3D Printed Ring - HW5 10/26/15

First, I used 123D Design, an Autodesk software, to create the torus shape. I used a digital caliper to measure my finger, and it was 15mm in diameter. When creating a torus using the software, it prompts for a major radius and a minor radius. I wasn't sure what this meant, so I googled it.

Since I wanted the width of the ring to be 2mm, I made the minor radius 1mm. Since the entire diameter was supposed to be 15mm, I made the major radius equal to 15/2+2 = 9.5mm. I also wanted to make a "mid-finger" ring or "above the knuckle" ring that would sit on top of my ring finger, so I made another ring with a major radius of only 7mm and a minor radius of 0.8mm. Then I decided to add horns, which were cone shaped. When adding a cone shape, the software prompted for a radius and a height. I used 0.8mm as the radius and 2mm for the height. I used the 3D box in the top right corner to rotate the screen around a lot so I could judge the angle that I was placing it in. The cones nicely attached to the torus shape that was already there, which was convenient. Once I placed the cones though, I couldn't figure out a way to move them anymore. Thus, if I placed it incorrectly, I would have to delete it and start over. Similarly, I couldn't figure out how to resize the torus or the cone after they were placed. I was able to rescale them, but I could not change the radii or heights, which was slightly frustrating. 

Then, I exported the files to a 3D STL file:

I then loaded the STL file in the Cura Type A software and saved it as a .gcode file. I  used normal quality, medium strength, checked support structure, and added no adhesion. The fill density was 25%

In using the Type A Machine 3D printers, I learned that I could actually connect to the printers from my own laptop by connecting to the wi-fi: Type A Cura with password "type a cura". That way, I uploaded my file directly to the machine from my own computer rather than having to use a USB flash drive. This made it much more efficient to upload and print directly from my laptop. The URI for the 3D printer was: http://series1-10035.local:5000/  where the number was the printer ID.

The temperature of the head had to be set to 220 and the bed to 80. For some reason, the temperature of the bed would keep reverting to 70, so I had to keep checking to make sure the temperature stayed at 80. 

For the 3D printing beds, I had to make sure to scrape the existing glue off the bed and also add new glue. Other than that, I didn't have many issues.