Potato Cannon! (May 10, 2015)
My son William and I built a PVC pipe "potato cannon", powered by ignited hairspray, and launched a potato deep into the woods behind the house.
MakerGear M2 customized twin extruder! (December 8, 2015)
This is a project I did to validate a method I invented for creating a dual-extruder 3D printer from two single extruders operating independently on the same belt drive. In this demonstration video, you can see how each extruder is coupled to the drive belt in turn, and at each change, the active extruder pushes the inactive extruder into a "parking" position on the side of the printer. The switch between extruders is entirely passive, being done with magnets and a tool change script. No additional electronics or electrical hardware is required, and no firmware changes are needed other than to set the 2nd extruder's position offsets. All hardware is either existing MakerGear M2 hardware, or is printed, with the exception of the magnets (bought from "Super Magnet Man" on Amazon), and a small, thin strip of scrap metal used for the parking plates (for which pretty much anything similar will suffice).
Twin extruder epic fail (December 7, 2015)
This is what happens when the printer nozzle isn't secured to the mount plate. The nozzle was a tight fit, and the screws were tight, and I didn't realize that they weren't tapped into the other side of the clamp. When the mount plate heated up, the clamp expanded, the nozzle dropped out, and plowed into the print, not only destroying the print but also damaging the surface of the Zebra plate underneath.
Twin extruder ditto print! (January 11, 2016)
This video shows the M2 twin extruder in ditto printing mode, which requires some firmware source code modifications but otherwise is a simple extention of the twin extruder project. A "Ditto printer" uses two or more extruders separated by a distance along the X axis, but responding equally to X axis movement and extrusion/retraction commands, to print multiple copies of the same print at the same time. In the "twin extruder" setup, a second magnetic belt grip is placed to the right of the main magnetic belt grip, and the right extruder couples to it. Since the belt grip is just slipped over the belt, the distance between the extruders for ditto printing can be adjusted quickly and easily.
Cicadas (May 28, 2021)
This is what it sounds like in the middle of Brood X, the 17-year periodical cicadas that emerge mostly around the Washington, D.C. area. This video was taken in my yard in Poolesville, Maryland.
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Last updated: May 28, 2021 at 10:28am