We have the big pool I started last night with a smaller version from today. I decided to print off some more deadly plants as well as a couple of low stairs. The stairs are the same print, just put in different orientation. My plan for these is to make some kind of a plaza with the throne on it. The stairs will allow entrance to it.
I also managed to repaint the back banner on the hero.
A bit brighter than yesterday. I also added a bit more to the skink oracle, he is drying as I managed to snap his wand off!
Tomorrow I will build a base for this in 3D builder. I might see if I have any STL’s for plants etc that I can add into the designs.
Off to play on Hunter: Call of the Wild… my go to chill out game
Well that is him printed. I still need to design a levitation base to make him float above the table top but the actual model is complete.
He is finished
I intend to add some Greenstuff lianas to the top where the disk joint is. You can just about see it on the photo above.
As you can see, he is quite tall. Because I removed the lumps and bumps and horns of the bottom he isn’t much taller than the original measurement yesterday. I reckon the base will be an inch high.
He took over 27 hours to print as he is. Add in the couple of error prints then we are up to 40 hours print time.
So after 17 hours 10 minutes I have the first bit of him done.
The 45 degree angle certainly helped with the supports as it allowed them to pretty much come away in two large pieces.
I reckon he is now a nice size for then rest of the miniatures. Now onto the rest of him…
The top of the banner is done. Took 5 hours 11 minutes to complete. Not sure what setting I had it at, but that seems a long time. I nearly cocked up big time. (Well apart from snapping bits off it!) I sat there with it and tried to get it to fit onto the top of the main body part. It would not fit, at all. The top of the disk was totally out of line.
Lots of swearing took place!
I checked it over and over again and nope it wouldn’t fit. So I started thinking what I could do to get it sorted – this included cutting out the top of the disk and redoing it in Greenstuff. I wondered if I had increased the size by accident when slicing it etc. I knew I hadn’t. There was lots of head scratching going on and then before cutting things off I turned around and saw the second one I had printed! I was trying to place a 200% top onto a 150% base.
Ooooh it fits!
Funnily enough when I put it on the right base it works really well.
This thing is going to be huge. It is already about 8 inches (20cm tall) without its base. The base is being printed now. After 3 hours 50 minutes the top layers have decided to delaminate. Not sure whether it was temperature or a partially blockage. It was going to be a six hour print so I cut my losses. I have redone it in 3D builder and have removed all of the the bottom bits, the horns and lumps and bumps etc. I will give it a low flying base to give it a bit more stability and also to stop it being very tall.
I have set it away again and I will keep an eye on it to make sure that it doesn’t do anything silly again before bed time.
Today I tried to get the support off the giant magic toad and it was a nightmare! In the end I gave up as somehow I had clicked on add the supports everywhere…Doh! Wasted 9 hours of print time.
I have decided to redo him at 200% instead of the 150% that I had done before. This time I am printing it at a 45 degree angle, with supports only touching the build plate. It is a 14 hour print so we shall see how it gets on overnight. As with previously, I will crank the nozzle temperature up as it goes on.
I also decided to do a quick print (well 4 hours plus!) of the Leech Queen. The last time I printed her she had a lot of fracture lines right up the body, similar to the Big Beasty. The one below was glued back together in lots of places.
This time I set the temperature at 220 and I got a perfect print.
Mess on the left, fab in the right
I will need to hide the joint where the head and body connect, but I am really pleased with it. I have had this one for ages, but I had a quick check and it came from Black Scrolls Games. https://www.drivethrurpg.com/m/product/188115
The Giant magic toad should be ready by breakfast time tomorrow. I hope to get some painting done in a bit too.
I managed to get hold of a free couple of dinosaurs online so I thought I would give one of the triceratops a try.
It is a beauty, with some amazing detail. They come from this guy who has some great 3D files. https://www.duncanshadow.com/
The triceratops comes in either a one piece model or a multiple piece Version. I decided to make a start with the head and crest. My original idea was to use it as a Stegadon, but before I do that I reckon I will have to increase the size a fair bit.
Well after yesterday’s total mess of a print I decided to try and do something to help the print overnight. First of all I bumped up the temperature to 224 for the overnight section of the print.
Other thing I did was to build a temporary box for the printer to work in.
It’s in there somewhere
So after a bit of a worrying night, I woke up to a great print… mega phews were breathed.
Print one on the left, print two on the right
The biggest problem I had was getting the bloody supports off. It was a 22 hour print and it seemed like 22 hours to get the support off. It was a nightmare! In the end I managed to pull only one foot off. You can just about see the line on the front foot.
It is a mighty Beasty and was well worth printing. Okay it took 34 hours in total (60 if you include the couple of duff prints). But it did save me £158 printing it. A whole roll of filament costs £18 for a 1kg roll. The whole thing weighs about 160g. So roughly £3.00 (a bit more for failed prints).
I have just measured him…he measure 12 inches (30cm) long. He does look large next to the Saurus cavalry and Kroxigor. (And this is at 70% size of the original!)
He is missing his crest.
The major buggeration I have is that with the lock down is that I am running out of white spray paint. Places won’t post up here so I might have to hold fire on painting things for a while. I was going to phone ahead to the car place and buy some over the phone then pick them up from the door.
This shit has totally got real very quickly. I honestly think I have been sitting in a little bubble and somehow have persuaded myself that everything was going to be tickety-boo.
Tomorrow I will try and get something painted (unless I find something new and exciting to print).
Well I thought I would remove the support from the body. And see if it was saveable.
The legs and spines mostly pinged across the room, but luckily for once, I found all the bits.
Model and support
Now this might be able to be saved with some filler or something similar as well as some Greenstuff. I am printing a second one with the temperature bumped up to 220. According to the filament spec it can go up to 230. I intend to make a plastic tent to cover it tonight to try and keep some heat in. I have never tried pausing a print before so don’t know if it can carry on properly afterwards. I know technically that the printer has a system where if the print is stopped due to a power cut it will store where it stopped and will then carry on. I have never had to try so I cannot pass comment on it.
So it has been printing for 21 hours now and it is a bloody mess. Some major fault lines part way through the build. The only thing I can think of is that overnight the ambient temperature in the shed dropped significantly causing the layers to not bond properly the bottom few and upper ones are fine, just the middle bits over night.
I might be able to save it with a Greenstuff skin over the worst bits, but part of me thinks it is going to be a waste of time.
Bugger… or words to that effect!
It comes off in an hour and I will see what kind of a mess it is when I get the supports off.
The tail that I printed is as tall as this, but had no problems at all. It has either had a partial clog that has pushed through or it is a temperature thing. If I restart when it comes off, I can increase the temperature of the nozzle overnight. Hopefully that will sort it out…
Today I cleared off all of supports on the various Kroxigor.
Quite a force!
This is what the waste pile looks like from five of them…
I need to work out how to reduce the raft size and try some different supports. These were a bugger to get off. One of them actually pulled a foot off one of the earlier prints when it came away.
The other thing I did was to ‘design’ and print some other weapon heads.
The two bladed ones used the original weapon head base as seen in the foreground. The knife blade came from the goddess of War statue that I had printed ages ago. I removed the hand in 3D builder and added it to the weapon base. It did start off looking like the one with the spike, but the support took one of the prongs with it. It looked weird with just one of them so I snipped off.
The big Beasty torso is printing right now. I will have to wait until tomorrow to see it finished.
One hour in… 22 left to go!
I might actually have to paint something this evening 😱
Bogenwald 