3D Printing What Are You Printing Today?

Leo said:

Designed and printed a "Cato-Adapter" that screws on to a 29mm Estes engine retainer.
Everything is friction fit, no glue used.
This should hopefully keep damage to the rocket at a minimum.
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Interesting idea. Have you successfully flown with this yet?

Yes, one engine cato'd. The two other engines thrusted the Mammoth to a little over 1000 feet without incident.

Awesome. Did you use motor ejection?

Leo said:

Yes, one engine cato'd. The two other engines thrusted the Mammoth to a little over 1000 feet without incident.

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No. This rocket flies DD.

Leo said:

Designed and printed a "Cato-Adapter" that screws on to a 29mm Estes engine retainer.
Everything is friction fit, no glue used.
This should hopefully keep damage to the rocket at a minimum.

Click to expand...

That's cute. It's like underpants for your rocket.

Well, to me it looks kinda awkward. When I'm back from vacation I will modify it a little for better looks and make it a bit lighter too.

Flightsketch Mini cases.

Tested a line filling method on a failed print: 15 minute epoxy thinned with denatured ethanol and brushed on.



The outer surface is painted. The inner and fins aren’t.

It actually worked quite well.

Memo to me: clear PETG might seem cool (and was decently priced) but it’s really hard to see print features or faults. I’m betting they show just fine after painting.

I tried the PET version of 3D Gloop.

It’s really quite thin stuff. No filling power. More like thin CA with a longer working time. The weld strength seems -quite- good.

Getting large pieces to match really well might be a challenge. I’m going to use a little epoxy to do touch up gap filling.

Oops, Anycubic Photon S arrived several days sooner than I expected. I've nothing ready so I'm not going to mess with it until I have the bits needed for cleaning and curing. Meanwhile, I'm going to FDM print some of the accessories I've found on Thingiverse.

I notice right off that the build plate is not perfectly flat; not terrible, but I can see gaps with a straightedge laid across it. I've noticed some people suggesting lapping it flat, and I have a flat piece of granite here that I could do that on. Worth the effort, ya think?

vcp said:

Oops, Anycubic Photon S arrived several days sooner than I expected. I've nothing ready so I'm not going to mess with it until I have the bits needed for cleaning and curing. Meanwhile, I'm going to FDM print some of the accessories I've found on Thingiverse.

I notice right off that the build plate is not perfectly flat; not terrible, but I can see gaps with a straightedge laid across it. I've noticed some people suggesting lapping it flat, and I have a flat piece of granite here that I could do that on. Worth the effort, ya think?

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I might be concerned about a non-flat build plate. My plate is flat when I put a straightedge against it, but the surface isn't polished super-smooth. I know that some people have sanded their build plates, but with varying success. There is a sweet spot between having it so smooth that nothing will stick to it, and too rough that you can't get a flat print.

Surface details.

Talking a few days off to do some maintenance. I am upgrading my ender to a Titan Aero and a proximity switch over the Pinda Probe. Hopefully this fixes it.

Leo said:

Designed and printed a "Cato-Adapter" that screws on to a 29mm Estes engine retainer.
Everything is friction fit, no glue used.
This should hopefully keep damage to the rocket at a minimum.
View attachment 400019

Click to expand...

This past weekend the adapter flew successfully on three E12 motors and hurled the Mammoth to over 1280 feet in altitude.
It was a beautiful flight.

Leo said:

This past weekend the adapter flew successfully on three E12 motors and hurled the Mammoth to over 1280 feet in altitude.
It was a beautiful flight.

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I have the same sort of adapter, they work great.

DiaLFonZo - Dart - Baby rocket with a 18mm inner body and 400mm long in 4 sections.

Based on my BeG fail.. This one will be small and hopefully lightweight enough. [emoji1787]

Imperfect print.. But.. Close

Bunch of stuff for preparing to use the Photon printer, in this thread.

I installed the 'silent' board upgrade on my Ender 5. I can't believe how quite it really is. Wow.

Now, to set the firmware back to having the manual 4 corner 'auto-level'. Working my way through the config.h options - but it looks like I'm coming up shy on space.

Charles_McG said:

I installed the 'silent' board upgrade on my Ender 5. I can't believe how quite it really is. Wow.

Now, to set the firmware back to having the manual 4 corner 'auto-level'. Working my way through the config.h options - but it looks like I'm coming up shy on space.

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Why are you going back to manual level? I'm asking because I was hoping to upgrade my Ender 5 with a BL Touch for auto-leveling this winter.

BDB said:

Why are you going back to manual level? I'm asking because I was hoping to upgrade my Ender 5 with a BL Touch for auto-leveling this winter.

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Not ‘going back’ - trying to restore it. I couldn’t figure out to to get the .hex file from Creality onto the board. I knew how to compile and upload the Marlin source. But that didn’t have the ‘auto level’ command that steps around the corners so you can manually adjust the screws that the original had. And turning on manual mesh (the reddit recommendation) kept running the build out of space. Enabling 4 corner leveling did the trick.

I have a TH3D EZABL on my CR-10 S5, and it’s great. Highly recommend. I haven’t gotten one for the Ender 5 because the manual level is -so- easy. The silent board is a good upgrade. I might get another EZABL in the future. If I do, I’ll adjust the bed screws so I can throw a lock nut on them.

I’m working on printing a plug with odd-sized threads. The conventional method for printing precise parts is to print on an angle, but that didn’t work out too well. The vertical print looks much better.

spent the last week off with my daughters printing a magnetic 3d Settlers of Catan game. We play it all the time as a family.

Printing the end pieces for a 38 mm launch tower that mounts on a 1010 rail. Designed by @GrouchoDuke: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3047161

This is the way. Printing a Mandalorian Helmet. 4 days and 92%.

Looks good, @BDB! Check out the new 4-fin 29mm version too!

Printing fin cans for a Mach Buster style kit.

Printing parts for the nose cone of my 4" Nike Smoke. The cone is so long I need to print it in 4 pieces. Also printing an 18/24mm motor adapter for my filament spool oddroc, which I will test fly on a pair of B6-2s.

Fin boxes for surfboards

This is the way.