Be Excellent To Each Other

Had some free time (whoop!) to have a crack with my 3D printer tonight. First thing I realised was the filament was caught round the cabling to the extruder and quite twisted somehow. As I untangled it the filament snapped. Remembered Mark saying everything needs to be heated up when changing over filament so I flicked it on... LCD screen showing garbage... after lots of turning it off and on again I realised the cable at the back of the LCD screen wasn't seated properly BINGO back in business!

Once the display told me the extruder was up to the right temp I tried pulling out the remaining filament but it wouldn't shift, I got some needle nose pliers on and tried to free it and ended up snapping the rest off the top. Read online that the cooled filament could have caused a 'plug' to form inside but it's too hot (and too late) for me to rummage about inside.

Hnnnnngnnnn.

You busy tomorrow night, Mark?

And I cut my finger

Free later on tonight mate. Did you press down the lever to disengage the extruded gear, though?

Yeah, I remembered you mentioned that.

Managed to sort out the filament problem after watching a couple of online videos and (partially) printed a test model with success!

Glass plate next and print out some reel brackets I've seen to have the filament placed in a better position.

Feel much better today now.

What sort of printer would I need to buy to be able to print these?

I quite fancy one, however to date the odd ones we have at work in various IT departments around the world are gather dust after printing the odd plastic model.

These adapters are useful for my sons train set and are always getting lost!

Also I was wondering how long they would take to print?

Pretty much any 3D printer would be able to do those and take maybe 30-40 mins a piece.

One of these maybe if you don't want to have to build a kit:

https://hobbyking.com/en_us/fabrikator- ... 100-1.html

Don't be put off getting a kit, though. Zardoz managed it and he's a graphic designer/illustrator!

Either way you need to be prepared for the fact that it's not like buying a normal printer, getting these hobby-grade machines working well is almost a hobby in itself.

I've heard nothing at all from Tiko about getting a refund.

Is it common to get refunds from kickstarter?

Depends on the scenario. In this instance, I'm not expecting to get a refund for my original pledge. However, what I am angry about (and so are the other backers) is that around this time last year we were told that shipping would be beginning soon and they asked us to send $55 to cover shipping, outside Kickstarter's payment system.

Shipping did start in July that year, but only to the first 100 backers, and then they established there were all sorts of problems with their QA etc. so stopped shipping while they worked it out.

There's nearly 16,500 backers - assuming they all pledged enough to get one or more machines, that's nearly a million bucks of shipping fees that should be refunded.

Good scam

Sounds like you've all had fun playing with the printers, but have you made anything useful/usable?

It depends on how you define useful I guess. I've made loads of things for my RC hobby, toys, planters, guitar and ukulele hangers other bits and pieces.

Fair point - I suppose anything that doesn't end up in the kitchen junk drawer (or wherever else all the plastic tat is shoved) would qualify as useful. Sounds like you have got some use out of it then.

I'd love to dick around with 3D printing, even though I'm not really sure why, or if there is any actual use-case for me.

They're hypnotic too.

Need to work out how to dampen the noise when printing at night. It's currently sat on a hollow shelf thing in my loft, right above our bedroom so the sound carries and makes Mrs Z angry at me.

Thinking some kind of foam matt (ground matt?) underneath would dampen it a bit. Personally I like the noise.

Just tell her that in a few months she won't even hear it any more, like living next to a train track. It'll be fine.

I'll print her a helmet!

Genuine LOL!

Anyway, be careful with sound proofing it as you may make it cooling proof too!

Thanks for the sound advice.

4 small bulldog clips bought, still need a clip frame though.

Asda do two for 2 quid, A4 size. Just make sure that it's glass and not plastic.

Yeah I'll go there after work. The ones I picked up were plastic or fancy frames for £2.99 or more! No way was I going down that route.

Clips were 99p and came with matching elastic bands and TWO different sizes of paperclips. I went for green.

I've lost all my elastic bands

Looks like the set I bought. You want my green elastic bands?

Think you can ping them this far?

*prints megapult*

After much faffing, sad face, consultation and eureka moments. My modded #HellaFlush printer spat out my first usable thing!

An angled board camera mount for my 250 Quadcopter.



3D printer noobie thoughts.

Cutting glass is horrible, and costly! Wasted £1 sheet on my first attempt.

Bald men buying large cans of hairspray in Morrisons look weird.

Car battery postal packaging foam makes great soundproofing.

This is fucking techno magic.

What material did you use? I got some TH8A shifter plates made out of PLA. I wanted kevlar-reinforced nylon but it was about £50 a plate.

PLA but it can run ABS through too.

Good to know.

Might have to ask Mark for paddle prints as mines going to be tied up with my Simuloid for some time.

You can apparently make parts stronger by annealing them in an oven, but depending on the shape it might also ruin them and I have no idea if it actually works:

https://rigid.ink/blogs/news/how-to-ann ... r-strength

Some of the more exotic filaments need more exotic printers, though.

But post a link to the parts you got if you can and I'll have a look. I've got a roll of ABS at home.

Also Hulk SMASH!



Unfortunately some of his fingers came off when I removed the support.

Wow, that's awesome!

I don't actually need anything done at the moment, but I'll let you know if that changes in the future. I'm not sure how long the screw threads will last made out of PLA...

Do you mean there are metal screws that go into the PLA or screws actually made of PLA? If the former and if I was any good at Autodesk yet I'd rework the design with a recess for a nut to go into.

Metal screws go into the PLA threads. So eventually they will get destroyed.

How long did Hulk take?

Ask your mum

Can anybody recommend a good 3D printing service, where you send a design file and money and they post you your printed thing back?

I quite fancy making myself a little Retropie handheld console, but even the designs that use ready-made Game Boy shells seem to rely on 3D printed structures that go inside (unless they're one-offs that cram everything in the case and then squirt a pint of hot-melt glue in).

3dhubs.com is where I got mine done.

About eight hours I think.

That's the badger!

Thanks, LW!

Had my first nose at 3D Printing stuff. I was after a replacement battery compartment cover for a Neo Geo Pocket Color, and rather than trying to find an original one, I wondered if it was possible to get them printed, and sure enough, someone had created a design for one. Picked about the cheapest option on there (wasn't fussy about the colour and materials used) and for $8.12 including shipping, I'm all sorted -

Did it come pre-scuffed?

Edit: I'm looking at the wrong bit, aren't I?

You can see why I wasn't too fussy about the new part - the rest of the console is a bit battered.