My son is doing his first science fair. I’m so proud. He wanted to do something with electricity, so I needed some battery packs. There’s an electro magnet and an electric coil motor. This may end up being on the first draft, but obijuan’s Parameterized Battery Pack really helped. Functionally there’s no difference, but it looks way better than duct tape.
Fully 3D Printed Engine update 2
I’ve been working on my fully 3D printed engine that I mentioned a while ago, but it’s still having trouble. I’m feeling like a total overhaul redesign is in order… which I really don’t have time for. Hopefully this video will help people understand how it’s supposed to work. Progress continues. The files on thingiverse have been updated with the latest …
My Pringles Dice Tower Build
I spoke before about a dice tower made of pringles cans. I also mentioned a project that I want to work on where I build an automated dice tower to test the balance of 3D printed dice. Believe it or not that project is going forward. Since that means I’ll need some dice towers (plural because I don’t trust the randomness …
What is up with today?
Seems like everyone is suddenly discovering 3D printing today. Shapeway’s twitter feed alone is full of articles published today lauding 3D printing. I’ve also had at least 3 people forward me information on the filabot like I haven’t been following since it’s kickstarter. I love it when someone discovers this hobby of mine for the first time. I just don’t …
That’s not good
I haven’t been reporting much on cool things that I’m printing because my Bot has mostly been occupied with making chess sets and restocking the store. I’m kind of determined to run out 4 rolls of filament, one white, one red, and two black, printing as many chess sets as I can out of them. However today I discovered that …
The problem with “Can anyone print this for me”
A common cry of those just outside the 3D printing community, and from many within, is that there needs to be a service where people can request something made by those with 3D printers. Well, now there are communities like Makzurie filling that gap. But twice this week alone I’ve seen the same story played out twice in different places. …
3D Printing Tidbit – PLA and Canola Oil
Personally I don’t use PLA, but this was just too weird not to share. According to the Makerbot Google Group if you put a little drop of canola oil on the tip of your PLA before you load it you have less problems printing. If you don’t remember PLA can be (and often is) made with corn starch. I think PLA …
Durability test complete
7 months ago I made thebluedirt’s airport proof buckle, wove a belt out of 50 feet para cord for it and have been wearing it for about 6 months almost every day. Late last week it broke. On the bottom where the hole for the hinge is closest to the wall gave and the buckle fell out. I’m going to …
3D Printing Tidbit – Shells are important
Okay, lesson learned. There is a reason why shells is one of the options on print-o-matic. Shells are as important to successful prints as filament diameter. I was having a terrible time printing stacking bins without cracking. I moved the Replicator somewhere warmer, slowed the print down, sped it up, increased printing temp, lowered it, all to no effect. Finally …
Shapesmith
Shapesmith. I have been wanting something I could recommend to people as heartily as I recommended Tinkercad before they went subscription based. Is Shapesmith that service? No. But it could be. Shapesmith is in early beta at the moment and is better suited for the draftsman than the tinkerer because it’s going to take a little while running through the tutorials before you’ll be able …