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Showing posts from February, 2024

Multicolor 3D printing a rocket?

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OpenRocket simulation of my 2.6" BFR with 24 mm engine mount showing semi-transparent fans While  struggling with taping and painting the BFR rocket  it occurred to me I could use my newfound multicolor 3D printing skills for rocketry.  I checked Amazon and ordered metallic silver and metallic black filaments to try printing the BFR (only) and make a D/E powered rocket as described by jgutz20 .  The new filaments are coming overnight, then I'll try slicing the nose and tail and see if I can find a good point to swap filaments.  I'll start with printing the nose to see how it looks.  I could try to match the filament colors with painting a BT-80 body tube, or just 3D print one!  I'll try designing that to see how much it weighs. Printing the nose cone and tail so the colors split at the fins necessitates flipping the objects 90 degrees in UltiMaker Cura before slicing and then printing them horizontally instead of vertically (compare this picture with my earlier vertic

Learning to 3D print in multicolor

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My wife is a " Dead Head ", a follower of the Grateful Dead and, lately, Dead and Company.  Of course one of the first things I printed was something for her, a Grateful Dead Dancing Bear cookie cutter .  After a month of printing, I was looking for a meaningful project I could 3D print for her a custom Valentine's Day present when I came across a project by a user, dneujahr , on Printables with a 3D Grateful Dead Coaster .  He showed it printed using three colors, red, white and blue, but provided instructions for building it on a different machine than I have and those instructions didn't work on my Anycubic Kobra Max .  After three weeks I am finally able to consistently print a nice three color 3D rendering by programming my printer and have made as set of unique coasters for my (happy!) wife! Starting out was very frustrating.  None of the Anycubic literature mentioned changing filaments, and a Google search quickly sent me into the bowels of Reddit looking for

Building my SpaceX BFR

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 I've always admired the retro look of the SpaceX rockets but didn't want to pay $150 for the ready-to-fly SpaceX Falcon 9 model from Estes.  When browsing Thingiverse I came across a f lying version of the Starship Super-Heavy by jsheedy , previously known as the SpaceX "BFR" (let's go with " Big Flying Rocket ").   The author provided files to 3D print the "BFR" nose cone, transition and fins designed to take my favorite 2.6" diameter body tube (BT-80).  I used some modifications made by jgutz20 on Thingiverse , allowing just the Starship to be a rocket by itself without needing a booster stage.   Starship BT-80 Full by jgutz20 on Thingiverse , not mine! I printed jgutz20's nose cone, which includes modifications attach a parachute and shock cord and 3D printed launch lugs, along with other parts from jsheedy (below), then built an OpenRocket simulation file based on their weights and fin shape to ensure its stability and pred