Tag: Improvements

Making the world a better place, one piece at a time

Slicing Anomaly: Resolved, With Cross-Check

Some pix that serve as a stick in the ground showing that my current Slic3r configuration constellation doesn’t produce thin infill…

All of the layers in the 20 mm calibration cube look just like this:

Solid cube - Slic3r normal infill — Solid cube – Slic3r normal infill

The bottom layer of the Tux mold comes out solid:

Tux thread fill - bottom — Tux thread fill – bottom

As does the top:

Tux thread fill - top — Tux thread fill – top

The Gcode Analyzer algorithm that assigns colors to numeric values tends to produce many aliases, although most of the time you can figure out what’s going on. If somebody wants to dive into the code, I’d like to have unique colors and get the color table sorted in ascending order.

The current Slic3r configuration:

# generated by Slic3r 1.1.1 on Sat May  3 10:31:36 2014
avoid_crossing_perimeters = 0
bed_size = 190,250
bed_temperature = 70
bottom_solid_layers = 3
bridge_acceleration = 0
bridge_fan_speed = 100
bridge_flow_ratio = 1
bridge_speed = 150
brim_width = 0
complete_objects = 0
cooling = 1
default_acceleration = 0
disable_fan_first_layers = 1
duplicate_distance = 6
end_gcode = ;-- Slic3r End G-Code for M2 starts --\n;  Ed Nisley KE4NZU - 15 November 2013\nM104 S0		; drop extruder temperature\nM140 S0		; drop bed temperature\nM106 S0		; bed fan off\nG1 Z180 F2000	; lower bed\nG1 X130 Y125 F30000	; nozzle to right, bed front\nM84     	; disable motors\n;-- Slic3r End G-Code ends --
external_perimeter_speed = 25
external_perimeters_first = 0
extra_perimeters = 1
extruder_clearance_height = 25
extruder_clearance_radius = 15
extruder_offset = 0x0
extrusion_axis = E
extrusion_multiplier = 1.07
extrusion_width = 0.4
fan_always_on = 0
fan_below_layer_time = 30
filament_diameter = 1.79
fill_angle = 45
fill_density = 100%
fill_pattern = rectilinear
first_layer_acceleration = 0
first_layer_bed_temperature = 70
first_layer_extrusion_width = 0.4
first_layer_height = 100%
first_layer_speed = 25
first_layer_temperature = 175
g0 = 0
gap_fill_speed = 50
gcode_arcs = 0
gcode_comments = 0
gcode_flavor = reprap
infill_acceleration = 0
infill_every_layers = 3
infill_extruder = 1
infill_extrusion_width = 0
infill_first = 1
infill_only_where_needed = 0
infill_speed = 150
interface_shells = 0
layer_gcode = 
layer_height = 0.2
max_fan_speed = 100
min_fan_speed = 75
min_print_speed = 4
min_skirt_length = 15
notes = 
nozzle_diameter = 0.35
only_retract_when_crossing_perimeters = 1
ooze_prevention = 0
output_filename_format = [input_filename_base].gcode
overhangs = 1
perimeter_acceleration = 0
perimeter_extruder = 1
perimeter_extrusion_width = 0.4
perimeter_speed = 150
perimeters = 2
post_process = 
print_center = 0,0
raft_layers = 0
randomize_start = 1
resolution = 0.05
retract_before_travel = 1
retract_layer_change = 0
retract_length = 1
retract_length_toolchange = 5
retract_lift = 0
retract_restart_extra = 0
retract_restart_extra_toolchange = 0
retract_speed = 60
skirt_distance = 3
skirt_height = 1
skirts = 3
slowdown_below_layer_time = 20
small_perimeter_speed = 25
solid_fill_pattern = rectilinear
solid_infill_below_area = 5
solid_infill_every_layers = 0
solid_infill_extrusion_width = 0
solid_infill_speed = 150
spiral_vase = 0
standby_temperature_delta = -5
start_gcode = ;-- Slic3r Start G-Code for M2 starts --\n;  Ed Nisley KE4NZU - 15 Nov 2013\n;  28 Feb 2014 - 6 Mar 2014 - tweak Z offset\n; Z-min switch at platform, must move nozzle to X=130 to clear\nM140 S[first_layer_bed_temperature]	; start bed heating\nG90				; absolute coordinates\nG21				; millimeters\nM83				; relative extrusion distance\nG92 Z0			; set Z to zero, wherever it might be now\nG1 Z10 F1000	; move platform downward to clear nozzle; may crash at bottom\nG28 Y0			; home Y to be sure of clearing probe point\nG92 Y-127 		; set origin so 0 = center of plate\nG28 X0			; home X\nG92 X-95		; set origin so 0 = center of plate\nG1 X130 Y0 F30000	; move off platform to right side, center Y\nG28 Z0			; home Z with switch near center of platform\nG92 Z-4.40		; set origin to measured z offset\nG0 Z2.0			; get air under switch\nG0 Y-127 F10000	; set up for priming, zig around corner\nG0 X0			;  center X\nM109 S[first_layer_temperature]	; set extruder temperature and wait\nM190 S[first_layer_bed_temperature]	; wait for bed to finish heating\nG1 Z0.0 F500	; put extruder near plate \nG1 E25 F300		; prime to get pressure, generate blob\nG1 Z5 F2000		; rise above blob\nG1 X15 Y-125 F20000	; jerk away from blob, move over surface\nG1 Z0.0 F1000	; dab nozzle to attach outer snot to platform\nG4 P1			; pause to attach\nG1 X35 F500		; slowly smear snot to clear nozzle\nG1 Z1.0 F2000	; clear bed for travel\n;-- Slic3r Start G-Code ends --
start_perimeters_at_concave_points = 1
start_perimeters_at_non_overhang = 1
support_material = 0
support_material_angle = 0
support_material_enforce_layers = 0
support_material_extruder = 1
support_material_extrusion_width = 0
support_material_interface_extruder = 1
support_material_interface_layers = 0
support_material_interface_spacing = 0
support_material_pattern = honeycomb
support_material_spacing = 2.5
support_material_speed = 150
support_material_threshold = 0
temperature = 175
thin_walls = 1
threads = 2
toolchange_gcode = 
top_infill_extrusion_width = 0.4
top_solid_infill_speed = 25
top_solid_layers = 3
travel_speed = 250
use_firmware_retraction = 0
use_relative_e_distances = 0
vibration_limit = 0
wipe = 0
z_offset = 0

