…code, cg, electronics, 3d printing…

This is a print of the San Francisco bay area I made based on the fantastic tool by Thatcher Chamberlin, Terrain2STL. I used Meshlab for cleanup of holes, and scaling operations.

I epoxied each of the four regions to a custom piece of light blue acrylic acquired fromTAP Plastics.

Get more info and download the files to print yourself over on Thingiverse.

To see a detailed overview the process I used to make them, check my pose here.

Check out the article written on it at 3dPrint.com.

So after owning my Makerbot Replicator 1 for nearly 2.5 years now, I finally upgraded the firmware to Sailfish.  Why has it taken so long?  I was under the (very) false impression that you’d have to use ReplicatorG to do all your slicing (these days RepG feels super clunky/slow to me).  As it turns out Sailfish allows you to use more slicers than Makerware does:  You only need a special cut of RepG to update the firmware.

Install took maybe 15 minutes, just because I was taking my time.  Did the initial print at 120mm/sec, and it turned out great (above).  Crazy to see my machine printing that fast with quality results: usually I let it run at 90mm/sec.

Interesting things:

• http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:32084 (custom cut of RepG to download)
• http://www.sailfishfirmware.com  (Full manual, etc)

Hexagons are a great form to build with when it comes to 3d-printing: for FDM machines, like my Makerbot Replicator (1) that print layer by layer, overhangs past a certain angle don’t print well, or print at all.  While my machine can print overhangs less than 45 degrees, that is the rule of thumb when it comes to making 3d printable items that won’t require support:  Make sure all overhangs are 45 deg or greater.  And if you tip a hexagon on its point, then the angles it creates for overhangs are exactly 45 degrees and avoids any bridging:  Complex structure, no support needed.

With that in mind, I made a Python script in Maya that will turn polygonal quads into hexagons with the click of a button.  The below two “Hex Vases” are the first tests with it.  You can find more info + downloads on their Thingiverse pages here, and here.