Frank

Thank you for joining us.
This is episode 46 of Amateur 3D Podcast, a podcast by amateur printers, for amateur printers, where we share our thoughts and experience.
Our panelists this week are me, Franklin Christensen, and my friends, Andy Codham, Kevin Buckner, and Chris Weber.
I’m back.

Kevin

Welcome back man.

Andy

It’s good to have someone at the controls, man.

Chris

Kevin was up good.
He did pretty good.

Frank

Yeah, I think Kevin did.
Great.

Andy

Did you have a good vacation while you were out?

Frank

San Francisco was awesome.
I don’t recommend the Amtrak any more than once, and anybody who has ridden it will understand.
But it’s a good experience if you’re going to go cross-country to do once.
And yeah, we spent four days in a hotel by Fisherman’s Wharf and just kicked around and did all the things.
We did not go to the Winchester house like you did when you guys went.
That was one of the things that I wanted to do, but it was just too much to get out there, and it would have taken, wasn’t it like an hour to get from San Francisco to the Winchester house?

Andy

Yeah, that it was.
It was a journey all of its own to get down there.
It is on the other end of the city there, so.

Frank

Yeah, and we just didn’t want to spend an hour to get somewhere for one thing and then spend another hour coming back.
That would have been a lot of stuff that we couldn’t do, like hiking around Fisherman’s Wharf for being on the bus tour.

Andy

Yeah, yeah.
I think when we went down there, we got to ride the BART most of the way there, so that was a neat experience to get down that way.
And then we just kind of planned the entire day of being on that end of the city.
So it didn’t make it too much worse, but since the Winchester house was like the entire center of our San Francisco trip for my little family here, it was kind of mandatory.
I’m glad you had a good time with it though.

Frank

Yeah.
There’s actually a couple of bus tours that go through the city, and it was just awesome.
We went everywhere from Fisherman’s Wharf to the Golden Gate Bridge and then back and hit like, there was 30, 40 stops, and it was one of those bus tours where you get on it and ride it for a stop or two, and then you get off and you go and explore, and then you get back on the next one and stuff like that.

Andy

Was it one of the double-decker tour buses?

Frank

Yeah.

Andy

We did that one too.
That was a neat thing.
But yeah, good that you had fun with it.

Frank

Yeah.

Andy

Good to have you back.

Frank

Need me to reign you guys in.
It seems like the last one got a little out of hand.

Andy

We got a little off topic.

Kevin

I mean, that does generally happen with or without you.

Frank

Yeah, but there’s a reason I decided to call the episode Wallet Fixation.

Kevin

Right.

Chris

Yeah, we did our best and we kept it in our pants.

Frank

So I do kind of feel left out that I didn’t get to talk about my wallet.

Andy

Oh, let’s hear about your wallet.

Chris

Let’s hear about what’s in your pants.

Frank

It’s not a 3D printed wallet, and it’s one of the off-brand flexible, minimal wallets that’s held together by a band.
So I’ve only got five cards in it.

Andy

OK.

Frank

And this one has got the RFID blockers so that my credit cards that tap can’t be stolen from me just by walking past me.

Andy

Yeah.

Chris

I don’t know if we talked about this on the podcast or not.
But yeah, you can buy that RFID blocking material way cheap on Amazon.

Frank

I got a couple of cards.
They’re like five bucks for three cards.

Andy

OK.

Frank

And you really only need one in your wallet and it’ll scramble all the signals coming from either direction.

Andy

Oh, that’s kind of cool.

Chris

What happens if you tape one to the back of your cell phone?

Frank

Not it’s RFID blocking.
It’s not all radio signal.

Andy

Yeah.
So your RFID reader on your phone might not function with the press against it.

Frank

There’s that.

Andy

But everything else probably so would.

Chris

There you go.

Frank

So, Chris, did you work on anything this week?

Chris

I did spend some time kind of griping and moaning and hitting my printer.
So you guys remember?
Yeah, I had the my bed sticking problem.
Oh, my gosh.
Adhesion, yes, that’s the word.
I was having that bed adhesion problem last time when I was trying to print that that that gear holder for my my little brother’s car.
So I used some tape and it was successful, right?
Well, I decided that OK, I’m going to re-level my bed and do it.

Frank

Tram

Chris

do it proper.

Frank

We’re using the word tram because people can confuse that.
Remember?

Chris

Oh, OK.
Anyway, so I tram my bed and tried to start printing a toy for the wife.

Frank

It’s a keep it PG there, Chris.

Chris

Articulated dragon.
OK, so it is actually, you know, a toy, something you stick on the shelf with all of our other collectibles.

Frank

And is it the the gem one?

Chris

My bed adhesion is fixed.
It’s stuff is sticking to the bed.
But now I’ve got the opposite problem where it’s getting little goobers on the edges of where it stops printing a little bit of a layer.
So it’s got pieces, pieces of the first first couple of layers, right?
It goes around and prints off.
It’s leaving little goobers kind of behind.
And as it comes back for, you know, on like the third or fourth layer, it ends up grabbing those little goobers are sticking to the to my nozzle and being pulled off the bed.

Frank

OK.

Andy

Oh.

Chris

So, I’m fighting my printer with with that issue at the moment.

Frank

I’ve had that issue myself.
Um, believe it or not, there’s a little bit of over extrusion that is causing that.
And are you how much are you extracting?
Are you extracting at all when you

Andy

retracting.

Frank

retracting sorry

Chris

Retracting and I didn’t look at retraction specifically.
I put my I put my Z hop on.