2014-05-04

V-Brake Replaceable Pad Pins

After replacing the front wheel bearings, I replaced both pairs of brake pads. The rear brakes use holders with slide-in pads, but I’ve never been happy with the dinky little pins that retain the pads, so this time I’m using ordinary cotter pins:

V-brake pads – cotter pin retainer

The rear brake pads on a diamond-frame bike sit nearly horizontally on the seat stays, with the pin head pointed upward. On Tour Easy recumbents, the pads stand almost vertically on the chain stays, with the pins sideways:

Tour Easy rear brakes

That photo dates to 2010, when those brakes were new. Nary a pin has worked loose yet and I don’t expect they ever will, but …

If the pins rust before the pads wear out, I’ll go back to those little bitty OEM stainless pins.

2014-04-23
Wide-Angle Lens Distortion Correction

The Sony HDR-AS30V camera lens has a view angle of 120° or 170°, achieved by internal image processing rather than mechanical lens adjustments. For most action-camera purposes you don’t care about fisheye distortion, but sometimes a more rectilinear picture will look better, in which case the GIMP’s Lens Distortion filter comes in handy.

A still image at 120°, which doesn’t look all that bad, really:

Sony HDR-AS30V 120 angle – as captured

Applying Main=-25 gives this:

Sony HDR-AS30V 120 angle – corrected

A frame captured from video at 170°, with the overhead wires hanging upward:

Sony HDR-AS30V 170 angle – as captured

Applying Main=-25, Edge=-12.5, Zoom=+8 flattens them enough to be acceptable:

Sony HDR-AS30V 170 angle – corrected

The main effect of the Zoom parameter seems to be discarding the severely distorted remnants around the edges of the corrected 170° view. Sometimes, those pixels around the edges can be very, very important, so I’d rather make that decision after the fact.

If you must fix many images at once, Fred’s defisheye ImageMagick Script would certainly be useful. There’s also a bare-knuckles ImageMagick version, including how to measure lens parameters.

