gap

[shy kelp]

if end up being pin config

[weary lichen]

Now, just because it's printed at 260 doesn't mean it won't get soft at lower temps. PLA is printed at ~220c but will get soft and deform if left in a car on a sunny hot day.

That said, air is an excellent insulator so I think you'll be fine.

[empty sedge]

Glass transition temperature of PLA is about 65C
Glass transition temperature of PETG is about 85C
A hot car is about 70C in the sun on the dashboard. I don't think you need to worry about PETG nearly as much

[tardy juniper]

Thanks! Yeah I ended up testing it out last night and the petg didn't deform at all which is great

Testing it again today and I'll actually try to reflow a pcb

[weary lichen]

As a free bonus, with it being 3d printed it's easy enough to modify the design if it did deform

[tardy juniper]

Yup!

And its a crazy simple design to begin with

[shy kelp]

this printer is driving me nuts
it was working
and now again with the endless media initialization fail

[empty sedge]

I had similar issues. It ended up being the main DC power input wires were loose. Along the way I tried a bunch of different usb cables or none but fixing the loose power/ground wires fixed it for good

[shy kelp]

this seems to have fixed it
I love you
they didn't look loose though

[shy kelp]

im gonna get a 3d printer

i dont know tooo much about 3d printing, what is the difference between bowden and direct drive

is direct drive a necessity for tpu?

[random urchin]

A Bowden arrangement pushes the filament through a tube before it gets to the extruder.
Advantages: The print head is lighter and can accelerate faster.
Disadvantages: You're essentially pushing a rope. The force of pushing the filament puts a lot of tension on the tube, which can cause it to detach at one end if not fastened properly.

Direct drive pulls the filament into the print head, pushing it directly into the extruder.
Advantages: Avoids the whole "pushing a rope" problem. Mechanically more robust.
Disadvantages: Print head is much more complex, with more electrical connections running from the controller. Also much heavier, making acceleration more difficult.

Personally, I wouldn't touch a printer with a Bowden extruder. But that's just me. I'm very risk-adverse, and the thought of the tube deteching mid-print gives me nightmares. 😄

Oh, and regarding TPU... Yes, I expect direct drive would work better for that, since it's more flexible, but I wouldn't go as far as to say it won't work with a Bowden. I'm sure someone who has one can chime in on that.

[sacred reef]

bowden is good I have an ender3 I recommend it to beginners

[shy kelp]

thx

[sacred reef]

Chep recommended I replace the original with a ptfe type but I bought one and am still using my original

[shy kelp]

yea im getting an ender 3, i plan on alot tpu printing so just wanted to be safe

[sacred reef]

if you are printing abs or other hot stuff, I recommend an enclosed printer

[shy kelp]

alr thx

[sacred reef]

I can see why the bowden might not work for tpu it is soft. I have never used it

I haven't found heat settings yet

direct drive is prefered

210 to 230 C

Ah is that what ninjaflex is? that stuff looks cool

https://all3dp.com/2/best-tpu-print-temperature-bed-filament/

[shy kelp]

yep

[sacred reef]

And they didn't used an enclosed printer so there's that I guess lol

yup they recommended it

[shy kelp]

i plan on using it for stuff like belts, necks, tongues etc(animatronics)

[iron remnant]

Oooooooh this sounds exciting, @shy kelp

I have printed TPU on my Ender 3v2 with a direct drive conversion (in my case a Bondtech DDX and a Mosquito hotend) and I guess you could probably do the less flexy TPU versions like 95A maybe but yeah, a direct drive is probably your best option

There is one brand of super flexy TPU that specifically wants a not-all-metal hotend but I think everything else is happy either way.

For animatronics the ability to print nylon or petg or other exotic materials might come into play.

[placid grail]

any idea what that 3d printer is ?

[sleek crag]

Some sort of Prusa clone.

Would need pictures of other parts of it to even have a hope of being more specific, but it also looks like it's been modified, so it may be even trickier to identify.

[placid grail]

one happy choice doesnt seem to be related to 3d printing at all too..

[sleek crag]

That's likely just who made the bed.

[balmy pulsar]

i think its a creality with a head mod

cause of the blue

and roller guides

[frail scarab]

Guys, my Ender 3 has gone wack and I don't really know what to do anymore! I've been troubleshooting for over a week.

