Considering 3d printing

[KentuckySouthern]

Nice little stuff, Darryl.  

[deemery]

Yup. The printing part is actually the easy part. The difficult and time consuming part is doing the 3D model in CAD. It is a whole hobby in itself.  You can make anything for almost free, but what is your time worth?

Darryl, what are you using for 3D CAD?

dave

[Mr. Critter]

"There's this guy who's 3D-printed an HO-scale dentist's chair.  Complete with drills and instruments on the tray."

"Huh.  Ask him how many times he's watched 'Marathon Man.'"

"Oh, he won't remember.  He has it on endless loop on VHS."

"And you know this how, exactly? Does he hate Dustin Hoffman?"

"Sorry I brought it up.  We should just shut up and bowl."

[Rail and Tie]

Darryl, what are you using for 3D CAD?

dave

Hi Dave, I am using Rhino. Much easier to use then Fusion or Solidworks. A little pricy for the hobbyist, but a proper NURBS modeler. 

[Rail and Tie]

"There's this guy who's 3D-printed an HO-scale dentist's chair.  Complete with drills and instruments on the tray."

"Huh.  Ask him how many times he's watched 'Marathon Man.'"

"Oh, he won't remember.  He has it on endless loop on VHS."

"And you know this how, exactly? Does he hate Dustin Hoffman?"

"Sorry I brought it up.  We should just shut up and bowl."

Yup!   LOLOLOL!!

[deemery]

Darryl, what are you using for 3D CAD?

dave

Hi Dave, I am using Rhino. Much easier to use then Fusion or Solidworks. A little pricy for the hobbyist, but a proper NURBS modeler.

Well, after my experience a couple years ago with SketchUp and its bleeping bugs, I'd definitely pay for a quality implementation that didn't have the same amount of frustration.

dave

[Jim Donovan]

I thought I would throw my two cents in on where I am at in 3D printing. I have two liquid resin printers, the first is a Elegoo Mars 2 and the newer one is an Anycubic Mono 5s Pro. Here they are:







I paid about the same price for each of them, $349.00, just about three years apart. I imagine I could get something as good or better for a little less today or pay the same for a larger printing plate machine. For less then $200 you can get a machine that will do a lot, the printing plate would be the size of the Mars 2 machine about  2.65x4.75 inches. The Anycubic machine has a large printing plate of 6.5 x 8.5 and can print vertically up to 9 inches. The Anycubic printer is the better printer by far but the Elegoo is still very useful for printing such items as windows, doors, chairs and other basic parts. The advantages of the Anycubic machine besides size are it has a heater to keep the area within the hood at 40c. Resin prints better in a warm environment and the heater eliminates a possible issue since I keep the printers in the garage. It also prints significantly more detail being a 14.4K resolution while the Mars is a 6K resolution machine. Finally, it is connected on the wifi network so I simply send the files from my computer to the machine. The Mars needs a USB stick which is not a big issue most times but sometimes the stick loses connection and I get a misprint.

I started printing with the Mars machine way before I knew how to design parts. I routinely check out the following sites where I can download free files or files that cost a couple of dollars. I've downloaded chairs, windows, doors, roof material, street lamps and other such stuff. You really don't need to know how to design to get your money worth out of a liquid resin printer. 

https://www.thingiverse.com

https://cults3d.com

I was put onto using Tinkercad, an on-line beginner CAD program by a friend up north. It is amazing how far you can go with this simple to learn program and like most things the more you use it the more you can do with it. Except for the man on the catwalk and the brick design on the wall everything you see in the following photo was designed using tinkercad;



The interior shown above slides into the bottom of the building and latched in place.

Like I said I keep the printers in the garage and I have them being vented to the outside through duct fans and duct hose. Still I get some smell in the garage, mostly from the alcohol used to clean the parts and the work area. I also have a part cleaner that I can put most parts into and it cleans like a washing machine. It then can be used to cure the parts using a UV light and a turntable so the parts are exposed to the light 360 degrees. A lot of guys don't use it but I find it very handy helping to keep the area clean and the parts finished easier. It cost around $130 made by Anycubic:









Finally, I have settled on using the resin from Anycubic. I get their standard gray and clear at a cost of about $17.00 per 1000 ml bottle when buying 5 from Amazon. You need to use gloves while working with it when it is in liquid form and it does have a mild odor but I find it works well with both printers and produces strong, clean, detailed parts. When I need super tough parts I get a bottle of their ABS (like) resin, very strong.

That about covers where I am at with 3D printing today. I like what it allows me to do in my modeling but I still enjoy simply working with wood and making items from kits as well. The printers might sit a month or two between being used these days but they certainly add to the enjoyment of the hobby.

Jim D

[friscomike]

Howdy Darryl,

Thanks for the nice overview of 3D printing.  I agree that 3D CAD is the most time-consuming.  If something isn't available commercially, I design and print it.  Otherwise, my time is worth more than the commercial cost.  The darn shipping is rough sometimes.

Have fun,
mike