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aaronalai

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  1. I agree with what's been said so far. I think SLA and FDM machines do similar things but have costs and benefits, each of which make them fill different niches as Valcrow mentioned. Benefits of SLA: smooth texture, high accuracy on small parts, quick print times. Costs of SLA: weak material strength, high cost of printing material (which will definitely come down in price as time progresses), few material types to choose from, and curing times. I see SLA being primarily utilized by people that want to make figurines, or jewelry to form a mold with which can then be made into an object out of any material that can be molded. Benefits to FDM: many material types to choose from, no curing time, a wide (and quickly growing) selection of materials with different properties, parts can be used out of the machine with a good deal of reliability, dual (or multi) print materials, relatively cheap material prices. Costs of FDM: small detailed resolution not always captured on different axie, more mechanical parts (more potential things to break), and slightly more knowledge about 3D printing needed (which could be seen as a good thing or a bad thing, contingent upon your interest); a knowledge of different settings and printing strategies is very useful when printing this way. That last point being said, the software needed to auto generate support structures and such of good quality for difficult overhangs and designs, has come a long way is always improving. I don't think additive manufacturing/3D printing will ever hit the general public, i.e. grandma is using the printer on a regular basis, until it can print cloths/footwear or electronics (think cell phone). I think this technology is already so apart of industry/research, that it will benefit the general public more indirectly than directly for a good while.
  2. Hey guys, looks like there aren't really any official submissions. Thanks for the participation regardless :grin:! It appears that the MPC isn't really taking off though so this will be the last one. It was fun, and actually really challenging; that mini gear was a tough nut to crack. Hope to see your future prints in Post Your Latest Print!
  3. Hey guys, to answer some questions: I'm using the standard file, except for the text. I used the thingiverse customizer to remove the text on the outside of the print. Hmm, regarding the tools we are limited to; I would like to keep this thread democratic, but if no one has any objections, I think your imagination should be the limiting factor. If people think you are pulling cheap moves then they will overlook you when voting. Yup, I disabled solid top and bottom in Cura with zero infill. The rationale behind this was to keep the nozzle from heating up surrounding plastic by just printing where I needed. Whether or not this helped I'm not really sure, this was a strategy I developed while printing out of PLA but I'm not sure how much it helped with ABS. Here are some of my print settings, I encourage people to evolve these or do something completely different. I hesitate a little to give some of the print settings away, not because of the competition it could generate, but because it could bias individual's thinking and prevent them from developing novel printing schemes. That being said, it seems like some tips could help people get off the ground. - At first I was printing really slow and cold, but I always forget how well the printer works at moderate to quick speeds. I printed the gear at 20mm/s. - To quickly narrow down my printing temps for new plastics or different applications, I use "Move Material" and set the material to ABS regardless of the material type. As the nozzle heats up I slowly increase the speed at which I can feed material through the nozzle. By keeping an eye on the speed and noting skipping of the feeder motor, I can narrow my printing temp range to about 10C of what I want or at least give myself a good place to start experimenting. - I printed the layers thick, I figured this would help keep the temps down (and thus reduce the gears from sticking to each other) by speeding up the print. - I think the first layer is pretty important on this print. If the first layer squishes the plastic out to the sides too much the gears will fuse together. I made a large skirt and adjusted the build plate while the skirt was printing so I got the first layer to barely stick.
  4. Alright a much better job, in Cura with good ABS; I didn't have to rely on any shrinkage. I'm going to try and go even smaller.
  5. Blarp, my latest attempt: I really like Sander's print; the first one to get a reasonably small size printed really sets the bar in this month's competition. I'm not deterred yet, I've still got several ideas I'm going to try out that include different filaments, for example will shrinking ABS plastic work better here? I have some really bad ABS that shrinks like crazy, could be useful.
  6. Hey guys, I was curious to see what I could do with Cura last night. Here is my .25 and .2 scaled test prints, I think they turned out alright looking, but still no functional rotation. There seem to be gaps between the gears, I think the first layer is bonding everything together. I'm interested in using scad, I haven't had the need to use it before, but see a lot of people discussing it. Due to the settings I imposed on the printer, really cold and really slow, I too got a couple of midair prints. I've seen this happen before when I tested this printing scheme; and thought it to be a bubble in the nozzle head that formed as a function of the cooler nozzle temps, but never had any proof until last night. The bubble in the photo is perfectly sealed and pretty hard; I turned off retraction to avoid this on subsequent prints.
  7. There seems to be a tie, so I flipped a coin at http://www.random.org/coins/ and Emmet's Gear Bearing with customizable text, by pyrophreek won. I'm interested to see how this one goes, I wonder how small we can get the gear bearing! I have some ideas I want to try already, good luck everyone!
  8. I got this stuff called PolyFlex from a Kickstarter, I'm interested to try it out. I saw a test piece from them at the maker faire and got my package about 2 weeks before moving. Perhaps I can try to print out two halves of a sandal? I think I'll try a simple test geometry first :mrgreen:.
  9. Hey guys! Thanks for all the interesting print ideas and submissions! With the influx of print suggestions I got last night, I think it fair to wait until ya'll have gotten a chance to look them over. I'll post the Current Challenge tonight at https://www.google.com/search?q=eastern+time&rlz=1C1CHFX_enUS503US503&oq=eastern+time&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l5.1656j0j4&sourceid=chrome&es_sm=122&ie=UTF-8#q=Time%20in%20virginia, for a list of all the potential August prints check out the http://umforum.ultimaker.com/index.php?/topic/6769-monthly-print-challenge-mpc-august/?p=62860 I wanted to print out shoes as well, but with a US size 14 my bare foot barely fits on the build plate diagonally oriented :-|.
