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Ccecil

1,126 karma · joined August 28, 2014

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Ccecil··on Ask HN: Are there examples of 3D printing data onto physical surfaces?
No. It was real.

How well it worked is a different story. I saw one of the records at Autodesk's Pier9 in their display [1]. But again...I never heard it play.

There was more posts at the time that went into more detail.

[1] https://flic.kr/p/Jb7naT

Ccecil··on Grid: Free, local-first, browser-based 3D printing/CNC/laser slicer
Kinda funny how things have progressed...

I work with the Smoothieware project. The V1 Smoothieboard was one of the first with ethernet onboard (although kinda borked). First thing that was advised to everyone was "never connect this to anything outside your local network"

Nowadays...it seems that warning has been lost. Even in the face of firmware updates that caused physical damage.

Something to be said for building your own printer.

Ccecil··on A Year of 3D Printing
In my case PETG had issues until I realized that on my machine it needs to go slower.

I can print PLA at 100mm/s with .25mm layers...but PETG I don't go much over 65mm/s give the same line width/layer height.

Since getting things dialed in I switched to primarily printing PETG. Although, I have no issue printing PLA, PETG or ABS when needed.

Ccecil··on Drones that recharge directly on transmission lines
That was my thought as well...I suppose there may be something I am not thinking of. Perhaps they get more total energy if they "perch" on the tower.
Ccecil··on ICE's Tool to Monitor Phones in Neighborhoods
I have an Eye-fi SD card which can send photos via wifi. Wouldn't be too hard to make a receiver that send from a raspi or something automatically.

Seems they are discontinued but there are other options that work similar such as "EZ Share"

Ccecil··on Experts explore new mushroom which causes fairytale-like hallucinations
Are they seeing tiny mice...or are they seeing the same 2cm tall "people"?
Ccecil··on OpenSCAD is kinda neat
I switched from Fusion to Freecad just before the 1.0 update.

Freecad 1.0 is a gamechanger IMHO. It so far has suited all my needs as well as being significantly easier to use than the pre 1.0 versions.

Ccecil··on OpenSCAD is kinda neat
If you are a programmer OpenSCAD is likely for you. It certainly has benefits in things that are repeating patterns (gears and such)...and if your mind is good at visualizing things in "code" things will likely go a lot faster.

I personally do better with CAD software such as fusion or freecad since my mind doesn't work in the code realm since I have more of a hardware mindset. Translating the picture in my head to code is more difficult than drawing it using the standard CAD set of tools.

My opinion on OpenSCAD is that it is a very useful piece of software which many have used to make some very interesting things. If you have a background in code I recommend giving it a go. I largely view it as "the coder's CAD".

Ccecil··on A Cozy Mk IV light aircraft crashed after 3D-printed part was weakened by heat
Right...I have loaded the wrong material before.

It didn't take long before I noticed. PLA is super liquid at ABS temps :)

(Not to mention that in my case ABS bed temps would melt the bottom of the PLA)

Ccecil··on A Cozy Mk IV light aircraft crashed after 3D-printed part was weakened by heat
Not to be a 3d print snob but....

Aside from the failure it looks like it wasn't the best print to start with. Lots of rashing from support and curling at the edges. You can see on the flats where the support was and the outer curve of the elbow looks like it likely wasn't airtight. Appears to me to be printed with the inlet facing upwards.

Better support planning, settings and possibly orientation may have helped.

Other commenters are saying it was likely PLA-CF, which I totally agree with based on the testing, but I can't help but think there is no possible way the person printing this item did not know that. I doubt the print would have come off as good as it did when using ABS-CF settings on PLA-CF.

Big chain of poor choices.

Ccecil··on Cars are steadily becoming longer, wider and heavier in the UK and across Europe
I can only speak for what I have seen in the US..but it seems to me that a large portion of the SUVs out there are really just minivans with different doors in the back and a slight suspension lift. Especially ones like the VW Atlas and comparable. Not to mention the living room sized vehicles like the Toyota Sequoia and GMC Yukon. Most of the larger ones have 3 rows and essentially the same design internally. If you squint hard enough and imagine sliding doors on the sides there is very little difference.

