3D Printing Forum

Getting there... Now to make a nice little stand... APEX or N7 ?

How long do you think this project will take to print?

Probably ages
And it takes about a kilogram of filament. It's a big gun
Created a magnetic stand, made from a wooden board. Some nice walnut or cherry wood will look nice. Or you could go with some metal-style venier-board. There are two magnets which will hold onto screws and should hold the gun in place nicely. Will see if that needs more work once I have the baby printed.
Added some thermal clips which will be used in my next project *drum rolls*. More later...

/edit:
By the way, it will take quite some time until I print it, because I will need to either build a new printer or rework my UMO before I start this big project. My UMO doesn't give good enough results to be worth spending 1+ rolls of filament on a print like this.

AHAHAHAHAHA, I just found out that SpaceClaim has a rendering module (Keyshot). It's limited to 800x600 but I still love it

Hey I feel your printing pain...try two BB-8 builds!

LePaul wrote:Hey I feel your printing pain...try two BB-8 builds!

All those nice and smooth curved faces.. These would look really bad from my printer. It has a bad Z leadscrew (UMO..) that keeps making horizontal artifacts into the print ~ every 5mm. And my nozzle has seen almost 3 years of printing without ever being cleaned or serviced. Feels more like an 0.6mm nozzle nowadays
But anyways, once I'm done with the Mass effect models I will finally get done with my mini printer (which can print these models!) and be among the exalted people who can print nice objects ^^

You'd be amazed what you can do if you have thick walls (like 1.2) and sand, sand, fill, sand and prime

Some of the prints I have seen from other BB-8 builders look rough, but after a lot of careful smoothing, look great

Well you know, as eager as I am to design stuff, as lazy I am when it comes to post-processing
The problem with sanding is, once you start, you have to go over the whole part or you won't get an even surface...
Haven't decided yet whether I want to paint my Carnifex or just print it in the right colors. I might print it with "architect's stone" from Faberdashery which is a light grey, sandstone-like material that can be finished very nicely, and then paint it. But that would still be a lot of work I'm also a very bad painter, I get stains and uneven surfaces all the time. Just not one of my talents...

If you are lazy, print in ABS and then use vapor smoothing with Aceton to get a nice finish.

Good idea, except I don't like ABS at all
I suppose my new printer will give me a good enough finish right off the printer (that's the whole idea behind building it in the first place).
Just discovered shapeways - I will have me some good PA parts for the printhead and extruder soon. I printed a prototype some time ago but nothing really fit..

Shapeways is expensive!

Does any of you know how precise the metal "prints" from Shapeways are? Do they publish tolerances?

They do, but rather vague. It just says "+-0.1 mm" (example). They don't differentiate between long flat surfaces, details, curves or whatever.

Small pieces aren't that expensive (of course, much more expensive than printing them yourself), but the increased quality might well be worth it. I will see (and show) when I get the pieces I ordered today.

https://www.shapeways.com/materials/steel

Accuracy ± 5% of any dimension (and one layer thickness of 0.1mm)

The bronze infiltration of each steel part makes this material less dimensionally accurate than other Shapeways materials. Shrinkage is more prevalent, especially on small holes and inner diameters. Accuracy and tolerance can vary greatly depending on the model, and are hard to predict because they are so geometry specific.

I think then I am better of milling the stuff that I need myself from aluminium...