Frank

OK.
That would help it, too.
I think it’s mostly you want to look at your retraction settings and maybe reduce your flow just like a little bit, like one percent or so.

Chris

Oh

Andy

what kind?
What kind of material are you printing?
Is this PLA?

Frank

That’s a good question to ask.
OK.
Yeah, PLA.

Andy

PLA, for instance, like PETG will make boogers.
Oh, my gosh, some people can get that dialed in.
Most of us, I think, try to just limit it.
You know, it’s so difficult not to get boogers.

Frank

But and don’t even get me started on TPU.

Andy

I’ve never had boogers with TPU.

Frank

Oh, I get boogers and I get spider web, cotton web stuff.

Andy

Oh, yes.
Stringing is definitely a thing with TPU.

Frank

Yeah, you get used to that.

Chris

This is the first time I’ve had this this this issue really were you get the get boogers and it’s a kind of a problem.

Andy

So, yeah

Frank

is it a material?
Like, is it a brand or color that you’ve used before?
So, you know…

Chris

Yup, it’s I’ve used it.
I’ve used it before the material.
Yeah, it worked perfectly fine before.
You know, if the exact same roll, you know, I used this roll at Christmas last year.

Frank

OK.
Um, I would also wonder, I’m assuming that you’ve started in your bucket with the desiccant and all that.
But it might be worth trying to recondition it a little bit.

Chris

That’s a good point.

Frank

I just because of how old it is.

Chris

I haven’t reconditioned my my desiccant using Andy’s method at all.
You know, so it could be that my desiccant really isn’t doing any good anymore and I need to steam it off.

Andy

Yeah, that might be a thing.
I don’t know.
I’ve never seen PLA booger up like that.
That is kind of weird.
And having to adjust flow settings to compensate for stuff like that.
That there’s I mean, having option or, you know, access to flow settings in Cura is great for little problems.
But that means there’s something else going on.
Your flow should always be at 100 percent unless something else is failing or something, you know, you know, over intrusion is a little weird.

Chris

Yeah.
And I’m thinking I’m thinking it’s possible that, you know, this material I’m I’m using and I’ve I’ve used a couple others previous where it’s got that metallic shiny stuff to it that it actually that might actually be causing wear on my nozzle.
Slightly excessive wear on my nozzle.
I haven’t changed up my nozzle ever on this printer.
And so that might be the thing is that the most get getting worn.

Andy

That that could get you for under extrusion.
But I don’t think that would affect over extrusion because your extruder is still your feeder is still, you know, pushing the same amount.
If you got a worn out nozzle, it’s just not going to be coming out very good.
So it could cause you under extrusion.
But I don’t know about over extrusion.
That is.

Frank

Yeah, I would expect it to be under extrusion, too.
Like, even if the nozzle opening was a little bigger, because, like you said, it was worn out.
The feed rate would be the same.

Andy

Yeah.

Chris

Hmm.

Andy

You could check the diameter of your filament.
Maybe there’s a possibility that the very end of this roll, the diameter was getting off on it.
And…

Chris

well, I’m and yeah, I’m dead in the middle of this roll.

Andy

So trying just another filament that your nodes worked in the past might might help with, you know, ruling out filament being the problem.

Chris

And that’s a good point.

Andy

Oh, these printers, God, there’s so many different things that could be wrong with them when you’re having problems.
It’s kind of neat, kind of like a scavenger hunt to figure out what’s wrong with it now.
You know,

Frank

yeah

Andy

there’s not always one solution to every problem.

Chris

Right.
Because, you know, you take care of the big things first, you know, so I trimmed the bed and I checked my my my my printer, my printer settings, my speed and my temperature.
And my my Z checked my Z hop.
And all of that seems to be right where it ought to be and where it used to work really well.
And so I adjusted those a little bit one way or the other to see if it made a difference and it didn’t.
So

Andy

hmm.
You just have to keep on playing with it a little bit here and there till you rule out everything that could be causing it.

Chris

But… yeah, I think I need to dial it in a little bit better before I try printing this articulated thing, because I think just the articulated thing might be a little more complex than I can my my printer is going to be able to print as is at the moment.

Andy

Really

Chris

till I fix that.
Yeah.

Frank

Unfortunately, there’s not a ton of tolerance in some of the articulated designs.
And I understand why, you know, you don’t want like a loose set of fingers or the dragons to be super loose or whatever.

Andy

Yeah.

Frank

But it gets frustrating when you’re trying to reach spec in a way that you haven’t in a while.

Andy

Yeah

Frank

if ever.

Andy

That is true.

Frank

Kevin, have you done anything this week?

Kevin

A little bit.
I said last week that my son had made a mini figure on Titan craft for his friend and tried to print it and part of it failed.
So I told him to to make some adjustments in the slicer and like adjust the positioning and angle and all that.
And then I also suggested that he try printing more than one at a time.
And of course, when we did that, both of the mini figures worked out perfectly.
So that’s how it goes.
So you try to print one and it fails.
And then you so you say, OK, well, I’ll increase my chances by printing two at a time or more.
And then that’s when they all work.
So you end up with extras, which is fine.
But that’s that’s really all I’ve done this week.

Chris

That’s still a lot.

Frank

Yeah.

Kevin

Well, and two figures, it’s not that much.

Frank

To be fair, your son did it, not you.
So…

Kevin

yeah.

Frank

So you didn’t do anything with your FDM printer this week, then?

Kevin

I did not.

Frank

OK.
Andy, how about you?

