Monday 30 January 2017

Filament strength as it applies to my Ukulele Hangers

I just ordered one of these cheap luggage scale to weight my ukuleles UkuleleAquisitionSyndrome
Aliexpress luggage scales
I have 4 uke's so my condition isn't that bad :-) But I am trying to test pla and petg plastic for use with my hangers.

I have tested in the past with the things I had on hand, but inspired by Tom's filaween series, I want to establish some constants with a set of scales. They don't need to be seriously accurate but hopefully consistent.
My earlier testing can be found here :-
http://lukethier.blogspot.com.au/2016/08/ukulele-hanger-strength-test.html



From left to right in the above photo we have some GITD Blue from http://www.aurarum.com.au/





Next the two are in a nice red from https://www.the3dprinter.com.au/
I will say here that there was a larger range of colours but I had to redesign my hangers as printing in a slightly lower temperature caused weak layer bonding and this caused them to break, so I'm reprinting in the new design. There were some in The3dprinter white but I had to throw them away along with the others in favour of the new design and will re print in white later on.
These colours were supplied by Dion for me to try out and I'm more than happy with his filament and indeed with all the Aussie supplied filament.

None of the filament was to blame for the breaking it was my desire to run a little cooler for a better finish that was to blame for the layer bonding failure. (Wont be doing that again!)




The black ones are in the 3dfillies pla (They are all pla btw) https://3dfillies.com/

Michael from 3dfillies was kind enough to send me some of their PETG Squeeee! to try out, so expect some feed back on my series of ukulele hangers in petg and their ability to hold ukuleles (Strength test) soon. I'll wait on the luggage scales before testing these PETG filaments for their ability to hold a precious ukulele away from harms way.  Hopefully it wont be 40 days before I can begin lol



I'm running a tower temp test on some yellow pla from 3dfillies right now however!


My photos don't really do the colour justice but it has a slightly translucent appearance


and the translucency is apparent under my led head light surround I now use on the frame rather than fitted back around my hotend...............just lazy is all :-D 



Here are the temps from bottom to top. The recommended temperature range is 195 - 210c 


Ever since my belt adjuster broke I'm having some issues with it cornering, I suspect the Y axis though, as it has some slop in it I cant remove without a complete tear down.


The 3dfillies yellow pla seems to handle this temperature range really nicely and in the photo the little black dot represents the Y front of the print for later use as diagnostics and so I don't lose orientation. I'm going to try 200c for my next print of a uke hanger as it seems the nicest quality form the test. Very happy with this yellow and their black is great also.



















Monday 23 January 2017

Analysis paralysis

Ok my brain has stopped working........again :-) This print is gaping when it moves from one level to another. There is a section that used to have supports but found I could print without them in  this spot.

This one in ASA didn't suffer from this problem at all!


Some materials have no issue with it. Others like my GITD Blue and white are having trouble transitioning from one level to another.

Ratty supports also an issue here but not on every print.

When it starts to get into the area where I no longer use supports right near my thumb in the picture, it starts to have trouble. My theory is that the temp is not right even though I've used it before with success. I am using some troublesome white I have that is ok for some things and would normally just blame it but it happened to some glow in the dark filament as well and sometimes you can see where it started to happen on other materials but fixed itself after one layer.

Here's where it didn't print properly and came away with little force.


The house hold gods are not happy! Must appease them.



I will try going back to supports if only to force it to lay down more filament in those areas and try and fix itself and I am trying cooler and later hotter temps to try and eliminate those as issues well.

So........I'm suffering from analysis paralysis and grasping at straws rather than working the problem, well I am working the problem but.................




Anyone have this problem in the past who could solve this problem?

Please no random Tourrettes I'm gunna shout any random thing as an answer.






Tuesday 17 January 2017

Cooridinate systems in 3d software

If you've ever imported a model into another 3d software application and your model has been 
unceremoniously flipped in another orientation I hope this Dummies guide will help explain why.


Left Handed Coordination


Firstly there are two basic coordinate orientations The Left Handed and the Right Handed system.
The most common by far... is the left handed system.

Thumb "Z" Pointer finger "Y" Middle finger "X"

Right Handed Coordination

Where it gets more complicated is when they start changing the  "Z" and "Y" around and this is where the problems start.

Here are several examples of different "Z" orientations.

You'll also notice they are always coloured R G B as well.

Blender has the "Z" up "Y" depth version
Blender has the "Z" up "Y" depth version




3ds Max has the "Z" up "Y" depth version
Click to see bigger version
3ds Max has the "Z" up "Y" depth version



Fusion 360 has the "Z" Depth and "Y" up version
Click for bigger version

Fusion 360 has the "Z" Depth and "Y" up version



Meshmixer has the "Z" Depth and "Y" up version
Click for larger version

Meshmixer has the "Z" Depth and "Y" up version


Autodesks' Maya also uses the "Z" Depth version and the term Z Depth has more than one meaning.

It is this orientation where we get our calculations for determining how we might set the visual falloff in 3d software where things blur as they are further away from the viewer.

Funnily enough 3ds Max also call this procedure "Z Depth" as well, despite it being in the "Y orientation in Max"



So if you make the "maker coin" in Meshmixer as it is presented in the picture and import it into Fusion it should retain its orientation, but if you import it into Blender or 3ds Max it will probably spin the coin to match its original orientation. This confusingly wont be the case with all software. I made the coin in 3ds Max lying down as you see it in meshmixer, so it hasn't re orientated the coin to suit the program it has reoriented the coordinate system to suit the coin.....

You should find that both Blender and 3ds Max along with some other programs, keep everything as you probably intended and will flip your coin to the orientation you made it in.


Blender

Meshmixer

Fusion360

So if your model is not in the same position you first modelled it in then it is the program you imported into that has a different coordination system to blame.

In Blender and 3ds Max it is very easy to change this orientation. The other programs could also be able to do this but I've never had the need to do this in them.

When exporting in the OBJ format in 3ds Max you get the option to set the "Z" "Y" orientation. This might also be available in other formats like FBX so check before picking your format. Off hand I don't know and I'm too lazy too check :-)

Click to see bigger version























Thursday 12 January 2017

Oh Dear........

Oh Dear, weren't the first words I said when I saw this at 10:30pm.....


I thought that the cable coming from the heated bed had crashed into the cooling fan at the rear of the printer.
Closer examination showed a surprising culprit, my belt tensioner I designed and made so I didnt have to struggle with taking it on and off, it had broken where the adjusting screw met the sliding tensioner.



An early print in pla before I had the thing dialed in.



Luck or good planning on my part meant I had a spare grey one in abs laying around, so its back together already.


HOWEVER!!

Stupidly I had spotted a small anomaly earlier with the print and I wrote off as something attributed to the design or just the way is was laying things down at this point and ignored it................dumb arse!

So now I'm not sure if its a design issue or print shift but the coin holders don't fit into the base and have large gaps around them when placed in the base and the 5 cent coins want to fall forward and all over the floor. Since they were booleaned out of the base they should be a tight fit but instead are really loose.












So....do I keep going and redesign the base and reprint or spit the dummy and move on to other things?

I think I can lean them back another 5 degrees and maybe sit them further into the centre of the base which might help. Need cooking off time I think.




















Wednesday 11 January 2017

Uke Hangers

Back Left 2 x Glow in the dark Blue
Back Right 2 x Green
Middle 2 x Balck
Front 2 x White


Click to view larger size