Watching. Not that I need any expensive hobbies, but I'm intrigued.

I'll probably never make any guns like the rebels are doing. LOL
[Reply]

My son's friend down the street is obsessed along with his dad with those things. They have four orange ones they put together that have reels of plastic hooked up like a sewing machine. Two others are enclosed in plexiglass his dad explained it's a kinda toxic resin that is vented out through drier vent hosing.

Honestly, I have never seen much made with one that interested me. Star Wars and the tree guy figurines. Oh, he made a Rasberry pi case for my son. I will admit the Thingiverse site has some useful looking projects. But I wonder if that requires a super expensive device.
[Reply]

I've had a FlashForge Creator Pro dual head for about 6 years now.

Not really that much of a learning curve to get started, but plenty of trial and error before you have sufficient experience. Patience is definitely a virtue as you take your lumps. The nice thing is that there is usually a pretty quick answer on the web if you just input any symptoms or problems.

I've designed so many cool things over the years, solved a lot of small problems with simple 3D designs. It's a very cool and fulfilling hobby.

And yes, thingiverse.com is awesome (BTW srvy, you can print pretty much anything with a standard printer).

Printers have become very reasonably priced, a lot of people are raving about the newest Dremels as they handle a lot of the bs without any headaches (bed leveling can be a real pia the first few times you do it), issue with the Dremel is proprietary filament... about double the price iirc.

I'm certainly no expert, but I've given my machine a good workout, if you have any questions, hmu!
[Reply]

I made this.....


[Reply]

Thank you. I purchased this model LINK which is scheduled to arrive on 1.20.21. You can almost count on questions and I'll be posting.
[Reply]

That looks more like a kiln model which killed Fawn Liebowitz in a kiln accident.

Do you have 3 dates for my friends?
[Reply]

We have one at new school. Have not been able to get to it yet. maybe of something breaks.

We are talking about letting kids do small virtual legos-then printing them out.
[Reply]

Wow how coincidental is this thread! We just discussed this in our Monday morning meeting! It has changed so much in the short run yet the cost is still the issue. Hard to get from the RED to the BLACK in this booming technology.
[Reply]

I can't believe I got this thing to actually print something... that was an arduous journey. It came a day early and called in for a 1/2 day at work and spent the last 10 hours getting everything setup and configured. I go into ADD mode when building PCs and now it seems 3D printing.

It's not much but not bad for the 1st day:
[Reply]

Is this the only 3d printing thread on CP? And it's almost 3 years old?

Last weekend my best friend gifted me a really nice Prusa MINI+ with a bunch of upgrades. Been printing random stuff all weekend. Didn't really realize how fun it was.

Anybody else tinkering with 3D printing these days?
[Reply]

Yep. I bought a Creality 5 S 1 a few months ago. It's not only fun but really good for little things around the house: Latches, organizers, decor, and of course toys.

The standard PLA plastic is not sturdy. It print quickly and is cheap and available, but it softens in heat and will just snap without too much convincing. I also bought some PETG and use that sometimes; it solves a lot of those problems with tends to clog up my nozzle.

I also bought some TPU which is apparently super durable but can have some sponginess to it; I haven't tried it yet because it can absorb moisture over time so I may have to pop it in the oven (!) if it has been sitting out for a while, and I'm not there yet. I'd also have to learn a bunch new settings. I'll get there.

What I'd really like to do is scan items into 3d and use the printer to output replicas. That can have huge implications like to replace old out-of-use car parts that would otherwise require a whole machine shop. Or, scan big items like public statues or buildings. That's all a ways away, though.

In the meantime, I can make all the model railroad buildings and Van Halen keyring ornaments I can handle.
[Reply]

Local Microcenter here in KC actually sells a pretty cheap in house filament labeled as Inland. I haven't had a bunch of time to really test it out. But my friend uses it exclusively and says it's great other than the silk versions. I got some of their PETG+ filament this weekend, and have been having really good luck with it so far.

AutoCAD actually is capable of printing directly to my printer, so I'm gonna have to install the latest version and brush up on my CAD skills. It's been a while...
[Reply]

Made this little push knife tonight. PETG+ so it's super durable and strong. Crazy sharp point right off the plater.


[Reply]

We hade one at work had enough going on that we needed to order a second one. They ended up shipping two, and we decided to keep both because it was easier than shipping it back. I was skeptical that we could put 3 to good use. Well, all 3 of them run pretty much all day. Mostly printing small parts for experimental apparatus or test prototypes.

We've been doing 3-d printed concrete for a few years at bench scale. We have a proposal in that would allow us to go to demonstration scale (size of a large living room with a high ceiling) 3-d printing for construction with two robotic arms coordinating with one another.
[Reply]