Andy

I had a fun adventure with my printer this last week.
During our last podcast, I had mentioned that I had the heater cartridge go out on my printer.
And you know, it’s a little bit older.
It’s a real old heater cartridge.
Of course, it’s the one my printer originally came with.
I’ve been it’s lived inside of, I think, three or four different heat blocks.
So I’ve been moving it from from, you know, place to place quite a lot.
But but it finally popped on me.
And so I went in to go replace it and I undid the set screw on it.
And I could not get it to slide out of the heat block.
It’s just got a little bit of plastic and stuff, not build up, but, you know, remnants of plastic around the the heat block, like they tend to get kind of dirty from strings and stuff.
And so I couldn’t get it out.
I try getting in there with a pair of pliers to push it out one side.
And I wound up breaking it further by pulling on its wires.
And it was just a pain in the butt.
So I figured I would go ahead and replace the entire heat block.

Frank

So, Andy, I know I give you a lot of crap for doing things that I deem less safe.
I’m surprised you didn’t just turn on the heater to pull the thing out.

Andy

The heater was broke.
So it wasn’t generating heat.

Frank

Oh.

Chris

This is where a butane torch is useful.

Frank

Yeah, you have other heat sources.
I’m surprised you didn’t think of any of them.

Andy

Oh, yeah, I guess I could have.
But at the time, I just barely started playing with it when I pulled out one of the wires from it, which it was a dead heater anyway.
But that kind of pointed out that this block is very dirty.
It’s got a lot of junk all over it.
I should probably swap out the block.
That’s no big deal.
I got a bunch of those, too, so you’re not expensive.
So I I went ahead and and undid the set screws that hold in the heat pipe, the heat break pipe out of my extruder, pulled it out, and I started trying to unscrew the heat break pipe out of the heater block.
Now, I use bimetal heat break pipes and so while I was trying to unscrew it, I unscrewed the bimetal components themselves.
Those came loose instead of the screw.
Excuse me.
So I messed up my bimetal heat block pipe, my heat break pipe, and those aren’t cheap.
They’re like five or six bucks a piece, and I’ve only got one extra.
So I went ahead and grabbed it, ordered some new ones and got it all put back together with the new heater cartridge.
And so everything is brand new.
And I just replaced the thermostat on it a little while ago.
So other than the thermostat, the entire all the way from the heat break pipe down is brand new on my printer now.
So it’s kind of nice to be printing on a new hot end.
But that entire fix for just one heater cartridge was about 20 bucks, which is a lot for that those components.
I mean, 20 bucks will buy you five or six, you know, the heat blocks with cartridges and thermal resistors, you know, for 20 bucks for the whole kit.
So it was just kind of a lot to wind up spending on such a problem.
It just seems like you start with one problem and then that causes another problem and that causes another problem.
And by the end, you’re replacing a lot more than you suspected.
So it turned out to be a lot bigger of a job than I originally thought.
But got it up and running again and no problems after I replaced those components.
And I’ve got a bunch of new heat break pipes.
They do tri-metal heat break pipes now.
I’m going to try some of those.
They’re stainless steel, titanium and copper.
And their entire point with that is heat doesn’t transfer between two different types of metals very well.
And that’s what they’re banking on.
So there’s three separate types of metals that make up this heat break pipe to stop heat from going from the hot end into the cold end, which isn’t really too big of a problem for my machine anyway, because I water cool the cold end.
And a lot of the times the cold end can be pretty close to ambient temperature all the way down to the heat break pipes.
So that’s really not that big of a deal.
But yeah, so that’s what I’ve done with my printer there.
It hasn’t really printed a whole lot after that.
I printed some track, some Hot Wheels track for my son that he wanted done.
And we got that done out of TPU.
And that’s all my printers been doing so far.
I did sit down and start kind of designing the we’re talking about doing some model rocket tree controller feel using PIC controllers to control control surfaces on a model rocket.
And we’re going to be doing the what do they call the water rockets.
That way they’re easier to shoot off multiple times.
But before the podcast here, I sat down and started designing them a new nose cone for our water rockets that could accommodate a PIC controller and a servo so I can have a control surface on it.
And I don’t know when that’ll come around.
It’s kind of just a fun game right now.
We’ll see how long it takes me to get that designed and shoot one off to see what data comes back from its gyroscopes, from its G sensors and then to see if any of that information is usable to be able to make it so it can control its own rotation and maybe even the direction it’s pointing and things like that.
So I’ll have to see how how fast the the PIC can pull the the chip I’m using for those G sensors to see how fast.
Because when a rocket’s going off, you’re talking about doing all sorts of kind of controls on it for about a full second or two seconds, you know, and that’s pretty much it.
So servos got to be fast and you got to be able to pull it really fast in order to make changes and stuff that you need to do.
So it’s kind of being a fun little experiment, but we’ll see what comes with that.
I did sit down this weekend or this week with the intent of purchasing an SLA printer and I got kind of hung up on the chemical smell and stuff like that that you could have from them, how sensitive the wife is to that kind of stuff.
And well, I’m thinking that I should I should get a ventilation set up done first before purchasing anything as far as SLA printing goes.
But that was on the mind here this last week.
Other than that, I’ve been suffering from a cold or from the flu here.
So if I sound like garbage, I apologize to you guys for that.

Chris

You always have no garbage.

Frank

I’m sure that everyone just figured you decided to talk with your nose plugged.

Andy

Yeah, sucking on a bunch of cough drops, trying not to cough into the mic.
It’s it’s been great.
I love dealing with the flu.
It’s one of my most favorite pastimes.