  10. Looking forward to seeing this thing in action! I think I can see how some of it goes together, I definitely can't figure it all out though. Great to see another modification to the printer come to life.
  11. Hey guys thanks, I'm excited to start printing again! Well, so far we have Better Dragon by illuminarti with or without baked in support in the lead, but I'll wait until tomorrow morning https://www.google.com/search?q=eastern+us+time&rlz=1C1CHFX_enUS503US503&oq=eastern+us+time&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l5.2019j0j1&sourceid=chrome&es_sm=122&ie=UTF-8 to update the official print. I'll start the new topic and leave this one to be populated as long as needed. Just remember to continue following this topic and we'll be able to keep tabs on what's going on. http://umforum.ultimaker.com/index.php?/topic/6769-monthly-print-challenge-mpc-august/
  12. Greetings and welcome to the Monthly Printing Challenge! ********************************* Guidelines: Beginning on the first of every month a winner is declared from the previous month. Votes and submissions can be made at any time during the MPC month. Below are ways to help me understand what people are trying to vote for, I'll read your post and try to figure out what your intention is regardless of your use of this format; they are simply suggestions for organization. Votes for favorite post = "Vote:Name" Official Print Submission = "Submission" Print Suggestions = "Print: http://www.thingiver...om/thing:192211" What you are interested in printing = "Print Vote: name or link of the vote print" Participate in any or everything ********************************* I'll tally up the best submission votes on a somewhat regular basis and update the numbers on the first post in this topic. I'll also keep a running tally of the prints that have been suggested and made, as well as the number of votes each new suggested print has. An example submission could include things like close up photos of hard to print details, an overall photo of the print on the printer bed not removed, a photo of the print off the bed; some information about the print, how long the print took to build, how many print attempts you went through, printer type, bed temp, nozzle temp, filament type, print speed, some shared files, screenshots from slicing software to show supports, photos while printing, etc. Not everything is absolutely necessary, this is intended to help others gain experience faster and to demonstrate what to expect in a quality print. Feel free to make your official submission whatever you see fit. CURRENT CHALLENGE: Emmet's Gear Bearing with customizable text, by pyrophreek printed at the smallest possible size MPC PRINT LIST: A Better Dragon, by illuminarti (2 Votes) Preassembled Secret Heart Box, by emmett (1 Votes) Sneakers I, by Recreus (0 Votes) Cyborg Beast, by JorgeZuniga (0 Votes) Rubber Band Powered Car Collection, by onepointdiy (0 Votes) Printed in August; 2 votes Printed in July; 4 votes[/b] LINKS TO OFFICIAL SUBMISSIONS: HAPPY PRINTING!
  13. Hey guys, I want to apologize for my extended absence. The week after we started the challenge I found out that I was going to have to move due to circumstances out of my control. I had only lived in that house for ~1 year, and to be honest I was stressing over everything after I found out moving was imminent. Some things people find very stressful in their lives I can handle with ease, but there are things that I obsess over and this is one of them. I do not like moving. To make matters worse I was put in a very tight financial situation that almost resulted in me being penniless. The two situations hit me at the same time and I wasn't taking it well, I haven't even printed anything for the last two weeks! I moved into my new place on the 25th, just got my internet hooked up today, and things are finally starting to settle down. I know I helped spearhead this topic and feel like a jerk for letting everyone down, I will be setting up the topic again for next month still; although I will understand if there is hesitance in participating as I definitely botched the first month's attempt. I doubt this next month can be as bad as the weeks of stress I put myself through recently, so expect to see more participation from myself. I actually have several bracelets printed out and none of them turned out very great looking, I think mnis's bracelet looks the best so far but will hold off on voting until tomorrow. Titus with respect to your questions, voting can take place at any time and this Friday a winner will be declared. So far there are no votes for the new print, the dragon print looks pretty interesting, there is also the Preassembled Secret Heart Box on the table for a vote as well. Also, any vote suggestions can still be submitted if something strikes your fancy. Print Vote: A Better Dragon If the Dragon gets voted on as the new print for next month I think either file (baked in supports or no baked in supports) should be printable as long as people identify which dragon they are printing. One more also, even though the bracelet was a difficult challenge I still support people printing it and posting progress in the new topic or even this topic. I know after my last bracelet attempt I came up with better printing strategies that I wanted to try out. @Blizz, the tool I was using in the video was called a Hemostat also called a Kelly Clamp; I purchased both a curved and straight version from SparkFun here: https://www.sparkfun.com/products/8555 https://www.sparkfun.com/products/71 They are definitely worth the couple of dollars, as the geometry of the tool lends itself to removing support structure in tight places easily.
  14. Blarp, hey guys; Tuesday evening my housemate told me he's moving out soon. I really super sucks hard because Tuesday was the beginning of a 5 day vacation for me and he totally F'd it up. It's hard to get an exact date out of him, and as such I've had to turn my vacation into a hunt for a new place to live. I can't realistically afford to live here by myself and I need to start now so I can move into somewhere sometime next month. I may be sparsy appearing on the forums for a few weeks until I can get everything settled and planned out, I'll still be monitoring the MPC and printing though. I'll be glad to move out so I am not subject to the knee jerk reactions of others :angry:.
  15. Alright!! A pinned topic! Yeah! Thanks IRobertI With regard to watching videos on the forum, it's always seemed glitchy to me as well. I use firefox and it automatically uses my VLC player to render the video. I hate dealing with QT's BS.
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