I have an ender3 with an upgraded 4.2.7 32-bit motherboard, a BLTouch, stiffer bed springs, and Marlin firmware.

Around 2 weeks ago my printer randomly started attempting to print about 1cm above the printbed. It ALWAYS does this regardless of if I level it right before or do any calibration. even after homing it always begins to print around 1cm above the printbed, just spilling filament around the place. Normally I could do some on-the-fly z-probe offset tweaks to try and clean it up, but it's just too big of a gap, and the gap always persists when I start a new print. It doesn't matter if I level every print or simply restore previous leveling data for the print. I've had this printer for around 2 years and none of the upgrades are recent at all, it's been working great and the BLTouch has been amazing until now.

After doing lots of testing with no luck I've just taken the printer apart and tightened/checked every bolt/belt, and I've downloaded Marlin over again and recompiled a completely fresh firmware for it with near-stock settings that just enable the BLTouch. I have no idea why it so consistently prints too high, even after leveling and homing.

I feel like it's a physical issue, since it now seems like my Z-probe offset needs to be a lot larger than it ever was for the last year. But I don't know what it could be.

Any ideas?

[sleek crag]

The logo matches, though, so I'm guessing the bed was something they sold in the past, but don't anymore.

[balmy pulsar]

i think its just the sheet made by that company. not the printer

[sleek crag]

Yeah.

[sleek crag]

Does it have a Z endstop switch? Does it automatically level before each print? Does it home to the correct position when not printing?

[vestal thicket]

@frail scarab The only thing I can think of is if it does it after every print after everything you've done - do you have some weird gcode start macro that raises it? Otherwise you've done everything I would do

[placid grail]

looks like the 3d printer above saw war to me but hey, looks really old and barely maintainable

[balmy pulsar]

looks pretty new. it just has a head mod

[placid grail]

hot plate is held by paperclips...

[sleek crag]

That's pretty normal, especially when using a third party bed. Easier and cheaper than overengineering a solution.

[balmy pulsar]

yeah thats standard

[sacred reef]

I use Kapton tape

the clips are in my build space lol

[sleek crag]

I still have a Printrbot Play with just the metal bed. I've got a 6 inch wide roll of blue tape and and a whole package of glue sticks. I raft everything, so I don't care what about the bed texture or imperfections, and only print PLA, so I don't need a heated bed.

[shy kelp]

thank you, this has been very helpful

[empty sedge]

There is a lot to check but I don’t have a similar machine to compare to. Can you connect with pronterface/printrun?

[ashen moat]

re: TPU with a bowden extruder, it helps to have a low-friction bowden tube, like the Capricorn stuff, and you need a very constrained filament path (no gaps!) between the drive gear and the tube entrance so flexible filament can't kick out sideways. you may need to slow down to 1/2 or 1/3 the print speed of PLA/ABS/PETG so you're not compressing and bunching the flexible filament in the tube. (I like bowden machines and I've done a bunch of TPU on one.)

if you expect to print mostly flexy stuff, and very squishy stuff like ninjaflex, direct drive is probably a better choice.

[shy kelp]

thx

[cunning hound]

Only thing wrong with the paperclips is that the arms are out on the bed, taking up print space. At least pull the arm back!

[placid grail]

eh I don't have control over it, just a 20$ maker space class on 3d printing had this pic

[ivory scroll]

Hi all! Not sure if many folks here do resin, but I just picked up an Elegoo mars 3 pro and have been trying to tune the settings with some Siraya tech blu resin. I found Siraya had tested settings for that machine/resin combo, but I still am getting really messy bottomed prints (see below). All I can guess at this point is that the supports are bad, but I was just using the default Lychee slicer settings. Does this seem like a support issue or something else?

[bronze iron]

Could someone create me an 3d peint file?

[sacred reef]

Of what? https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4727379/files
(I didn't make it...)

[balmy pulsar]

haha

[bronze iron]

Lol naw

[sacred reef]

you want a file that produces that?

id, od thickness? I assume they overlap equally?

[bronze iron]

Yea i want a file to produce that

I don't have anymore measurements at the moment. That piece and diagram are at home im at work

[sacred reef]

5" doesn't make the center one overlap the bottom 2 the same. (assuming the bottom 2 are overlapping 1/2")

did u want symmetry more than just the left right mirror?

or:

[copper rose]

Is it common and/or reasonable to, in a CAD model of an object, represent the fasteners that hold the object together? I'm trying to use a CAD model as the visual plan for a woodworking collaboration.