Frank

I have heard there’s a lot of people that have had the issue of a summer cold.
I imagine it’s one of the side effects of the COVID.
Everybody hasn’t been out interacting.
This is the first time in four years that everyone’s been out and doing the thing.

Chris

So come on, Frank, you had to drop the C-bomb like that.

Frank

Yeah, sorry.

Kevin

I would say, though, as far as with the SLA, I’d say it might not be a bad idea to buy one and then wait till you’ve got the ventilation set up to use it because right now I don’t have a lot of sales going on.
But like Anycubic is selling their mono 4K for $150 right now.

Andy

Oh, Really?

Chris

yeah.
So Anycubic is upgrading their line and discontinuing some of the older stuff.
So you want to get some of their older stuff is like dirt cheap right now.

Andy

I might have to recheck that stuff out.

Kevin

So that’s that’s when I got mine was they were doing the same kind of thing.
They were discontinuing the photon and photon S.
And so they I got my photon S for a hundred dollars.
It now it’s not available anymore because they don’t make it anymore.
Now, that does mean that like if something were to go out on it, I’d have to go third party to fix it.
But that’s fine because…

Chris

they’re popular enough.
There’s lots of third parties making parts for it.

Kevin

So and the third party options are cheaper or less expensive, I should say.
And and some of them, the reviews say are actually higher quality than what Anycubic would have sold you if you were to buy name brand part to replace it.

Andy

Oh, really?

Chris

Yeah, some some third parties are able to improve upon OE design to for better longevity simply because they can make better sales by doing so.

Andy

Huh, and you would recommend going with Anycubic for the SLA printer there?

Kevin

Yeah, I I don’t have any experience with anything other than Anycubic.
I just know that they tend to be they tend to be good.

Chris

They’re they’re the creality of SLA printers.

Kevin

Right.
They’re they’re good and they’re inexpensive.

Andy

OK

Kevin

like I mean, you’ve seen what my printer can do.
And yeah, it’s actually kind of.
Like they discontinued it because it’s it was like the worst one they made.
Everything else reportedly has better quality.

Chris

Wow, that’s amazing.

Kevin

Yeah.

Andy

OK, that’s great to hear.
I might reconsider then.

Kevin

And I think the the the 4K has a larger print bed than what mine’s got.

Chris

And and and actually getting a good and good ventilation is actually relatively cheap and easy.
Like I was looking at some of those turbo fans that fit inside a four inch ducting pipe and you can get that one down at the local hardware store for like I think it was like 15 or 20 bucks and it has a massive airflow too.
So, you know, it moves, moves, moves air really, really easily.
And it’s if it doesn’t have a switch, it’ll be easy to put a switch on it.
So…

Andy

yeah, yeah.
And I think that’s the route I’m going to do.
I’m going to make it.
I use I think it’s three inch.
That might be four inch line for the.
Yeah, I think it is four inch line for my dryer dryer.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But instead of a tee, because I don’t want it blowing into the dryer itself, I was thinking I could 3D print a tee that I could stick inside of there where I will have a baffle that could either shut off the tee side and allow it to be a straight pipe for the dryer or pull the baffle down on the inside to block the dryer.
And so now it’s like a 90 degree fitting for the printer.

Chris

Come by my place or maybe I’ll drop it by.
I’ve got a Y, a ducting Y, a four inch ducting Y pipe that I was using when I had the in-laws rooming with me.
I had a setup for two dryers.

Andy

OK, does it have a controllable baffle in it, though, at all?

Chris

No, but you’d be able to put one in.

Andy

OK, I think it might be easier to to start off the bat 3D printing out where you can accommodate for it on the inside to be able to flip up and flip down.
But anyway, that’s the idea and then using one of those forced fans.
But I got to have something to block it from going back into the dryer.
Otherwise, you’re just blowing it out of the printer, and it’s going to be easier for it to blow it into the dryer than it will be for it to blow, you know, into the out of the house.
So…

Kevin

yeah

Frank

the little flap one way valves would do it, wouldn’t it?

Andy

Yeah, probably.

Frank

And it doesn’t
It doesn’t even need to be heavy.
You could print you could print your way out of it.
Just do a little thing that you put the ducting into on both sides.
And it doesn’t even have to be.
It could be a living hinge.
Just needs to be able to be overcome by the pressure.
And when it’s not running, it lays flat and doesn’t let her go the other direction.

Andy

Yeah, I do want to try to limit the amount of back pressure that the dryer receives as much as possible, though.
That way it can breathe as well as it can.
I don’t want to interfere with the dryer by adding, you know, ventilation for a 3D printer.

Chris

Yeah, a simple butterfly valve will probably do most of what you’re wanting.

Frank

Yeah, you could put the valve on.
We’re talking about a four inch duct.
But you could put one on both sides so that both of them have to overcome the just a little bit of pressure to lift it off and then escape and then just naturally have it closed.
So when the other one’s running, it doesn’t go the other direction on either one.

Andy

True.
That’s not a bad idea.
I’ll have to come up with something on that.
But the wife is so sensitive to chemical smells.
Like I can’t even use floor cleaners really at all to clean.
Whenever I’m doing that, I’ve got to air out the entire house real good when she’s not home.
If I’m going to use some like pine saw or something like that, she’s real sensitive to those kind of chemical smells.
They nauseate are really easy.

Chris

So I understand I have to have to set up a box fan at any time.
I’m using bleach in the bathroom and etc.
Yeah.

Andy

Yeah.

