Making Spanners with ChatGPT

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Close but no cigar

As part of the fixing of the Canon Dial camera I needed a spanner to remove the dial spring winder. The spanner is a bit special because it needs to fit between the winder and the camera body. Ivan was kind enough to make me one out of brass, but it turned out to be a little bit too thick. So I thought I’d 3D print one. I’ve been impressed with how tough PETG prints have turned out, and the spanner doesn’t have to be particularly strong, so I was hopeful this might work.

And, since I’m lazy I thought I’d ask ChatGPT to produce the spanner design as a Python program I can run inside FreeCAD. I asked the question and out popped some Python. Which didn’t work. There then followed around fifteen minutes of me explaining why the supplied design was wrong, followed by ChatGPT then producing a differently wrong result along with an explanation of how it had fixed the faults that were still there.

Eventually I gave up and wrote the design in about five minutes or so. These things are very clever, but if they get it wrong it seems that sometimes it stays wrong whatever you do.

The spanners worked a treat, although I had to make a really thin one

ChatGPT and HueForge

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It did a nice job with “Nissan cube”

Here’s a nice collision of useful technologies. HueForge is a great way to design 3D printable artworks. And ChatGPT is a great way to package expertise. So Jay has made a GPT which combines the two. You can ask it to make a HueForgeable (if that’s a word) image from a text prompt.

And this is a very presentable Twin lens REflex camear

I might even have a go at printing some of these.

Hardware Meetup Wednesday 17th January

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Printer Poop produced when switching colours

We’re having a hardware meetup next Wednesday evening at Hull Makerspace in the Central Library in Hull. We’ll be opening 5:30 pm with a presentation of 3D printing lithophanes and the HueForge program starting around 6:00 pm. We’ll finish around 7:00pm

There’s no need to book, just turn up and look interested. If you’ve got anything to show off we’d love to see it.

Lithophane Colour Chart

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I’ve Cropped off the very dark areas

I thought it might be fun to make a lithophane of a colour test chart just to get an idea of how well colours are resolved and what colours you could get. Above you can see the original chart. I ran it through Colour Lithophane Maker and then printed it.

This is 0.1mm layers with a 0.4mm nozzle

This is the lithophane that I got. Quite interesting. I think it might be worth running your images through a “posterise” filter of some kind before making the lithophane.

HueForge

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This is fresh from the printer plate, complete with purge tower

HueForge is amazing. It lets you care 3D printable pictures from images.

I’ve mapped different colurs in the image to different filaments

The original image is on the right. The predicted print is on the left. On the bottom left you can see the four colours I’m using (black, blue, grey and white) and you adjust the sliders to determine the image colours they match. It works wonderfully well and drops out an STL file. You just have to tell your printer the layer numbers where the colour changes and away you go.

If you have a 3D printer that can print different colours you should get HueForge. It’s as simple as that.

Kinect Carbonizer still works

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Carbonized Duck ready for printing

Around ten years ago I created one of my first ever GitHub repositories when I uploaded the code for my Kinect Carbonizer. You can find it here. Now that I have a 3D printer that can print things in colour (and at speed) I thought I’d revisit the project with a view to making some multi-coloured carbonized images. I installed the Kinect toolkit, plugged in my Kinect sensor, downloaded the repository, pointed Visual Studio 22 at it and it just compiled and ran.

Amazing.

I had one issue, where the USB on my Windows 10 machine refused to properly recognise the Kinect sensor. I’ve updated the GitHub page with the fix for this.

You can pick up Kinect 2 (not the the original Kinect 360) sensors really cheaply nowadays. You can’t plug them into your computer directly - you need an adapter and power supply - but you can pick them up on ebay at a good price too.

Bambu Studio lets you set the colour of each layer in a print so I should be able to make multi-coloured carbonized prints quite easily. Such fun.

New Years Higher Resolution

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I thought you might like to see the original picture. I took it in Melbourne a few years ago

Most 3D printers use a print nozzle which is 0.4mm in diameter. This is a good compromise between speed and quality. But you can get 0.2mm diameter ones too. So I’ve tried printing the same lithophane as you saw yesterday, but with a 0.2 nozzle. There is a definite improvement, but I don’t think it is worth the extra six hours of printing.

This is using a 0.2mm nozzle for best results

The detail is improved, but I would have to add more layers to get rid of the sky banding. Which would make the print time even larger. I reckon a good compromise is 0.1mm layer height with a 0.4mm nozzle. And perhaps not an image with lots of gradual colour changes.

Lithophane Fun

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This is about half way through

What better way to start the year than by printing some lithophanes.

This is Melbourne

I’m quite pleased with the results. I got a Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, White kit from Bambu. They have a little wiki which tells you how to do it. This image took around 2 and a half hours to print, which is not bad. Next step is to try a 0.2mm nozzle and see how that turns out.

Bambu Printers: A1 versus P1S

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One of the standout things about technology is that as soon as you have bought something a newer and possibly better one is released. A month or so ago I summoned up the courage to invest in a new 3D printer - the P1S made by Bambu which was acclaimed as the best one you could get. Then, last week Bambu released the A1 printer which seems to do everything that my printer does, but for a bit less money. Should I be upset? Read on to find out.

When number one sun arrived here for Christmas the first thing he did was order up a Bambu Lab A1 printer (the new one) to be delivered to our address. This means that for a while we’ve had both 3D printers working in the same room. Let’s take a look at them. The pictures here are from the Bambu website. I hope they don’t mind. I totally forgot to take any shots of my own.

