Author Topic: Merry Christmas to me!  (Read 11234 times)

Offline Kim

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #30 on: January 08, 2024, 11:29:26 PM »
For Christmas this year, my wife got me the Prusa Mk4 upgrade kit!  This includes new electronics, new stepper motors, and many, many other small updates to the printer.

Here are the contents of the kit spread out on my table, ready for assembly to begin. The first step of in making this was to print out many of the new plastic parts used for the upgrade.  They supplied a small spool each of black and orange PETG to make these with.  Since this is an upgrade, the assumption is that you have a Prusa Mk3 printer and can print these out.   It’s pretty important to remember to do that before you start taking the printer apart for the upgrade!  You can see all the parts I printed there (the pile of black and orange plastic gizmos).


Lots of work later, and here’s the assemble kit, back in the little ‘enclosure’ I keep it in (it’s a lightweight photo tent, and I use it to help keep the printed parts warmish while they are printing in my unheated shop.)  Here I’m printing one of the new Prusa test models.  The white ball-looking thing in the lower right corner of the picture is actually a WIFI baby monitor that I picked up on Amazon for cheap.  It is great for keeping an eye on the printer while I’m not in the shop.


Here’s the completed model.  It’s a fairly detailed model of a rocket engine!  Very cool!  And it prints quite fast!  Probably 2x faster than the older version that I upgraded from. (You weren’t kidding when you said it was fast, Chris!)


But I’ll have to say, my favorite feature on the new printer is the auto first layer height setting.  That is just super cool.  But there are many cool features with the new Mk4 printer.  Quite a fun process to build it and I’m looking forward to printing more cool things with it.

Kim

Offline steamer

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #31 on: January 08, 2024, 11:42:00 PM »
Cool!!!    That's a useful thing Kim!

Dave
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Offline Dave Otto

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #32 on: January 09, 2024, 12:03:02 AM »
That is a nice looking print, great work!

Dave

Offline crueby

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #33 on: January 09, 2024, 12:25:09 AM »
Thats great!  I really like the Mk4 version, so much faster than before. The first firmware they put out was a little buggy for the nozzle cleaning part, but they fixed that about a month ago. The engine came out great - when will your elves be launching?   :Lol:   

Offline cnr6400

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #34 on: January 09, 2024, 12:59:15 AM »
 :ThumbsUp: :ThumbsUp: :ThumbsUp: :popcorn: :popcorn: :popcorn: Sounds like a great printer upgrade Kim! Nice looking rocket engine print. Will you do the other 4 to build a scale model Sat-elf 5 ? I see Chris had a similar thought.  :Lol:
"I've cut that stock three times, and it's still too short!"

Offline Kim

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #35 on: January 09, 2024, 05:24:57 AM »
Thanks!  Yes, I'm pleased with the upgrade for sure.

As for more rocket engines... probably not.  One's plenty.  And besides, if you tried to actually fire them up, you'd likely end up with a little puddle of PLA on the floor to clean up!

I have printed several 1:200 scale rockets in the past (Saturn V, Saturn 1b, SLS Block 1, Falcon Heavy and Star Ship) and I've got a few more that I want to print.  But that engine is a tad large for any of those!  :Lol:

Kim

Offline Alex

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #36 on: January 09, 2024, 08:27:33 PM »
Hi Kim - thanks for posting this, and for the others for chiming in.

My first home printer was a Printrbot Simple back sometime 2013/2014 - wooden kit, Dremel sanding drums and fishing line to move the X/Y axes, wooden stepper/nozzle assembly. Never got it to work very well at all. I did purchase a metal printhead assembly from them, which was better, but.

(I did have a Stratasys one at work I could use, so it was like night and day...)

I'm still on the fence with a home printer, (once bitten twice shy) but you guys do make it look more useful than the olde Printrbot turned out to be!

JohnS Ottawa.

Offline Kim

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #37 on: January 09, 2024, 10:58:58 PM »
Alex,
I can't really compare the Prusa to other printers, since I haven't owned any, but I can tell you my experience with it.