Kevin

Yeah.
If there’s that kind of sensitivity, you definitely will need some kind of ventilation because even mine with the filters it’s got will still make the definitely the room it’s in.
And sometimes even the entire upstairs smell like resin.

Andy

Does it?

Kevin

Yeah.

Frank

I guess that’s one of the benefits to FDM that we hadn’t really.
I guess we have kind of talked about it.
Not too much.

Kevin

Yeah.
And and I’ve thought of maybe like building a fume hood that I could then just vent outside.
Like there’s a window right in the room that I’m in and it’s never open.
And I know that they’ve got like inserts you can buy for a window so that you can have a little air conditioner in the room and vent it outside.
So it wouldn’t I’d just use something like that.
That wouldn’t be too difficult to do.

Andy

It’s not a bad Idea.

Kevin

None of us are particularly sensitive to the resin smell.
So we just kind of endure.

Andy

Yeah.
It makes sense.
Yep.

Chris

But I mean, I’ve been I’ve been thinking about venting mine simply because I’m making this enclosure and mine is actually relatively simple.
I’ve got one of those old, old windows from the 50s.
So I’m just going to knock out the glass and glue in a board with a hole in it.

Andy

Yeah, that would work.
The only thing though, if you if you’re in closing to maintain your temperature, venting it outside, you’re going to be having to suck air from inside.
And that might affect you from being able to maintain a particular temperature on the inside.
Right.
However, if you’re printing ABS, I think that it wouldn’t be too bad of an idea because of.

Chris

Yeah.
So the problem is that I want to print ABS and I want to print nylon.
So hence the need for the enclosure and the external venting.
So really, I’m going to take I’m going to take the heater coil from this little desk desk heater and use that as a heater coil.
That way, you know, it doesn’t doesn’t doesn’t take too much power to keep it keep the temperature where I want it.
And it’s not not much of a problem.
But it’s also one of those things where I can open up.
I can close off the outside and open up an… a vent just inside the house if I’m not printing ABS, you know, so that like I don’t have to I don’t have to use the heater all the time when you’re getting colder out, you know.

Andy

your bed puts off quite a bit of heat when it’s running.
I think you might you might want to try.
You might be surprised.
You probably don’t even need a heater to heat up the enclosure itself.

Chris

Right.
Well, that’s where I’m going to start.
But should I start having issues?
I do have those extra parts to that’s good to compensate.

Andy

So yeah, that’s good.
But yeah, what I was going to say before I started gagging on myself.
Sorry about that was that out of all the filaments that I’ve printed, the only filament that I’ve noticed any smells from during printing has been ABS and ABS stinks when you print it.
But everything else doesn’t seem to really have that much of a smell to it.
In my opinion, at least.
Yeah, ABS can be a little potent.

Frank

I will say I think that I get used to the smell because it’s not especially potent or anything like that.
It’s a very mild odor.
But if I start a print and then I go, you know, leave the house or whatever, come back an hour or so later, I’ll have that initial smell.
It’s like, oh, yeah, my printer is still running.

Andy

Oh, really?

Kevin

I mean, and that’s kind of how it is for me also with the resin.

Andy

Is it?

Frank

Hmm.

Chris

I know that I get that smell, but only when my printers been printing recently, because it’s it’s the smell of hot plastic.
But you let it sit for a little bit and then it’s gone.

Frank

Yeah, there’s another thing to consider, too.
Yes, arrange the exhaust and all that.
Be prepared to do it.
But maybe just like do like a test print and ask her how negatively it affects her.
And you may not have to be as aggressive about the exhaust is what you think you will

Andy

possibly.
I honestly think this would be a much better thing to not say that I’m doing and then listen for complaints, because if I point out that I’m doing something, she can smell it through lead.
So

Frank

Well, OK.
Because she’s hyper aware of…

Chris

Because it’s part psychological.

Andy

Yup yup.

Frank

Kind of like how I’m a I’m a sympathetic puker.
I don’t really get sick very often.
But if I see or hear somebody throwing up, I, for some reason, decide that I want to join them.

Kevin

Because it’s fun.

Andy

Don’t don’t have kids.
Um, yeah, they’re all everywhere.

Frank

That that’s not the reason, but of course not.

Andy

While we’ve got the flu here, I swear every kid I had just like to stand there and just let it come out wherever they’re standing.
They don’t try to aim for anything or they I swear to try to aim for like material or bedding or something like that or be a little bit more like a sprinkler like turn is they’re doing it and just cast a big arc of puke all over the room.

Chris

OK, my cat’s not that bad, but you know.

Frank

Andy, like what not to like

Kevin

What my cats like to do is they’ll they’ll be on like the hardwood or tile floor and they’ll run to the carpet to throw up.

Andy

Yeah

Frank

well

Kevin

You were right where you should have been.

Frank

OK, so animals are one thing.
But Andy, your children, that’s learned behavior.
Not to point fingers or anything, but that’s all your fault.

Andy

That’s all my fault.

Chris

Oh, man.

Andy

I thought I had something to do with their age.
You know, they’re pretty young and don’t have that guidance yet.
Haven’t had to clean up after their own selves so they don’t yet know the trouble of why it’s so important to grab a bucket or something, you know.

Chris

Well

Frank

still still learned behavior and it’s still your fault.

Andy

OK.

Chris

No, I do remember being sick when I was like eight or nine years old.
And I really remember that I didn’t recognize what that feeling was in my stomach until it was too late.

Andy

Yep, it just goes right up.

Chris

I would say that it’s it’s a good chunk of it is age.

