SDF-1 3D Model + 3D Print [SD Machine Style]

[UN_MARINE]

I ran into a similar issue a few prints ago, the nozzle was colliding on the taller parts, and the whole part would separate from the raft. I figured the part was too tall & thin, plus there were other parts printing along with it - eventually, the nozzle skipping from part to part would drag the other parts sideways.

I tend to avoid printing tall parts when necessary - sometimes I add shorter, wider objects to go with the print to help "anchor" the tall part with extra part/support material.

When I need a tall/long part, I just cut the model up to fit the bed diagonally.

Sometimes, I'm amazed at what this thing will & won't print haha.

[UN_MARINE]

All the printing's done! I forgot about the control tower deck parts... so it's 17 sets total. It'll be assembly for the next few hours.

 

[UN_MARINE]

It's in 1 piece!

Slight fit issues due to shrinkage/warping, but nothing a truckload of sanding & putty can't fix.

 

[tekering]

Dude, you work fast!*  

Amazing to see your design become a reality... and so quickly, too!

 

* Your printer's no slouch, either.  

[UN_MARINE]

20 minutes ago, tekering said:

Dude, you work fast!*  

Amazing to see your design become a reality... and so quickly, too!

 

* Your printer's no slouch, either.  

Thanks!

I wanted to get it to this stage before work picks up in a couple of days - everything will get much slower from this point.

The printer and I have an understanding - I keep the models "print-friendly", and it doesn't have unscheduled catastrophic failures (often).

[UN_MARINE]

Oh right... technical stuff:

Approximate print time is 31 hours on 0.25mm layer height, "loose" (75%?) infill. Roughly 470 grams of ABS.

[derex3592]

Hey, that looks great!!

[UN_MARINE]

13 hours ago, derex3592 said:

Hey, that looks great!!

Thanks!

 

EDIT:

New feature!

Edited August 24, 2019 by UN_MARINE
Added pic

[Convectuoso]

It looks great! 

[Chronocidal]

Amazing print!  That's awesome that it came out so cleanly on the first go.  

Far as tall parts go, I basically try to avoid printing anything flat, because I could never get a smooth surface in that direction.  Consequently, I tend to print things standing on their engines, and printing toward the nose.  I always found detail engravings seem to work better on the sides of a print as well.

[UN_MARINE]

8 hours ago, Convectuoso said:

It looks great! 

Thanks!

6 hours ago, Chronocidal said:

Amazing print!  That's awesome that it came out so cleanly on the first go.  

Far as tall parts go, I basically try to avoid printing anything flat, because I could never get a smooth surface in that direction.  Consequently, I tend to print things standing on their engines, and printing toward the nose.  I always found detail engravings seem to work better on the sides of a print as well.

Thanks! It's relatively clean, although there was a mishap with the raft lifting on one of the initial part sets.

I just count the bottom of the prints as total losses - if I need all sides clean, I just split the model & orient the important sides facing up.

A bit of extra work, but it plays to the printer's strengths.

[UN_MARINE]

After a bit of sanding, the parts fit a whole lot better. I can probably run a v1.5 print with improvements next week.

 

Tiny Destroid Monster!

 

Also got rid of the chest/cannon drooping in Storm Attacker mode.

[coronadlux]

That is very cool. You do work fast. Where did the Valk come from?

[UN_MARINE]

3 hours ago, coronadlux said:

That is very cool. You do work fast. Where did the Valk come from?

Thanks!

I found the Valk at a local swap meet/convention, the box was messed up, but everything inside was complete, including the sticker sheet.

[UN_MARINE]

Messing around with a composite of the transformation sequence.

[nightmareB4macross]

Will this be available for sale?

You have done a remarkable job! 

[UN_MARINE]

15 hours ago, nightmareB4macross said:

Will this be available for sale?

You have done a remarkable job! 

I'm looking into possible options:

I figure a fully built kit will be very expensive, on top of the shipping - this may as well come from Mars.

The second option is Shapeways, which will probably be ridiculous expensive.

Third option is a distribute-able file set, for a reasonable cost.

Considering the time & effort required to build & make it pretty - I figure # 3 could be our best case scenario.

 

Thanks!

[nightmareB4macross]

What would it cost just to print this for someone? I have zero access to a 3-D printer so file sharing might not work for me.

[UN_MARINE]

7 hours ago, nightmareB4macross said:

What would it cost just to print this for someone? I have zero access to a 3-D printer so file sharing might not work for me.

It's about $150 to print on this type of printer, + $65-$110 shipping estimate, from this side of the world (yikes!).

And it'll need a bit of extra work to make it look smooth & pretty.

 

I'm still in the middle of improving the model for weight/material reduction, I'll get back to you guys when I get everything "packaged" for Shapeways.

[coronadlux]

8 hours ago, nightmareB4macross said:

What would it cost just to print this for someone? I have zero access to a 3-D printer so file sharing might not work for me.

You can also commision someone nearby to print it for you. There are a few 3d printing Facebook groups that might help with that. Or a member on here.

I like the #3 option myself.

