Veronika somehow realised that the only missing thing to complement our manufacturing ability is the 3D printer. After a brief discussion I’ve picked “Creality Ender 5 Plus”, which is a Large Format Core XY Style 3D Printer with 350x350x400mm Build Volume for ~$1000 AUD.
This should be one of the largest volume “public” printer available, where common printers work mostly with a volume more lie 250x250x400mm.
Box came in couple days from Sydney and Sebi & Oli helped me with its assembly.
Printer also came with a single 200g white PLA filament. If you wonder what 3D printing filament and PLA stands for, I recommend very nice article on Wikipedia.
PLA has become a popular material due to it being economically produced from renewable resources. In 2010, PLA had the second highest consumption volume of any bioplastic of the world, although it is still not a commodity polymer. Its widespread application has been hindered by numerous physical and processing shortcomings. PLA is the most widely used plastic filament material in 3D printing.
Wikipedia
Traditional question appeared – “Where to put it”? Luckily there is some sort of unused wardrobe in our garage so I came with a plan to expand it to be to some serious use from now on. I’ve documented that on few pictures below.
We couldn’t resist to kick of some printing and picked one from those pre-loaded models.
30 minutes later … Tuzi is a rabbit! 🙂
When working, it really looks pretty sci-fy (or neardy 😉 ).
Since that we’ve been productive!
Second print was a rock-guitar for Jakub K.
I did some experiments and printed ducted fan. (It actually came out awesome for such a complex print!)
Sebi designed and printed missing bishop.
But not everything went that awesome and I had number of bad prints as well.
I am not 100% sure, but this above was really one very difficult one and I suspect that nozzle hit the print as the room temperature was dropping quickly on a windy day and printer was shrinking (its made from aluminium).
I am now preparing a plan on how to address this issue through a proper layer of the thermal insulation + front door. However I suppose it will take me a little to get it ready, while other things are happening meanwhile! 🙂
Update 12 Oct 2020
I think that all those failures are a combination of several factors, the main one seems a calibration of the printer to be done always before the printing.