People seem to buy way larger than they really need also...but that has kinda always been a thing in the US.

Ccecil··on Border Patrol is monitoring drivers, detaining those with 'suspicious' patterns
This has been going on for at least 15 years. But it is a wider scale than just the Border patrol. Police agencies monitoring cameras and working with other agencies to notify in advance of people coming through. Flagged plates are pulled over. IIRC, "Desert snow" was part of this. [1] I suppose the new thing now is the bandwidth and tech to watch more cars. Local police forces and cities are purchasing more readers and installing them on cars and around town in certain bottlenecks. In my town there has been a bit of an uproar...but about 25 years too late (my area started this after 9/11).

Certain highways have always been worse than others though. Back in 2013 I was working with Trinitylabs in Portland developing 3d printers (For those of you in Ruby on rails this was Ezmobius' company). After working for a week doing 15hr days getting 3d printers assembled I was driving home along the Columbia river gorge but I was on the highway on the Washington side. I was pulled over in the middle of nowhere at ~10pm for going 8mph over the limit. After a bit of talking and letting him know what I was doing..including a 20min conversation about 3d printing on the side of the highway in literally the middle of nowhere [2] the officer tells me "I only pulled you over because you are on a known drug running highway...and you are driving an Audi which is a known drug runner car."

At least he was honest :)

[1] https://www.engadget.com/2014-09-09-police-seizure-black-asp...

[2] We were so far out that he his radio wouldn't work to contact his dispatch...he had to use a cellphone :)

Ccecil··on A squeaky nail, or the wheel that sticks out
The squeaking wheel gets replaced.
Ccecil··on Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication
A former girlfriend of mine had a picture of her mother holding a Raccoon. I asked her mother about it and she said that they lived out in the woods in Minnesota and they found it on the porch when it was a baby. The mother had died or something so they kinda raised it. It was free roaming in/out of the house but they could hold it and it would also get into their food. She mentioned one time it ate a bunch of mixed nuts...but didn't like one type so it left all those in the bowl. Another time it ate an entire pie...but left her one piece ("so she wouldn't get angry"). She did say it was never really a "pet"...more like a wild animal that sometimes acted like one. This would have been in the late 70s early 80s by my guess on her age in the pictures.
Ccecil··on The US AI Bubble Reminds Me of the Eve of China's Real Estate Collapse
Canned goods? Camping gear?
Ccecil··on Being poor vs. being broke
It's been posted here before...Vime's boots.

https://terrypratchett.com/explore-discworld/sam-vimes-boots...

Ccecil··on Attention lapses due to sleep deprivation due to flushing fluid from brain
At that point...shadow elephants.
Ccecil··on Fallout from the AWS outage: Smart mattresses go rogue
Exactly...

Fail "safe"...not Fail "keep running"

Ccecil··on Americans can't afford their cars any more and Wall Street is worried
I have been noticing similar but not "loud muffler" so to speak but instead it is noticeable lacking maintenance on "mid-high" value cars.

There have been a lot of cars I consider "nice" but have squealing wheel bearings, squeaking brakes and/or engine tune issues which point to general lack of maintaining the vehicle.

Good to see I am not the only one seeing this warning sign.

Ccecil··on US car repossessions surge as more Americans default on auto loans
When I last priced the equipment it wasn't that bad costwise. In my case though it was only worth it to get rid of the whole "dealing with tire shops" issue. A close friend owns a used car dealership and they bought the mounter and balancer. IIRC...it just needed a 240v line.

I have also lost days waiting for tire shops and alignment...as those are the only 2 things I don't do myself.

Ccecil··on US car repossessions surge as more Americans default on auto loans
Bushings and suspension parts will likely have similar (or possibly worse) wear than an IC based car due to the extra weight. Brakes a bit less possibly since you can use the regenerative braking but this also depends largely on the driver and situation.

*This is an assumption based on my experience with cars in general and doing my own repairs/maintenance not a slam on EVs.