Andy

Yeah, plus you’re so I mean, they feel like garbage.
The last thing on their mind is making things easier for mom and dad to clean up.
They’re worried about how they feel.
So that’s fine.
It’s just comical.
Sometimes the amount that they the the the distance they can project vomit can be impressive.

Kevin

Yes, I also I do remember when I was a kid, I was sick.
And so I just have this one very clear memory of this.
And it ended up all over the carpet, but I tried not to.
Anyway, my mom had just given me some red Gatorade.
I was very sick and the the danger of dehydration was very real.
So I drank it down and then I started going down the stairs, which are linoleum stairs.
But…

Frank

that was their first mistake, let’s be honest.

Kevin

Well, then then I felt it coming back up.
And so I had only gone down a couple of steps and I was like, OK, I’m about to throw up.
I need to hit head to the bathroom.
So I turned around and then it all came up all over the carpet.

Frank

Oh, so you’re saying that your cats learned how to hairball from you?

Kevin

Well, except I didn’t have my cats at that time.

Frank

Well, they’re half psychic.

Chris

So it depends on the cat, too.
You know, different cats have different issues like what my cat?

Frank

You mean, cats have different personalities, just like people and dogs and all the other kinds of pets that we have.

Chris

My cat didn’t have any puking issues until relatively recently.
And that’s when she had she she has to be on this this new diet.
But

Andy

OK

Chris

that’s because she’s really.

Andy

So what about you, Frank?
Have you done anything this last week since you got back?

Frank

Um, I decided that rather than trying to just improvise my solutions for my under extrusion, I was going to print a series of test towers.

Andy

OK

Frank

because that’s the smart way to do it, just in case anyone was wondering, making it up as you go is not very analytical or scientific.

Chris

But it sure feels good.
There’s some neat add-ons in the cura to just easily import tests.

Frank

Yeah.
And I’ve got two add-ons.
One of them does primitive shapes and one of them does the towers.
So.

Andy

Oh, nice.

Frank

Yeah, that’s what I’ve been printing for a couple of days since I got back.
I will say that it not to draw a correlation between causation and correlation.
But me complaining about Ubisoft the last time I was on.

Andy

Yeah.

Frank

And doing nothing else with my computer fixed my problem.

Andy

That’s worse for it to start working again.
And you had to have no idea why it was selling to begin with.

Frank

Yeah.
I kind of wish that I hadn’t reset my computer.
There would be some things that I didn’t think to archive.
That I didn’t lose.

Andy

Yeah.

Frank

But, you know, none of it was like a big deal.
It was more quality of life stuff.
So.

Andy

OK.

Frank

But yeah, between my games downloading now and my printer still being a pain in the butt.
I haven’t done very much.

Andy

Really?

Frank

And I’ve only been home for three days.
So

Andy

that’s true.
That’s true.
I don’t know why you didn’t bring the printer with you.
I’m kind of disappointed that your vacation had to come before 3D printing.
I mean, well, you should have brought it with you.

Frank

I did go on the Amtrak to San Francisco.
And since there’s really not a weight restriction, the biggest thing for me to be concerned with is I wouldn’t want to check my printer on the plane back.

Chris

You have to have power.

Andy

Yeah.
So you’ve got to like have a backup battery or something to bring because you can’t waste that time that you could be printing while you’re like walking from the station to get on the train.
I mean, that’s all valuable printing time.

Kevin

You also need an inverter at that point.

Frank

I would also need like a stabilization rig.
I guess it wouldn’t be super difficult.
But as long as I am carrying it with me, I don’t want my movements to negatively impact what I’m printing.
So…

Chris

no, no, you just need to get a little bit of chicken feed and about three or four chickens and some tape.

Andy

There you go.

Frank

So so talking about that, I I’m reminded of two things.
There was one I can’t remember what video it was, or maybe it was something that my wife was talking about.
But on some naval ships, the oven is on like a hinge.
So that it’s always level, no matter what position the ship is in.

Andy

Makes sense.
That’s kind of cool.
I mean, it only makes sense to this that way, but I never really thought about it.
That’s cool.

Frank

Well, and it only matters when you’re baking something that needs a stable environment.
Like bread, for the most part, bread doesn’t care how stable the environment is as long as it is cooking, right?
For the most part, things like souffles, if they want to cook a souffle on a submarine, they need a stable environment.

Andy

Yeah.

Frank

Well, thinking about that and how they do stable camera holds or holders that are basically in a gyro that’s weighted so that it’s always down, no matter how you move your your handle, the gimbal.
It’s not quite like the gimbal on your your your drone, but it’s very similar.
It’s like, you know, you could do that with a 3D printer and make it mobile.

Andy

I bet you there are some stuff that people have made for like cups of coffee or drinks.
You put your drink inside and it’s a handle itself that does all those kinds of things.

Frank

I have seen some of those, too.
Makes it kind of difficult to drink, though, because it doesn’t tip.
You have to take the other hand to tip it in and then.

Andy

True true.

Frank

but yeah.
I have seen some of those myself.

Kevin

That would be interesting.

Andy

It’s kind of neat when they take drinks like that and put it on a like a string line that you’re holding from top and then being able to show you how how stable it is, how difficult it is to actually spill anything when you’ve got that kind of system.

Frank

They are fun.
And actually, I saw my first stability camera rig Oh, gosh, 20 years ago, 30 years ago.
And they were doing a comparison side by side.
So they had for our younger listeners, they had a the video camera used to have what’s called a tape in it.
They’re about 10 inches by five inches and they have reels and all that stuff.
So you put that in there and the thing probably weighed 15 pounds, right?