[sacred reef]

It makes sense that you include it. I suppose it depends on your minimalism.

[copper rose]

nice, thanks. I'm working in OpenSCAD, so it seems like it wouldn't be too much work to make a reusable screw/nail template ("module" in OpenSCAD terminology). I don't need it to be the exact size or appearance of the specific kind of screw or nail, just to indicate there's a fastener there.

[sacred reef]

https://github.com/adrianschlatter/threadlib

Or you just want a head? lol

you are the designer. whatever you want.

unless you have rules to follow 😦

I thought you meant hinges etc. Also

[copper rose]

am noob, no rules 🤘

though explicitly modeling the threads of a screw is definitely overkill for my case lol

I get why it's useful tho

thanks for the link!

[sacred reef]

coding to creat 3d models. like cli cad

like a nail like icon to represent a thing. Sauder (ikea etc) furniture plans...

[misty gyro]

Just throwing my hat in the ring now, but for 3d modelling, I've settled on https://www.tinkercad.com Definite learning curve, but what 3d modelling software won't have that? Nice thing is that I can download an STL file from it, throw that at Cura, and boom: gcode file ready to rock and roll on the printer.

Your actual mileage may, of course, vary. 🙂

[sacred reef]

you can export plenty of object files from openscad. I feel like most cad are gui and I am not sure of any else like openscad where you HAVE to code.

I use microsoft 3d builder a lot lol it's generic

That's what those images were from

[copper rose]

I think a script-based CAD interface will probably suit me better than a point-and-click one. I'm comfortable with programming, and just looking back to how bad I was at platformer games...

[misty gyro]

I'd probably be able to work in openscad, but it'd be a major gearshift. I do think very "numerically" when working in tinkercad, but I still always have that visual representation of the model to confirm I'm not way off in left field.

The only downside to Tinkercad is it's web based, done by Autocad. Mind you, they've been in business for something like 30 years now, so they're probably not going to vanish any time soon. The nice thing is that undo and redo persist across sessions on the same model. That can be a huge plus occasionally.

[sacred reef]

opencad exports You can "see" the math with code. I feel that it is best to have as many tools as you need.

[copper rose]

for me, the ability to comment and version-control the source file is a big plus

sure you can version control an STL, but the diffs are not as useful

[misty gyro]

Yep. More tools are always good. That why we have C/C++, Java, Python, Javascript, Lua, Groovy, Rust, ... Each of those has its place, so you can just about always find the correct tool for the job.

[sacred reef]

@bronze iron what file format do you want? stl, 3mf, obj?

Do you have a slicer? What printer is it for?

[bronze iron]

@sacred reef stl

Im just having someone from eBay do it i dont have a 3d printer

The 2nd one you made up

What program you use to draw them up?

[sacred reef]

3d builder. your design is very simple. any cad can do it.

[bronze iron]

If you print that will it make the 3 circles together or be layered seperate? Sorry if that's a dumb Q

[sacred reef]

Shoot sorry

Glad you caught that. Yes. Now I am at work and don't have any cad. Let me look. Technically whoever prints it has to slice it and theoretically if they have them placed that way, the slicing will merge them. But it should have been merged before. Let me see what I can do from here. Lol

[bronze iron]

No hurry you can do it later

[sacred reef]

maybe you can do it. what os do you use?

i can't install things on work computers...

[random urchin]

I think this gets what you want. OpenSCAD source included in case you need to play with the dimensions.

Top to bottom measurement came out to 127.72mm (5.02"). Hopefully close enough.

[sacred reef]

that sounds wrong then

i don't have openscad to play with. maybe 359 should be 240? but I know my first image was when I used the 5" to center the third ring. I had a gap between the id of more than the 1/2" when I moved it down to fit, it was obviously less

I like how you converted to metric first lol

maybe the .6 instead of .625 was something?

I only double checked the math on "id" I swear...

[random urchin]

Yeah, OpenSCAD is all millimeters. 😄

[sacred reef]

your example seems simple and to the point. I like the rotation. makes sense that would be the right way to do it. I plotted it on x/y

you defined a w, but I don't see it used.

why did you use h*3 to remove the core? just random > 1 to ensure you don't leave a "skin" behind?

