My new favourite 3D printer bed leveling method

Should I heat the extruder when bed leveling, or leave it cold?

 

If hot, how do I deal with oozing filament?

This is my new method which addresses these issues.

3D Printing: humidity & keeping your PLA filament dry

It is generally agreed that you should try to keep your reels of PLA filament dry.

 

But I'm not sure that all suggested methods on the net make complete sense!

So here are my mad ramblings on storage and relative humidity.

3D Printing: filament grinding & nozzle blockage

My printer stopped printing part way through a print!

 

I'd never experienced this before...

...and I'm still not sure what the reason was for this problem.

3D Design & Print: bits for my kitchen radio

I wanted to add a BlueTooth transmitter to KitchenPi

At last, a mini-project to exercise my [dubious] 3D design skills.

FreeCAD: Pads & Pockets

I'm slowly getting to grips with FreeCAD...

 

...but its certainly been challenging.

In this post I describe how to make a simple structure including holes & cutouts.

Starting FreeCAD: making name plates

Drawing my own objects in 3D is the next logical step on my 3D Printing adventure.

However, 3D CAD software can be tricky to get your head around.

But this is how I designed a few 3D name plates.

Multicolour printing on Creality CR-10-V3 with Cura

This is a detailed guide on colour printing with a single extruder.

 

Multicolour printing can really lift some prints, especially where appearance is more important than functionality.

The Cura slicer provides good support for this process.

3D Printer control via Gambas

Its easy to write some Gambas code to provide basic control of a 3D printer.

You just need a good G-code reference list.

These notes were born out of a few experiments I recently conducted with my Creality CR-10-V3

3D Printer: isolating the USB 5Volt feed

I'm really not happy that my printer's display "lights-up" when I turn on my connected computer.

This is not how USB is intended to work when connecting one 'machine' to another.

So I had to come up with a fix.

3D Printing via Cura on Linux

I'm getting a bit bored with transferring g-code files to my printer's SD card.

 

Its not one of life's most difficult tasks.

But I thought I'd try printing from my laptop, and see how I get on with it.

My Bleepin' 3D Printer

My printer knows how to bleep!

 

That is to say that the controller has some kind of audio transducer which can make sounds.

So this post is about putting it to use.

3D Printing: printer to Linux computer serial link

There may be times when you want to link your printer to a Linux laptop via the serial link.

 

Its very handy to be able to slice and print straight from a connected computer.

...so here is the procedure.

3D Printing: time to replace the nozzle?

During the last 7 or 8 days, something bad has happened.

 

My 3D printer has been producing rubbish.

Something rather unexpected seems to have solved my problem.

Filament "pull" affecting 3D print performance

Friction in the filament feed path can affect 3D printer performance...

 

...or at least that is the conclusion I have come to over the last few days.

Here are my notes to back this up.

3D Printing: sticking and removing

This post is primarily concerned with 2 issues;

 

1) Getting your prints to stick to the bed

2) Getting your prints off the bed

3D Printing: I'm back in the saddle!

It is almost 8 years since I've posted anything on 3D printing.

 

That's largely because its almost 8 years since I last touched a 3D printer.

Well now that I have my own printer...I'm back!

MakerBot Replicator: Print Quality #3

We recently invited a guy into our organisation to conduct basic training on our MakerBot Replicator 3D printer for a bunch of department heads and other interested staff.

 

He also gave our machine a bit of a tune-up which has considerably improved print quality.

This post follows on from three previous posts: Replicator, Print Quality & Print Quality #2.

MakerBot Replicator: Print Quality #2

Having upgraded the Replicator's firmware, I was able to run a couple of test prints using acceleration.

This allowed me to print a TreeFrog in under 30 minutes.

Following on from my previous posts on the Replicator and Print Quality, I wanted to try a print with acceleration. But my first problem was locating the acceleration mode on the Replicator...
...it didn't have one.

MakerBot Replicator: Print Quality

What level of print quality can you expect from your new MakerBot Replicator?

 

Here are a few illustrations which I hope might help show the sort of results you can expect from this model of 3D printer.

...Or maybe you get better results, in which case, I have a problem!

Having levelled the Replicator platform and left all other settings at their default values (e.g. nozzle & platform temperatures) I selected the "whistle" from  the ReplicatorG software example list as a test piece.

The 3D Printer: Toy or Techno-Wonder?

I was lucky enough this week to get my sticky little hands on a 3D printer: the "MakerBot Replicator".  So what's all the fuss about?

First impressions are that this printer has been built using old parts from a flat-bed scanner, and housed in a primitive, makeshift, wooden chassis.

But on closer examination, the chassis is in fact a very sturdy structure, closed at the base and the back, but open on the other four sides.