Andy

Yeah

Chris

not only that, but it was the size that the camera itself was a good, almost, you know, foot and a half long.

Frank

Right, right, right.
So they had a guy that was carrying one of those on his shoulder, filming the other guy with a stability rig.
And all he had was a little grip so that he could direct where the camera was pointing.
But it was all it was mounted to his chest with the springs and the stability.
And he they were going upstairs and the guy that had the camera on his shoulder needed somebody to guide him to make sure that he wasn’t tripping over stairs and stuff like that.
And the guy with the rig is sitting there watching the stairs and just looks over every once in a while to make sure that the camera is pointed where it’s supposed to be.
It’s like, this is so cool.
It changes everything.
Yeah, and not long after that, I saw the documentary on bullet time for for The Matrix and that just kind of blew the stability rig out of the water.
So…

Andy

yeah, I remember seeing that one on the matrix with the dozens and dozens of point and shoot, not point and shoot, but cameras, the steel frame cameras.

Frank

I remember it being movie cameras that were all in sync.

Andy

Oh, really?
I remember that was a long time ago.

Frank

I think that the hardest thing for them to do was to make sure that they were all synchronized because it wasn’t digital recording yet.
And so they all needed to snap at the same time.
And they were just far enough apart that they could take this frame and then that frame and then that frame from different cameras and get the horizontal movement all, you know, 360.

Andy

Oh, I’m looking at the bullet time rig that they did.
And it’s it’s hard to I don’t know professional equipment.
So I don’t know if those are still cameras or video cameras.
They are smaller, though.
But video cameras at that age might have been that size.
So hard to tell.
Either way, it was a neat way to do something like that.
That was.

Frank

And it was it was interesting to see it as they were figuring it out.
Now, the technology is not really as relevant.
I mean, I’m sure that there’s a there’s a lot of there’s a lot that we learned from it.
And those lessons are still being added to.
But, you know, there was like the Matrix and then maybe one or two other movies where they actually did bullet time and they stopped.

Kevin

Yeah

Frank

it kind of became clack cliche really quick.
So

Andy

yeah, well, the technology they had back then, they really had to think this kind of stuff through now.
It’s just all CGI, which is in itself its own kind of complexity.
But it seems to be the easy way out compared to rigs like this that they designed for that one shot.

Kevin

Yeah

Frank

I think it was ready player one.
I think is one where I saw where I know the director’s name is one of those great directors.
And…

Andy

you know that that…

Frank

completely escaped me.
Anyway, to to finish this thought, he had a rig.
It was a three like in 3D space where he’s recording the actor.
They’ve got the dots all over them and he is controlling the rig like a regular movie camera and choosing the angles, even though it’s recording in virtual space.

Andy

Oh, that’s cool.
And it’s like, that is cool.
I like that.
Um, I still say that as great as our technology is in 10 years, everything that’s 3D is not necessarily going to stand up very well where the practical effects that have always been great are going to continue to always stand the test of time because it’s not computer generated.

Kevin

Right.

Andy

And to bring it full circle, that’s 3D printing props makes it really easy to make those kinds of things.

Frank

Oh, yeah.

Kevin

Yeah.
Actually, there was another podcast I was just listening to where they were talking about what they call a cut suit where they do they call it hyper real, whatever.
But anyway, the cut suit is basically to use movie lingo, a fat suit.

Andy

OK.

Frank

And when somebody gets quote unquote hurt, the doctor comes up and treats them like they’re doing surgery there so they can cut into it and it’s got the tactile feeling of actual flesh.
It’s got a circulatory system.
It’s got a rib cage.
It’s got organs inside of it.

Andy

OK.

Frank

And they call it a cut suit.
But it’s a physical experience for first responders and that sort of thing.
And it’s like, oh, my gosh.
Number one, those are probably a lot of 3D printed things.
But number two, the fact that we can do stuff like that now right just kind of boggles the mind.

Chris

It’s going to make Halloween a lot more interesting.

Kevin

Ooh. for sure.

Frank

You got me thinking, maybe I should start researching 3D printing scars and that sort of thing out of TPU.

Andy

There you go.

Chris

Yep.

Frank

Get going on it now so I can paint them just right.

Chris

I was thinking about one time when I was a kid, I was out trick or treating and there was a scarecrow sitting on the porch.
Right.
And, you know, the guy did really well.
It looked like he genuinely looked like it was a poorly done fake scarecrow.
Right.
So I’m going up to to ring the bell and go trick or treat.
And I can’t remember why, but I ended up kicking the foot of the scarecrow and going, wow, this is this one was really poorly done.
And then the scarecrow gets up and says, well, come on, man, it’s not that bad.
Scared the pants out of me.

Andy

That’s beautiful.
That’s good.

Frank

Probably that is a great one.
Let me start there.
My favorite prank to do is one where this guy set up his front door so that he could put his face in it for the knocker.

Chris

Oh, yeah.

Frank

It’s it looks like a very elegant, very detailed, like a lion-faced door knocker.
And whenever, like, a delivery person would come up to the door, you look at him and go, what do you want?

Andy

That’s awesome.

Chris

I was thinking it’d be fun, you know, and you could easily 3D print this nice little thing to do that to your own door, although that would mean putting a big hole in your door.

Frank

I have decided that if I was to ever do something like that, I would get a spare door.

Kevin

Yeah

Frank

like pick one up off of an abandoned house or something, you know.

Chris

Yeah, I can’t do that.
My front door is a special size, so change it out just for the holiday.