This printer just works.  It prints what you ask it to, and it does it well.  You don't have to do a lot of fiddling with this and that because Prusa supplies presets for all major types and brands of filament.  It has auto-bed leveling, which removes a big issue people have with other printers. And now, with the Mk4, it has the auto first-layer height so you never have to do the first level Z adjust setting anymore - which wasn't terrible, once you figured it out, but now you don't have to anymore.  And it prints quite accurately. Online, I read about people having to adjust their prints by +/- some percentage factor to get them to come out the right size but I've never had to do that.  It just works.   And the PEI build plates work great too.  I have a smooth plate and a textured plate. I use the smooth for PLA and the textured for PETG.  Other than not getting the plates clean enough every once in a while, I've never had any bed adhesion problems.*

I can say that the Prusa printers, while a little more expensive than other options, just work.  I've never had to play with things any more than I wanted to. All settings are available for you to play with, and I've done my share of playing from time to time. But when I want to just print something, it always just works.  I've done very long prints before (30+ hours) without a problem and it just works.

This has been my experience.  I don't work for Prusa, don't get a kickback from them, and I paid my own money for the printer and upgrade kit (well, I let my wife do it for me  :embarassed:).  YMMV and all that. But it's just been a dependable printer from my experience.  I don't think anyone could go wrong with the Prusa Mk4.

So if you wanna give it a go, I think you'd be pleased!
Kim

PS  And building the printer is quite a fun project too.  I found it fun and educational and all that.


*OK, one time I accidentally (stupidly?) printed PETG on the smooth plate and actually damaged the PEI on one side of the plate getting the print off the build plate because it adhered SO well (which I knew was a problem, duh you're supposed to use glue stick if you use the smooth plate).  Since then, I've stuck to using the textured plate for PETG.  It works quite well and I've never used stick glue or hairspray or anything. Just a good clean build plate!

Offline ddmckee54

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #38 on: January 19, 2024, 10:09:50 PM »
RE the 3D printed rocket.  I knew I'd seen one before, just couldn't remember where.  Integza has a YouTube channel and he has done it.  He used potassium permanganate and hydrogen peroxide as the fuel/oxidizer with a 3D printed nozzle - more of a restrictor.  (That's the same stuff they used to power the turbopumps on the V2.)

You get a very dirty steam as the exhaust, but it does work.  Maybe not well enough to lift off, but the elves could make a nifty rocket sled.  If you start to see purple stains around the shop/house, they didn't get the idea from me.

Offline Kim

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #39 on: January 19, 2024, 11:20:16 PM »
Well, of course, I had to go google that Integza guy and, well, that was pretty interesting stuff!  Some of it seemed a little scary to a non-chemist like me.  I worried about the fumes he was creating with that silver and all!  But really interesting nevertheless!  And his printed nozzle worked OK, but I think his rockets would have worked better if he had a smaller throat which would have built up higher pressure and thus higher velocity of the gas being expelled from the nozzle.  But hey, I'm no rocket scientist!  And his video was sure fascinating!

Kim

Offline ddmckee54

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #40 on: January 22, 2024, 06:59:00 PM »
With different nozzles he could have definitely gotten higher pressures.  But that probably would have exceeded the strength of the materials he used.

It's been a long time since I watched the video about the V2 turbo pumps, but I THINK they were getting a couple of hundred PSI out of their steam generators using the same chemicals Integza used.  Pressures like that would probably be more than the 3D printed nozzle or the acrylic tube could withstand.

Offline Kim

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #41 on: January 22, 2024, 09:40:47 PM »
Good point!  Have to think about that   :Lol:

Kim

Offline Vixen

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #42 on: January 22, 2024, 10:43:36 PM »
OK,
So where does this Integza guy, legally obtain concentrated hydrogen peroxide from??? Things may be different in the 'Land of the Free' but in most parts of the world, concentrated Hydrogen Peroxide mixed with a well know solvent, are classified as components for terrorist bombs and therefore is strictly controlled. The 100ml rule for carry-on liquid on both domestic and international flights is a direct result of a failed H2O2/ solvent bomb plot.

Very dilute Hydrogen peroxide (3% to 6%)is readily available as a hair dressers bleach or as an antiseptic, but I am sure it is far too dilute to produce much (if any) reaction with a catalyst.

Just a rhetorical question, I have no desire to play with the stuff.   :zap: :zap:

Mike
« Last Edit: January 22, 2024, 11:44:56 PM by Vixen »
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Offline ddmckee54

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #43 on: January 23, 2024, 07:22:47 PM »
Don't know if it's legal or not, but one of his videos shows that he concentrates the dilute stuff.  Vacuum distillation maybe, not a chemist so I don't know, just guessing. 

Offline crueby

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Re: Merry Christmas to me!
« Reply #44 on: January 23, 2024, 07:52:31 PM »
Easy to find his house - follow the plume of smoke and the sound of sirens...

 

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