It all came down to this… When I assembled the extruder (makerbot mk4) the allen wrench that came with the kit never felt right. Regardless I tightened the set screws on the gear until the allen wrench felt like it was about to strip it, and then I went on my merry way. After watching …
Author Archives: TinyEnormous
DIY heated build platform for makerbot cupcake.
Let’s give this a try! Tonight I prepped 4 3ohm 10 watt aluminum resistors with in two parallel pairs with solid copper wire. I gave it 12 volts of juice and it got plenty hot quickly, so hopefully this back of the matchbook effort will pay off. I don’t have the aluminum plate with me, …
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What to do with a broken makerbot?
As I’ve been blogging, my makerbot is sick (as in broken). Yesterday as a fun distraction I ran across the makerbot music page. Thankfully you don’t need an extruder in order to make music, so I dropped the lady Gaga “bad romance” gcode onto my bot and hit run. It was a good break, and …
assembling a metrix createspace molded wades extruder
I recently bought a molded reprap prusa mendel kit from Metrix create space. They are a hacker space in Seattle, Wa. The molded kits cost anywhere from a third to half of what a set of printed parts cost because they take far less time to produce. One downside of the printing method is that …
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Makerbot down! We have a makerbot down!
I’ve only had the makerbot for a month now, but it’s refusing to print. Sigh. I know it’s a diy kit, but this little puppy only had three whistles printed on it before it rolled over, ready to die. Here is my thought process as I go about trying to fix it. Symptoms: The extruder …
Designing gears, cogs, sprockets in illustrator for laser cutting
I really enjoy building mechanical movements, and I am terrible at it. It is really difficult to build things that move without relying on expensive pre-built mechanisms. Thus I am always looking for cheap ways to design and build cogs, gears, and sprockets.
Drilling out a bolt – the hard way
After breaking my makerbot extruder head I decided I wanted to try my hand at making one from scratch. It’s a brass m6 tube with a nozzle screwed onto one end. How hard can it be! It turns out it’s really hard, but I ended up having luck with a technique called the “afghan lathe” …
Announcing a new habit – Makerbot!
Due to a long and strange twisting string of circumstances I recently ended up with a makerbot kit at work. I have a build video and a lot of info, but here is the first of two quick posts about my trials and tribulations with this little guy. This is more a question to the …
DIY Rotary turntable
I have wanted to build a rotary turntable for quite a while. With it I can shoot 360 degree product shots, I can set the camera up on it and shoot panoramas. I can use it with my timelapse setup to put motion into a long shot. I also have an idea about trying to …
Macro photography focus stacking rig
The main reason for building this as opposed to a sliding sled is that you can do what is called “focus stacking” with this. Macro photography will sometimes have an area of the subject that is in focus (focal plane) that is only a millimeter thick. Focus stacking enables you to have a wider focal plane by combining photos.