[random urchin]

I imported your model and mine into PrusaSlicer. They virtually overlap. Nearly identical. Not bad, considering the completely different approaches. 🙂

[random urchin]

General rule of thumb I used when subtracting cylinders in OpenSCAD. I triple the height, then center vertically. Ends up with 1.5x the height below an .5 above. Avoids weird edge conditions.

[sacred reef]

i hate those

[random urchin]

Yeah, w was the 5" shown on the diagram. I briefly created a 5x5" box to see if the set of rings matched that dimension. If not, I was going to adjust the offset value until they did.

[sacred reef]

but the way the drawing is was with 5" (< 5" actually though) on a certain line of symmetry the other axis would have been 5.25"

so i had to ask Pythagarus what my y was for the center ring

[sacred reef]

my right ring was centered at 0,0
my left ring was -(15/8 + 4/8), 0
and so the center of the third ring was simply:
1/2 * -(15/8 + 4/8), sqrt((19/8)^2-(19/16)^2)

lol

[random urchin]

I took the outer diameter of each as the inner diameter plus twice the band width, assumed the rings met in the middle at the radius of the rings, then assumed rotational symmetry.

[sacred reef]

I liked your way. I thought it was self explanitory.

I don't have a rotate function other than rotating an object or group of objects by their center point.
or I can not change the point by which I can rotate things?

I didn't use openscad ok? This is a perfect example of knowing how to use the right tool

lol

but seriously, should your 359 be 240?

cuz the picture you showed looks right

[random urchin]

OpenSCAD is great for creating engineering type stuff. Not so good for artistic things.

[sacred reef]

good choice of words

yeah try blender

that would be another dedicated channel. graphic arts

[random urchin]

Yeah, 240 would've worked. I just type 359 out of habit. Basically, "keep rotating by the increment until just short of a full circle". 🤷

Since 360 would've been the next rotation, it stopped at 240. Just me being too lazy to type in the correct end value.

[sacred reef]

but isn't 359 360-1 and 360 is 0? there was 0, then 1/3 turn for the 120.

oh ok

yeah

that argument is for how many degrees it turns? then the third one says for how long? wait I will just go read documentation real quick.

[random urchin]

I've got this bookmarked: https://openscad.org/cheatsheet/ 😄

[sacred reef]

thats where i am. what does rotate([0,0,359]) do?

Are you punking me?

lol

i am not sure how it would have known to stop at 240.

sorry I like feeling dumb though. It makes me know that means I am soon to be gaining knowledge

[random urchin]

Oh! It never gets as far as 359. It does 0, then adds 120 to get 120, adds another 120 to get 240. Then, when it adds the next 120, it's 360, which is past the end, so it stops executing.

[sacred reef]

it always spins whatever around 0,0,0 unless you specify an alternative vector

why does it add 120 each time? I thought the values are iterating each one at a time?
rotate([0,0,0])
rotate([0,0,120])
rotate([0,0,359])

[random urchin]

Yeah, it rotates around the origin, but you can do arbitrary rotations by combining translate and rotate.

[sacred reef]

from the for loop

[random urchin]

The for loop statement contains [start, increment, max]. So, start at "start", keep adding "increment" until you hit less than or equal to "max".

[sacred reef]

unfortunately I must leave to do works. I will be back...

Oh good to know. that is exactly as I suspected and I asked if that's how it was. I did not notice that syntax. There are quite a few formats of rotate. cool thank you for the tutorial 😉

[random urchin]

So for(x=[5:5:24]) would do 5,10,15,20 then stop.

[sacred reef]

Yes. I figured it had to be that way for your picture to match

glad to know I wasn't going crazy

[strange ledge]

That makes no sense to me at all..

I mean, sure.. I can maths, but I can't fathom the ... Logic?

[sacred reef]

this is the key: [start, increment, max]

[random urchin]

Yeah, OpenSCAD is quirky at best.

[strange ledge]

But why would it assert that 359=3*120?

[sacred reef]

because you can create a spiral by rotating a thing for many times that of 360 and change a different axis nibbles extra

he could have said anything between 240 and 359

honestly the last number could be as big as you have room to overlap objects... after 360, they would just be placed inside each other

[random urchin]

True. I could've said [0:120:240] or [0:120:359.999] and it would've executed the same way.