Frank

And I’ve even designed a seat so that I can sit there with my head in the hole and the door is still functional so like somebody can open the door and that sort of thing.

Andy

No, that’s good.
That’s good.
That’d be fun.

Chris

But yeah, I was thinking more along the lines of 3D printing, you know, guts and stuff to put on a little mannequin or something just outside the door.

Kevin

Yeah, that’s an idea.
And speaking of which, that reminds me, my son has been trying to find a good mask and costume for Davy Jones from Pirates of the Caribbean.
And he really wants it to have moving tentacles, which just like way over complicated, I think, but he can’t really find a mask that he likes.
It’s like maybe TPU could be an option there.

Chris

So, yeah, maybe a simpler solution would be to have like a a single motor on the back with various lengths of fishing line attached to it.
And so as the mootor as the motor moves forward and backward, it’ll pull up, you know, it’ll it’ll pull up, pull up on these lengths of line and that would move them and that would be a quick and simple solution.
And it would be easy to hide underneath the the the tentacle beard.

Kevin

Right.

Andy

Yeah.

Chris

And it would be very, very cheap and very not complex, very on the simpler side, because you’d only need a small motor and a very small battery for it.

Frank

Yeah

Chris

I’m thinking like maybe one of these CD drive motors, like I’ve got, you know

Andy

just do a fake arm on the costume and let him use his hands for the tentacles.

Chris

Oh, that’s even simpler.
Yeah, although I don’t know about you, but I would think his wrist would get cramped at some point.

Kevin

Yeah, probably.

Chris

But yeah, you could you could easily print up a good chunk of that mask in TPU, I would think.

Frank

Yeah, should be doable.
I don’t know how I’m going to do TPU in the near future until I figure out the the dual hot end thing, though, because it’s been such a pain.
I’m almost hesitant to print TPU right now, just because I would want to come back to PLA.

Andy

There’s something weird with it always getting clogged on you like that.
That’s weird.

Frank

And it’s only been after I do TPU when I’ve done PETG.
It’s fine.

Andy

Hmm.

Frank

But then PETG is more similar to PLA.
So I guess I would accept that.
I don’t know.

Andy

Something’s going on.

Frank

Yeah, I’ll figure it out.
And then I’ll experiment with it and be all screwed up again.
So…

Chris

that’s the best part about experimenting.

Frank

That’s how I live, man.
So I guess that means that I should let Chris get his last comment out and then maybe wrap this up for the week.

Chris

Well, I was just thinking that maybe we should all start talking about what we’re going to be printing for Halloween or thoughts on that, because it’s that time of the year we need to start prepping for Halloween.

Frank

So we are coming up on that.
I’ve been seeing a lot of Halloween stuff, actually, like the last week or so, which is weird because we’ve still got four months.
And there’s no reason for things in like grocery stores or we don’t environment, online environments.

Kevin

We don’t have four months.

Frank

August, September.
Oh, two months.
You’re right.
Well, October is three months because it’s the end of October.
So it’s still a good little while off.

Chris

Well, not when you’re 3D printing stuff to prep for it, because that’s very kind kind of need to get started now.

Frank

That’s true.
Yeah, honestly, in my head, I’ve been so focused on the one year anniversary of this podcast.
I was setting that as a higher priority, I guess.

Andy

It’s fine.

Kevin

There you go, Andy.
There.
There he’s got his priorities straight.

Andy

Yeah.
That’s good.
That’s good.

Frank

At least one of my priorities.
My wife would disagree with my priorities, I’m sure.

Andy

Well, she’s not in the 3D printing.

Frank

Sorry, you guys were on top of each other for that.
Andy you go first.

Andy

I forgot what I was going to say.
I’m sorry.

Frank

OK

Chris

sorry.

Frank

Chris

Chris

I was like my my priorities and my wife’s priority never line up, so.

Frank

Yeah, I’ve noticed that.

Andy

Well, she’s not in the 3D printing, so she doesn’t understand that 3D printing is better than everything.
3D printing is always have to come first.

cho

3D printing is life.

Frank

The first rule of 3D printing is tell everybody…

Andy

about 3D printing.

Kevin

Yes.

Frank

All right.
Let’s wrap this up and we’ll.
Yeah, just go on from there.

Andy

Sounds good.

Frank

All right.
We’d like to thank everyone for listening to the very end

Chris

the very, very end.

Frank

If you like what you hear, please give us all the stars and subscribe.
We are available through a wide variety of podcast vendors, and so are easy to share.
If you have feedback or if you have content requests, please let us know.
You can find us in our Facebook group, Amateur3DPod.
Or you can email us at panellists@amateur3dpod.com.
For individual feedback, you can email us at Franklin, Kevin, Andy or Chris @amateur3dpod.com.
Kevin Buckner is the one that wrote the music for this episode.
And if you didn’t notice, we did an analog.

Andy

Acoustic.

Frank

We did an acoustic version that Kevin played on his guitar for the last episode.
Make sure you let us know how he did.
Open A.I.’s Whisper completed the heavy lifting for the transcripts, which you can find linked in the description.
Our panelists are me, Franklin Christensen and my friends, Kevin Buckner, Chris Weber and Andy Cottam.
And until next time, we’re going offline.

Kevin

Keep your FEP tight.

Andy

Always use hairspray.

Chris

I upgraded my printer to 4D.
Printing time is really hard.

Frank

Yeah.
Did you ever get that Tesseract printed off for me?

Chris

It’s in The Cube, man.

Frank

I didn’t get the cube either.