[Convectuoso]

I would also prefer option #3

[Xigfrid]

I think also that shapeways will be too expensive for this size of toy. Plus it will add a lot of time to sprue everything to reduce the selling price etc 

I am also looking for a digital solution to sell my model so i could just bypass shapeways and offer 3D files instead. I am really looking forward if you can find a viable solution for option #3

Edited August 30, 2019 by Xigfrid

[Chronocidal]

1 hour ago, Xigfrid said:

I think also that shapeways will be too expensive for this size of toy. Plus it will add a lot of time to sprue everything to reduce the selling price etc 

I am also looking for a digital solution to sell my model so i could just bypass shapeways and offer 3D files instead. I am really looking forward if you can find a viable solution for option #3

So, I know when I put one of my models up on Shapeways, I was able to offer the model for free download.  Is there a way you could add a model to your shop that can be purchased without ordering a full printing?  

Or even if you can't order just the model file, could you setup a print for purchase that would give a reasonable price, and allow purchasers to download the model, even if the model itself wasn't really viable?  It would be kind of an odd backdoor deal, but let's say you could offer the model in cruiser mode at something like 1 inch long... no one wants it that small, but if that gives you a reasonable price to sell it at, and gives the buyer the ability to download your original model to print themselves at their own preferred size, that could be a viable method.  (This of course assumes Shapeways would even claim to be able to successfully print that 1 inch model, and allow people to order it.)

Edited August 30, 2019 by Chronocidal

[UN_MARINE]

17 hours ago, Xigfrid said:

I think also that shapeways will be too expensive for this size of toy. Plus it will add a lot of time to sprue everything to reduce the selling price etc 

I am also looking for a digital solution to sell my model so i could just bypass shapeways and offer 3D files instead. I am really looking forward if you can find a viable solution for option #3

That's what I was worried about. All that extra work to add sprues to lower the price by a fraction isn't really winning me over.

 

16 hours ago, Chronocidal said:

So, I know when I put one of my models up on Shapeways, I was able to offer the model for free download.  Is there a way you could add a model to your shop that can be purchased without ordering a full printing?  

Or even if you can't order just the model file, could you setup a print for purchase that would give a reasonable price, and allow purchasers to download the model, even if the model itself wasn't really viable?  It would be kind of an odd backdoor deal, but let's say you could offer the model in cruiser mode at something like 1 inch long... no one wants it that small, but if that gives you a reasonable price to sell it at, and gives the buyer the ability to download your original model to print themselves at their own preferred size, that could be a viable method.  (This of course assumes Shapeways would even claim to be able to successfully print that 1 inch model, and allow people to order it.)

Option 3 looks feasible through Pinshape. I've uploaded a design for free distribution there before, I just need to check the payment option.

I'll probably upload the files arranged per group, color, and optimal layer thickness, like the raw print pics. I don't think the site will let me upload 80 individual model files.

 

[Xigfrid]

I was thinking of a 3D file that could be sold be and be used only once to be printed. To be honest, I don’t think the STL files have this ability, and the industry doesn’t seem to be ready to accept anything more complex than it for now. 

[Sanity is Optional]

Yeah, you pretty much need an STL to print from, since G-code needs to be tweaked based on the printer anyway.

A single-use print file would need special physical media and a special printer. Not to mention someone would just figure out a way to rip the file anyway.

[UN_MARINE]

I figure once the files are out there, it's pretty much the wild west/high seas.

So uh... just remember to point to where it came from, I guess (A feature or interview on a blog/site will do nicely).

[Tage]

He's so cuuuuuuute. 

Love your work on this.

Interesting on the distribution too... need USB stick that self-destructs after it's plugged into a printer and printed it's thing haha.

[coronadlux]

On 9/1/2019 at 6:05 AM, Xigfrid said:

I was thinking of a 3D file that could be sold be and be used only once to be printed. To be honest, I don’t think the STL files have this ability, and the industry doesn’t seem to be ready to accept anything more complex than it for now. 

I have worked with more complex parts at work. Granted. We use 100k+ dollars metal printing machines.

One particularly complex part has about a thousand tiny slots inside a manifold. It was printed with a DMLS printer.

[mickyg]

I think he's referring to the ability of a file to expire or be "use once only".  Not actual file complexity.

I love metal printers!

[UN_MARINE]

14 hours ago, Tage said:

He's so cuuuuuuute. 

Love your work on this.

Interesting on the distribution too... need USB stick that self-destructs after it's plugged into a printer and printed it's thing haha.

Thanks!

I guess that's one way to impose DRM haha.

"Printing complete. This 3D file will self-destruct in 5 seconds..."

[Xigfrid]

In the Digital cinema industry, they have the DCP (digital copy protection) system that does exactly that: each copy of a movie is sent through internet entirely encrypted with a unique key. 

Each theater has an identifier key that can be used to decrypt the movie, the file format also defines the conditions of use such as time validity etc

[UN_MARINE]

14 minutes ago, Xigfrid said:

In the Digital cinema industry, they have the DCP (digital copy protection) system that does exactly that: each copy of a movie is sent through internet entirely encrypted with a unique key. 

Each theater has an identifier key that can be used to decrypt the movie, the file format also defines the conditions of use such as time validity etc

That's pretty cool. I don't believe that level of security is necessary for this little project, though.

 

Got some minor adjustments to the model. The center antenna mast now has holes, so it doesn't look like a sail, and added some detail on the thighs.

Also added/enlarged some tabs for more positive locking for transformation. I'll run a test print to see if everything works, then I can work on uploading the files.

 

[coronadlux]

How many hours have you spent on it so far?

This is awesome work.

[UN_MARINE]

12 minutes ago, coronadlux said:

How many hours have you spent on it so far?

This is awesome work.

The model took a week to finish, about 4-6 hours a day. Possibly 35-40 hours total. Plus 31 hours of printing.

Thanks!