Ccecil··on The World Trade Center under construction through photos, 1966-1979
The album for "Party Music" from Boots Riley's band "The Coup" was scheduled to be released in September and they had to delay it due to the cover having a picture of the WTC exploding [1]

Tom Clancy's book "Debt of Honor" is very similar in a spooky way as well. Including the hesitation to shoot down commercial airliners being used as weapons. [2]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Party_Music [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt_of_Honor

Ccecil··on ICE Wants to Build Out a 24/7 Social Media Surveillance Team
I guess I had always just assumed this was the case for quite some time. Or I should say "someone" in the govt was always watching...not necessarily ICE.
Ccecil··on Burnend alive inside a Tesla as rescuers fail to open the car's door
IIRC...on my older VW there is a way to set this to disable but it requires using OBDeleven/VCDS (or similar) via the CANBUS.

Typically, there are a few different options of things you can enable/disable that have no other menu options. OBDeleven has "one touch apps" that makes this easy...but there is also other ways to do things using the adaptations or long coding.

If you do any work on your own car having something like OBDeleven is pretty much required. You can't even change the rear brake pads without it.

Ccecil··on Magic Lantern Is Back
https://fujihack.org/
Ccecil··on The "996" schedule of working 9am-9pm, 6 days a week comes to Silicon Valley
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/666_(number)

Christians tend to see the number as having a negative meaning. Similar to why there are no 13th floors on (some) buildings.

Edit: learned a new word "hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia"

Ccecil··on Why you can’t grow cool-climate plants in hot climates
I second the Youtube channel suggestion. Very entertaining and informative. Lots of trash talking and banter to keep things interesting. The SF tours are especially great. Explanations of why things should/should not be planted in areas really opened my eyes to how bad the urban designs can be.

Sidenote: I like that he tattooed his finger with measurement lines so he can use his fingers in the pictures as reference for size.

Ccecil··on Burner Phone 101
One thing I didn't see covered is to never have your "real phone" and your "burner phone" on you (or in the same location) at the same time while powered.

Easy enough to say "Gee...these 2 phones are always together or nearby when activated" or "this phone shuts off right before this one powers up".

Although, I suspect there are a few other ways to determine identity easier. Such as tracking the device identifier and then looking up nearby public facing cameras.

Ccecil··on Open hardware desktop 3D printing is dead?
I started in Reprap in 2011...frequently spoke with Prusa and many, many others in IRC. Watched the development and commercialization of the whole project through the years.

My main takeaway (and one that I attempted to point out often) is that the value of the Reprap project and it's OSHW nature was not to "own a machine"...the true value was the process of building the machine, tuning and evolving. This all began to stagnate in 2014 when the "You are a fool to build your own printer when you can buy one prebuilt" came about. This seemed to be spread by people who either had no idea what they were doing...or were intentionally planting the seed of doubt. We were told that it was better/easier to buy 10 and throw away 5 in a year since it was more cost effective.

My current printer I built in 2015. It needs very little work but has evolved slightly through the years...mostly in electronics since it is my test platform for the V2 Smoothieboard development. It does not have a lot of the software "magic tricks" but it prints very reliably and solid (even after being toted around to events).

It was once said to me by Logxen "Opensource hardware is engineering on an artist's business model". IMHO...saying it is dead and giving up is the same as quitting doing art you love because someone else paints better/faster/cheaper.

A quote attributed to Limor Fried says it best "I'm going to keep shipping open source hardware while you all argue about it".

@josefprusa...since I know you frequent here...don't forget about the impact the projects have on the world. There are bigger things than just money. There was a time you cared about OSHW enough to get it tattooed on your arm.

edit: grammar

Ccecil··on Do You Need to Own a House? Many Older Americans Decide They Don't
Not at all stable from my experience.

Plus, it is in no way tied to what the "average renter makes". In my state there are very few laws about rent increases. It can basically happen within 1 month of lease renewal IIRC. Which does not allow (most people) time to move and typically the surrounding rents have increased higher than the proposed increase so it often does not save money.

It really depends on the landlord or property management company involved though. Some do 5-10% increases every time they can because "that's the way it is"....some don't.

If I would have bought a house 6 years ago I would be spending ~$500/mo less than I am for the house I currently rent.

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