2014-04-14
Improved Packing Tape Dispenser Spool

As I recall, a few weeks after I bought this packing tape dispenser, I dropped it with the nut downward, whereupon all six of the little tabs that were supposed to hold the tape roll in place broke off, allowing the roll to walk off the holder. Having put up with that for far too long (I don’t do a lot of shipping these days), I finally drilled and tapped three 4-40 holes and ran a trio of setscrews against the inside of the roll core:

Packing tape dispenser – improved spool holder

The holes are angled so that the setscrews bite into the core just enough to prevent it from walking away, but I can still pull the roll off when it’s empty.

That should last pretty nearly forever…

2014-04-05

Kenmore Model 158 Sewing Machine: Cool White LED Strip Lights

The reel of cool-white LEDs finally arrived from halfway around the planet and, based on the ahem customer feedback concerning the earlier prototype warm white LED strip lights for Mary’s sewing machine, I went with two parallel strips on each mount:

Strip Light Mount - 2 wide - build layout — Strip Light Mount – 2 wide – build layout

Natural PLA provides a nice, crystalline appearance:

Kenmore 158 Sewing Machine - Cool white LEDs - rear no flash — Kenmore 158 Sewing Machine – Cool white LEDs – rear no flash

Cool white LEDs have somewhat higher lumen/watt efficiency, but the real gain came from doubling the number of LEDs:

Kenmore 158 Sewing Machine - Cool white LEDs - front flash — Kenmore 158 Sewing Machine – Cool white LEDs – front flash

I overvolted the warm white LEDs to 14 V to get closer to 20 mA/segment, but the cool white ones run pretty close to 20 mA at 12 V, so I didn’t bother.

That black Gorilla Tape remains butt-ugly:

Kenmore 158 Sewing Machine - Cool white LEDs - rear flash — Kenmore 158 Sewing Machine – Cool white LEDs – rear flash

Obviously, I must find some white duct tape…

Commercial versions of this hack secure the wiring with little white clips and foam tape, so I should conjure up something like that. Mary specifically did not want the lights affixed under the arm, though, so those things weren’t even in the running.

The OpenSCAD source code widens the mount and moves the wiring conduit a little bit, to simplify the connections to both strips, but is otherwise identical to the earlier version:

// LED Strip Lighting Brackets for Kenmore Model 158 Sewing Machine
// Ed Nisley - KE4ZNU - March 2014

Layout = "Build";			// Build Show Channels Strip

//- Extrusion parameters must match reality!
//  Print with 2 shells and 3 solid layers

ThreadThick = 0.20;
ThreadWidth = 0.40;

HoleWindage = 0.2;			// extra clearance

Protrusion = 0.1;			// make holes end cleanly

AlignPinOD = 1.70;			// assembly alignment pins: filament dia

inch = 25.4;

function IntegerMultiple(Size,Unit) = Unit * ceil(Size / Unit);

//----------------------
// Dimensions

Segment = [25.0,10.0,3.0];		//  size of each LED segment
SEGLENGTH = 0;
SEGWIDTH = 1;
SEGHEIGHT = 2;

WireChannel = 3.0;				// wire routing channel

StripHeight = 12.0;				// sticky tape width
StripSides = 8*4;

DefaultLayout = [1,2,"Wire","NoWire"];
NUMSEGS = 0;
NUMSTRIPS = 1;
WIRELEFT = 2;
WIRERIGHT = 3;

EndCapSides = StripSides;

CapSpace = 2.0;						// build spacing for endcaps
BuildSpace = 3.0;					// spacing between objects on platform

//----------------------
// Useful routines

module PolyCyl(Dia,Height,ForceSides=0) {			// based on nophead's polyholes

  Sides = (ForceSides != 0) ? ForceSides : (ceil(Dia) + 2);

  FixDia = Dia / cos(180/Sides);

  cylinder(r=(FixDia + HoleWindage)/2,
           h=Height,
           $fn=Sides);
}

module ShowPegGrid(Space = 10.0,Size = 1.0) {

  RangeX = floor(100 / Space);
  RangeY = floor(125 / Space);

	for (x=[-RangeX:RangeX])
	  for (y=[-RangeY:RangeY])
		translate([x*Space,y*Space,Size/2])
		  %cube(Size,center=true);

}

//-- The negative space used to thread wires into the endcap

module MakeWireChannel(Layout = DefaultLayout,Which = "Left") {
	
	EndCap = [(2*WireChannel + 1.0),Layout[NUMSTRIPS]*Segment[SEGWIDTH],StripHeight];	// radii of end cap spheroid
	
