SilverTriple's printing stuff...

[silvertriple]

If you're not changing resins and don't have the printer near a window you don't even need to drain the vat unless you're going several months with it not in use.

I know but It really depends the resin you use (not all are behaving the same on that aspect - some resins have a life once outside of the bottle which is really short : better to check specs and technical information provided by the resin manufacturer) ... And anyway, next prints are another resin for some specific reasons...

[silvertriple]

A new printer arrived home during the week...

Elegoo Saturn 4 Ultra


The bed is bigger than the Photon M3, and this should become my main resin 3D printer. I don't know yet if I'll keep the Photon M3, as I have no clue if this big bed printer will work with flex resins, and if it is not the case, I'll keep the Photon M3 just for those...
I intend to do my first prints with the Saturn 4 Ultra over the week-end...

[silvertriple]

New printer, new mistakes to make . In other words, new printer = new things to learn.
The printer has a printing mode set by default as Fast. I indeed found that the tilt was going very quick, and the detach element was quite brutal. Part of the raft was still on the FEP (settings for the resin comes directly from resine manufacturer and they are for normal printing mode - one resin is suitable for Fast mode, but that's not what I use right now).
I therefore decided to retry with normal mode, but I also changed the slicing to include another part : the target is to print the Hunter prototype roll cage with monoshock option in two parts. I used auto-orientation, and heavy supports (it may work with medium supports, but I'm not tempting right now). The resin is Sirayatech Blu Obsidian Black (nylon like resin).

[silvertriple]

Multiple fails...
Cumulating new printer, new resin, new slicer (Chitubox in version 2 is slightly different than V1). this makes the thing slightly more difficult. The resin is not an easy resin, and I start to suspect the tilt makes orientation of parts slightly more difficult...

I resliced my parts, reviewed the supports and i'm retrying again...


This is a bit frustrating, but that's part of the learning curve...

[Dadio]

Good luck , always more challenging with a greater number of new variables .

[silvertriple]

This time it is a success. I changed the supports settings accordingly to some tricks I found on a the sirayatech user group on facebook, added a few supports just to be sure, and it worked...


I removed the supports and put the parts in the cure station after cleaning...


I'll put some smaller parts now. I won't have a time lapse, because the parts I'm going to print are not that big

[silvertriple]

As mentioned earlier, I have the intention to put the Nylon like resin to the test...


Those parts are quite hard in FDM because there is no ideal orientation... Theorically, SLA is much better in Z, so it may be a very good use case for this. I printed a few set in order to ensure that if I snap one, I can still change it and get back to run. That will be most likely the only parts printed for the Mercury 4xi beside the rims...

[silvertriple]

While spending the afternoon to change the bumper of my daughter's car, I face a small problem of tooling. There is no way I can find a drill bit of 19mm diameter, and even the cones I have go by step of 2...
I tried to play with a file and that did not work out. I decided to drill a bigger hole taking benefit of the cone, and to adapt a mount for the rear view camera...
The adapter is going to be in 2 pieces : one of the right diameter to insert the camera and this part will be inserted in the bumper. There will be a thread so I have a ring with the opposite thread to fix the part...


I'll launch a 25 minutes print after the current print is finish and this will be solved (hopefully )

[Frankentruck]

19.04mm is a 3/4" drill bit

[silvertriple]

19.04mm is a 3/4" drill bit

The time I get those Imperial (aka "freedom") units bit here, I have tons of prints done

[juicedcoupe]

19.04mm is a 3/4" drill bit

The time I get those Imperial (aka "freedom") units bit here, I have tons of prints done

Some of the price of "freedom" is that we have to buy tools in SAE and Metric. Good thing I like buying tools.

In the 80's and 90's, lots of US cars had both. The power-train would be SAE and the vehicle itself would be Metric. My 5.0 Mustang is like that.

[silvertriple]

3D printed part worked perfectly

And it is even similar to the OEM mounts for the ultra sonic sensor on the side of the same bumper, which is even better...

I don't mind buying tools when I have the use for them... The thing is here, it would have taken 4-20 days depending of the tool ordered. Which means my daughter would have required me to dispatch at the poney club to feed the 2 poneys (her's and my wife's) every day, which means a lot of time loss for me. Better to have a quick solution. We asked around if someone had something to save us, but ultimately, the 3D printed part works...
NB: the TPU printed silent block was installed on the car during the winter to hold the exhaust rear piece (and replace a part which was received only 3 weeks later). It is still on the car and functionnal...

[silvertriple]

Decided to pull the trigger on a Bambulab A1 Mini for very specific uses cases that I don't want to tackle on the X1C:

• Printing low shore TPU/TPE requires to change the extruder spring tension to work. This appear possible to do on the X1C by modding the printer head cover, but comes with additional issues (at least for me): I use my X1C so much that I don't want to have to think about what filament I used last time before pushing anothe filament in. Ultimately, convenience commands not to do this on the X1C, as changing the extruder tension would make the printer not working with anything than the filament you used last. In short I needed another printer for this. Further the A1 series have a tension screw easy to access on the side of the printer head

• Each time I'm going in vacation or in family, I regret not having a printer available. The A1 mini is small and easy to move, and that will be practical for rapide prototyping while travelling. I could even have it with me during RC event to print some stuff

I just ordered it while it is in stock, so it should arrive rapidly. I did not opt for the AMS lite as I don't see the point for my specific use cases...

[XLR8]

The A1 looks like a very capable yet inexpensive machine and perfect for single purpose printing. Very much looking forward to your review.

[silvertriple]

The A1 looks like a very capable yet inexpensive machine and perfect for single purpose printing. Very much looking forward to your review.

For the small story, one of my friends contacted me because he had a small rc project (a mini Lunchbox 1/32 with available parts on Thingiverse) and he told me that as per the estimation he did on websites for printing the cost would be about 180€. I downloaded the parts and did a quick analysis. 90g of material (PETG for such a project), less than 4 hours print on a 256x256 bed : somehow 180€ for this is likely way overpriced. I told my friend the situation, and suggested to consider buying a printer and use the project to learn, hinting him about some printer possibilities and indicating as well the limitations that comes with the bed slingers (no enclosure means no ABS and high temp material - but for such a project it is not required). Then my friend was silent on the chat for quite a while, and when the chat was coming back it was his wife thanking me as she knows now what will be the christmas gift of her husband . Next day I had a long discussion with my friend about 3D printing, materials, limitations, possibilities and so on. He had a look at multiple review and was still to choose between A1 and A1 mini.

At the end, he chosed an A1 mini : for him it is the starting point, and at some point, if he needs bigger, there will be another printer. That was Wednesday. He told me today that since he ordered the printer, he and his wife have a lot of printing ideas (spoiler : I told him only limitation comes from your own imagination).

I found this refreshing. And it also put myself to question after my long talk with him on the other day. My imagination is never the issue and never limited. I have many use cases to explore with 3D printing. The A1 mini and A1 had already my attention in the past because of the accessibility of the extrusion spring setting, but the discussion I had with him remind me those few expensive rolls of filament I can't use because of this same settings requiring to mod the X1C (there is a tutorial on Recreus youtube channel), but I do not want to do this... And this got me thinking for the last two days, and today, I did pull the trigger. And yes, sure, I'll have a review of it... And sorry, it may generates as well some temptation for some of you