This is about as rough as they get with no effort put into cleaning the bed or levelling it, just draw (15 minutes using Openscad) and print (20 minutes). Control panel for my spot welder.
This is about as rough as they get with no effort put into cleaning the bed or levelling it, just draw (15 minutes using Openscad) and print (20 minutes). Control panel for my spot welder.
this example I designed for an astro all-sky camera
Eh, who cares if the layers are visible, it's funvtional apparatus, not a beauty contest. I print at 0.3mm and i find the finish just fine. Obviously print orientation needs to be considered, but for my functional prints i don't do cleanup other than removing support.
For more aesthetic stuff to steal a phrase, filler and paint makes it the printer it ain't.
Eh, who cares if the layers are visible, it's funvtional apparatus, not a beauty contest. I print at 0.3mm and i find the finish just fine. Obviously print orientation needs to be considered, but for my functional prints i don't do cleanup other than removing support.
For more aesthetic stuff to steal a phrase, filler and paint makes it the printer it ain't.Sorry, I just like nicely made stuff.
Don't you just hate it when people make it sound as though you have to choose between functionality and quality/aesthetics/fit-and-finish/look-and-feel, as if they were somehow mutually exclusive?
If anything, I'm kinda surprised that engineer-y folks don't have higher expectations on quality, given that engineering is all about making good designs. I would expect engineers to appreciate build quality more than the average joe.
There seems to be an attitude that engineering types don't need nice things. It seems to be partly bravado, and partly the false antithesis you speak of.
Sure, technical people are often more than capable enough to deal with clunky designs, and generally wouldn't sacrifice performance for looks, but why not make something more functional and nice to use by designing and constructing it well?
why not make something more functional and nice to use
by designing and constructing it well?
If the objective is a mirror smooth finish, 3D printing is at a disadvantage. Many other technologies come with a smooth finish for free, or nearly free. While you can post process or use other techniques to improve the smoothness of the finish another approach is possible, and far easier with 3D than with other technologies.
Give the finish a deliberate texture. Appropriate choices of texture can mask the roughness from the 3D process and enhance the beauty and functionality of the box. Things like better grip, non slip stackability with minimal volume penalty, and so on.
Our preferences in boxes and our definitions of quality have been shaped by the fabrication technologies we use. They are not immutable. Think of the hammered metal paint finishes that were popular toward the middle of the last century (partly because they hid manufacturing defects).
There seems to be an attitude that engineering types don't need nice things. It seems to be partly bravado, and partly the false antithesis you speak of.
Sure, technical people are often more than capable enough to deal with clunky designs, and generally wouldn't sacrifice performance for looks, but why not make something more functional and nice to use by designing and constructing it well?Preach!!!
My professional background is in technical writing and usability in the software world, and even there you run into people who think that professional software mustn't be too elegant. It gets dismissed as consumer-y, even if it's just as capable and much easier to use.
Every usability person understands that the usability demands of consumer products are very different from those of professional tools (in that the latter situation can tolerate a steeper learning curve in exchange for greater long-term efficiency), but often times, professional software is just needlessly complicated. It really is an attitude of "It's professional software, we don't need to make it user-friendly." Somewhere on this forum, I wrote a long rant about how maddeningly difficult and error-prone Eagle and KiCad are to learn and use, and of course many people just blamed it on me. But I feel that it's eminently possible to make professional software that is literally an order of magnitude easier to use than the incumbent, because I have literally seen it happen.*
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hi all,
I'm bouncing this old thread to ask a different question and to get a feel of the state of the art. It has been quite a number of years since this thread started.
Today 3d printing is a rather mature tech, many people probably have a 3d printer compared to back then.
However, my biggest peeve about 3d printing is that it can take a long time (hours) to print even rather modest enclosures.
What could be worse is if you consider failure rates, e.g. with the 'difficult to print' ABS, that needs a heated bed and is prone to warping, 'complicated' 'large' models are particularly prone to warping.
There could be other failures, you could imagine worse situations if failure occurs.
And there are various limits as well. One rather 'common', but I'd guess overlooked issues is, FDM 3D printing is a layered technology, with one layer stacking on top of another.
This means large vertical windows are *overhangs* and they are a problem to print. It would either need supports or that the whole model need to be redesigned to eliminate supports etc.
Possibly a multi-part print which needs to be glued together etc.
and for my very 'average' 'low cost' 3d printer (a Creality Ender 3 variant), it gives an estimate of 6 hours 18 minutes to print that.
I think xrunner's hybrid approach is a nice touch.
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/cost-3d-printed-enclosure-vs-project-box/msg4184563/#msg4184563
hi all,
I'm bouncing this old thread to ask a different question and to get a feel of the state of the art. It has been quite a number of years since this thread started.
Today 3d printing is a rather mature tech, many people probably have a 3d printer compared to back then.
However, my biggest peeve about 3d printing is that it can take a long time (hours) to print even rather modest enclosures.I don't really care about time to print. Make sure your printer is fire safe, and let it run overnight if you need to.