	HalfSpace = EndCap[0] * ((Which == "Left") ? 1 : -1);
	
	render(convexity=2)
	translate([0,Segment[SEGWIDTH]/2,0])
		intersection() {
			union() {
				cube([2*WireChannel,WireChannel,EndCap[2]],center=true);
				translate([-2*EndCap[0],0,EndCap[2]/2])
					rotate([0,90,0]) rotate(180/6)
						PolyCyl(WireChannel,4*EndCap[0],6);
			}
			translate([HalfSpace,0,(EndCap[2] - Protrusion)]) {
				cube(2*EndCap,center=true);
			}
		}
}

//-- The whole strip, minus wiring channels

module MakeStrip(Layout = DefaultLayout) {
	
	EndCap = [(2*WireChannel + 1.0),Layout[NUMSTRIPS]*Segment[SEGWIDTH],StripHeight];	// radii of end cap spheroid

	BarLength = Layout[NUMSEGS] * Segment[SEGLENGTH];				// central bar length

	hull()
		difference() {
			for (x = [-1,1])						// endcaps as spheroids
				translate([x*BarLength/2,0,0])
					resize(2*EndCap) rotate([0,90,0]) sphere(1.0,$fn=EndCapSides);
			translate([0,0,-EndCap[2]])
				cube([2*BarLength,3*EndCap[1],2*EndCap[2]],center=true);
			translate([0,-EndCap[1],0])
				cube([2*BarLength,2*EndCap[1],3*EndCap[2]],center=true);
		}

}

//-- Cut wiring channels out of strip

module MakeMount(Layout = DefaultLayout) {
	
	BarLength = Layout[NUMSEGS] * Segment[SEGLENGTH];
	
	difference() {
		MakeStrip(Layout);
		if (Layout[WIRELEFT] == "Wire")
			translate([BarLength/2,0,0])
				MakeWireChannel(Layout,"Left");
		if (Layout[WIRERIGHT] == "Wire")
			translate([-BarLength/2,0,0])
				MakeWireChannel(Layout,"Right");
	}
}

//- Build it

ShowPegGrid();

if (Layout == "Channels") {
	translate([ (2*WireChannel + 1.0),0,0]) MakeWireChannel(DefaultLayout,"Left");
	translate([-(2*WireChannel + 1.0),0,0]) MakeWireChannel(DefaultLayout,"Right");
}

if (Layout == "Strip") {
	MakeStrip(DefaultLayout);
}
	
if (Layout == "Show") {
	MakeMount(DefaultLayout);
}

if (Layout == "Build") {

	translate([0,(3*Segment[SEGWIDTH]),0]) MakeMount([1,2,"Wire","Wire"]);		// rear left side, vertical
	translate([0,0,0]) MakeMount([5,2,"Wire","NoWire"]);				// rear top, across arm
	translate([0,-(3*Segment[SEGWIDTH]),0]) MakeMount([6,2,"NoWire","Wire"]);	// front top, across arm
}

2014-04-02

Rebalanced Desk Lamp Boom

Moving the pivot point of the rebuilt desk lamp arm back about 75 mm put it at the proper spot:

Rebalanced desk lamp boom

That required snaking new wiring from the transformer in the base through the upright and out through the boom to the LED floodlamp. I used a random length of speaker cable from the Big Box o’ Heavy Wires, although it doesn’t take much to carry 300 mA at 12 V.

The lamp head now reaches the work area and the base stays out of the way:

Rebuild desk lamp over sewing machine

It is, we both agree, hideously ugly, but it puts plenty of light at the right spot.

2014-03-29
Strobe Photography: Falling Objects!

A black background does wonders to improve the presentation:

Clay slab – 180 ms

That’s ISO 800, 1/10 s, f/8, 30 cm manual focus, with the flash about 20 cm away in the right foreground. The Xenon flash has a 1 µF capacitor giving a pulse width of about 100 µs. The LED visible on the lower right flashed 1 ms after the lump broke the laser beam.

Rather than do science, I shoveled small objects through the aperture…

Falling LED striplight

Falling Sierpinski gasket

Falling clay block

Falling cotton swab

Falling AA cell

Falling SDHC Card

Falling lock washer

That was fun…

2014-03-27