This is the A1. The thing on the right is the Automatic Media selector (AMS)

This is the P1S. The AMS is on the top.

The A1 is what is known as a “bed slinger”. The print head moves left and right over the bed, which moves forward and back. The print head gantry is lifted up as the object is being printed. The P1S puts the print head on a carriage above the print plate. The build plate moves down as the object is printed. But which is best? And should I have waited for the A1 (assuming that I knew it was coming)? Some points to ponder:

  • First things first. Both printers produce excellent prints at very high speed. There is little if anything to choose between them on print quality. At one point we were printing different parts for a gadget (the amazing Toriodal Launcher) When we finished we just put the parts together and they fitted perfectly. So I can’t say one printer is better than the other at printing.

  • The A1 really does sling its bed around at speed while it is printing. It made the desk underneath really bounce. This would worry me if I was printing something tall and thin, but we didn’t have any problems during printing.

  • The P1S is completely enclosed, which means you can print materials which need to be kept warm. The AMS system on the P1S is also enclosed, which means that reels of filament won’t get damp or dusty while they are waiting to be used. Everything is open on the A1.

  • The A1 has a lovely little colour display which shows you what is being printed and provides a nice touch interface. The P1S has a four line text display which does the business but is nowhere near as fun to use. Having said that, you can control both printers from you phone, so the amount of button pushing you do on the device can be zero.

  • Both devices (as purchased) have automatic media selection. They can change filament during a print. This lets you do multi-colour printing and would also allow the printer to switch to a different filament roll if one runs out. I think the AMS solution of the A1 is much more elegant than that on my P1S which seems to involve lots of toing and froing as the filament is wound all the way back onto the roll when it is changed out. The A1 just retracts the filament from the print head itself (although it does have to have four filament feeds to the head). The A1 can only support 4 different filaments; the P1S can be expanded to use 16 by using 4 AMS units.

  • It is much easier to get at and change the print nozzle on the A1 series. The print head itself is more accessible and the nozzle is clipped in rather than screwed in, as it is on the P1S. If you want to regularly switch nozzle sizes this might be a thing to consider.

So, am I regretting my purchase? Is the A1 better than the P1S? I reckon they are pretty much the same. The decision goes down to form factor. I started 2D printing 12 years ago with Una the Ultimaker who was very similar in design to the P1S. I prefer this “enclosed” design, although this is very subjective, so I’m happy with my P1S. Number one son started with a Crealty Ender 3 which is a bed slinger, so he went for the A1. The P1S also takes up less desk space as you can put the AMS on top of it (although you can print a bracket to mount the AMS on top of the A1 as well).

If you are looking to buy one of these formidable devices my advice would be to go for the A1 unless, like me, you prefer the look of the P1S. Both work well and should be equally reliable.

Safemaking with the Bambu P1S

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somewhere safe to put all the money I haven’t got

One of the great things about having the Bambu printer is that I seem to be able to decide to print something and then just print it. Even if the thing is large. Today I had a go at printing this bank vault. It just worked.

These are the main parts

I was expecting a bunch of problems and a ten hour wait. After all, I’ve been printing for a very long time. What I got was all the important bits printed before lunch.

The lock contains a surprisngly complicated latch

I had the whole thing built by mid afternoon. The design cost me a couple of quid or so and it was very well worth it. I even got instructions telling me how to assemble the different parts.

Bambu printer top tip: pick the right buildplate

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If your plate is gold (which is most likely) it will be the Textured PEI plate)

I’m getting to really like the Bambu P1S. It’s unlike printers I’ve had before. With those the very first prints I got with them turned out to be some of the best prints they ever made. With the Bambu it seems that the more you use it, the better it gets.

This is the first printer I’ve had with swappable build plates. They are held on with magnets but you can pop them on and off - especially useful for removing prints. There are also a few different types of plate, and herein lies a problem that I (and lots of other folks) had. My first prints looked good, but kept coming off the print bed or curling up at the corners.

It turns out that the print is supplied with a Textured PEI Plate, but the default setting for the Bambu slicer is the Cool Plate. So the temperature of the print bed was far too low. A peek at the forums revealed that lots of other folks have had this problem. So - if you are lucky enough to get one of these machines, make sure that you make the build plate match the slicer for best results.

The Bambu P1S 3D printer

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Scary fast

I’ve been working quite hard recently. And rather than fritter my earnings away on fripperies like food and fuel I decided to get a new 3D printer. This is my third one. I’ve still got number one, Una the Ultimaker because she has huge sentimental value (and can still print up a storm when required). But number two, Edna the Ender, has now moved on to a new home.

I’ve been watching videos about Bambu printers for a while. I didn’t think I’d be able to afford one of their amazing X1-Carbon printers. In fact, I still can’t. Instead I’ve got myself a P1S which seems to offer all the advantages with a much smaller price tag. They also offer the very interesting AMS which can switch prints between four different filaments. I’ve wanted to try using multiple filaments in a single print job for a while, and now I get the chance to have a go.

The printer arrived yesterday and it is lovely. So far. It reminds me of one of those posh “bean to cup” coffee machines. You set it off and it makes all kinds of whizzing noises. Then some filament goes in one end and a well printed item drops out of the other. Unlike previous printers which I spent many happy (and some unhappy) hours fettling I’m kind of hoping that this one will just work and keep working. I’ve printed a “benchy” (the standard little boat design used to test these things) and it came out very well in double quick time.

I’m looking forward to printing a few more things in the future.