[sacred reef]

so it starts at a value. iterates over the next value until it gets to the other value.

[strange ledge]

Is that some arbitrary limitation, or.. ?

[sacred reef]

you could have said 0:120:720. having 6 rings before the union would still be the same object.

That almost is how the $fn works

[strange ledge]

Can't it be incremented by 1... or.. 1.29735 ?

Seems odd to have a specific limitation of 120.

[sacred reef]

we were rotating around a circle 3 ways

1/3 rotation

[strange ledge]

So you've set a restriction for $reason?

[random urchin]

The second value specifies the increment. So, yeah, you can increment by any value you want. If I wanted 7 values from 0 to 100, I could do for(j=[0:100/7:100])

[sacred reef]

you say restriction. we are defining the degrees of rotation for each iteration.

[random urchin]

I should've just put [0:120:240] in the original source, shouldn't I? 🤣

[sacred reef]

No! this was more valuable than that.

I felt like I understood, then I realized I was assuming, then I second guessed myself.

[random urchin]

And, yeah, one of the problems is that a lot of things in OpenSCAD that aren't vectors are written as if they are. It's kind of annoying. I mean, for(i=[1:3:28]) could've just been for(i=1,3,28) and been more readable.

...and sometimes the delimiter is , and sometimes : and it's not very intuitive when you use which.

[sacred reef]

I may have seen colons and assumed commas. I wasn't familiar with that format, but I could tell it would have made the math work.

[high path]

Anyone know where I can find 1760mm GT2 closed loop belt that is 6mm wide? Can't find anyone selling this size.

[sacred reef]

sounds long and specific for a closed loop...

[high path]

well that's what I need 🙂

[sacred reef]

I see nothing with 580 teeth or 1160. 1140 seems to be the spot then the next popular is 1220

is this custom or replacement?

[sacred reef]

2 teeth off so close: https://www.mcmaster.com/7947K764

[high path]

This is not even close, I need 1760mm outside diameter.

And I need GT2

[sacred reef]

1760 i thought u said 1160 oopsie

that is 2 mm pitch by 6mm it would have worked I think

now it sounds even longer lol I may have seen one that was 2000

[random urchin]

Might have to resort to splicing something together out of something like this. https://www.amazon.com/Upgrade-Non-Slip-Version-Printer-Printers/dp/B08R93QQ8Z

[bronze iron]

So who has the correct model?

[random urchin]

No idea. I'd say, grab both. Print the first couple layers of each and see which is the closer match.

Not sure how precise the model needs to be. Depends a lot on its purpose.

[balmy pulsar]

try misumi. they sell some more unique items

[high path]

Already did, they barely go up to 1,000mm 😦

[balmy pulsar]

no custom?

[sacred reef]

Steve's is right. mine was separated remember.

[bronze iron]

I dont have a 3d printer

[sacred reef]

you did say that.

[random urchin]

Ugh. That makes things more complicated. I think I could dial it in a bit with 2 more measurements:
A - the widest part of each ring
B - the distance from the center of the part to the outside of a ring
Both can be inferred, but I'd rather be sure.

BTW, is they happen to be exactly the same value, that makes the calculations much easier.

[strange ledge]

Praise be to Grandfather Nurgle! 😅

[bronze iron]

@random urchin A. 2 7/8 and B 2 3/4

[random urchin]

Based on that, I think @sacred reef's model is correct.

[sacred reef]

something must have been deleted about. I don't see anything between 4:13am and 2:54pm my time.
remember when you said this? that means the 5" is not correct. Steve's and my second are identical (should be) just rotated. And in those two versions of ours A = B

are you saying the 5" is true?

if so, what is the other length (perpendicular)

oh maybe the difference wasn't a lot and it just looks like 5...

[bronze iron]

Its hard to measure it with the circular shape so I just took a tape measure and measured the top to the where bottom circles end at for 5"

[random urchin]

Here are the two STL files. I corrected mine with the updated info. They look to be identical now.

[bronze iron]

Alright

[random urchin]

In both cases, the 5" dimension comes out to ~4.93". Close enough.

[bronze iron]

Yea that sounds about right

Thank you guys so much for helping me out

[sacred reef]

no problem