Joe’s Makerbot is now Joe’s 3D Workbench. http://joes3dworkbench.blogspot.com/ This has been a long time coming. I avoided it for many technical reasons, but I now feel it’s time. Joe’s Makerbot (this blog) will remain with it’s history and posts, but I will no longer be updating it. From now on all posts related to making, designing, and teaching will be on …
New Makerware first impression
Big news, there’s a new version of Makerware out. When I decided to adopt Makerware as much as possible I’ve only found a few little issues. Just last week I found another one, a model that sliced really strange even tho it looked fine in the software. So I’ve got a lot of tests to run. The first thing I …
MakerWare’s failings
First I was all “MakerWare, meh.” Then I was all “MakerWare, yeah.” Then I was all “Heck yeah MakerWare.” This post is going to bring the excitement back a notch because I’ve found a few places Makerware fails. Printing a batch of TARDIS rings I was surprised to see these little gaps in some of the rings, especially after the …
Stress test? Pshaw
TurnRock’s Super Stress Test is designed to push the limits of what home 3D printing can do… theoretically. In reality this was hardly a test at all for my Makerbot. I know I keep lauding it here, but I am really impress with the small details that MakerWare handles so well. So to really stress the test I reprinted the …
Fixing the Ceramic Tape again
This is by far the most annoying bit of maintenance that the Makerbot needs. The ceramic tape is held on only by Kapton and frequently exposed to plastic from failed prints, which is what broke the right extruder’s insulation this time. The left one also has problems in that the ceramic tape has broken down, turned brittle, and is flaking …
Reevaluating MakerWare
After giving Makerware a public lashing I found myself in contact with Joe Sadusk who is a developer for MakerWare at Makerbot (this blog attracts the Joes doesn’t it?) We spent the weekend talking about MakerWare, the shortcomings it had and Sadusk defended MakerWare extremely well. So I decided to give MakerWare another shot and since I needed to test …
Makerbot to become Stratasys Makerbot
Rumors have been flying. Rumors have been confirmed. Stratasys will be acquiring Makerbot. When the rumors started that Makerbot was going to sell, but no one knew who to, this to me was the best possible scenario. Stratasys invented the 3D printing process everyone is using now and they’re still innovating today. I would rather Makerbot be in the hands …
MakerWare vs RepG
For my book (yes, got it in early) I had to explore MakerWare for the first time, for the sake of completeness. Before I’ve never really had any incentive to switch over and I still don’t. I do like like that MakerWare allows you to plate multiple objects easily and I’m currently trying to see if it’s slicer does a better job …
Thingiverse Custom Lithophanes
Exciting to see this morning that Thingiverse’s web version of OpenSCAD aka “Customizer” can now accept uploaded files making possible a custom lithphane script. Apparently my work has merited credit in this, which is cool. Naturally Thingiverse is flooded with people making lithophanes they have no intention of printing. Every meme and logo is going to be lithophaned by the …
Again, seriously?
Darn it, I replaced the HBP cable already, I should not have to deal with this again. Talked to makerbot, sounds like they’re shipping me a new one so I’ll give it another shot, but I hope there’s some advice to prevent this from happening again. At least this time it’s still printing. Makerbot says not to worry as long …