These are my current \u201cdaily drivers\u201d in my stable of 3D printers. I have owned 14 printers of various types. One I donated to a high school and one is brand new still in the shipping box unopened. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
What\u2019s important is how many are used, not how many have or are owned. I have had up to six of them running at the same tine. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
These two see most of the present activity. Both are dual filament Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) that extrude melted plastic layer by layer to a build surface. The raw material is purchased as a kilogram (2.2 lb) filament on a spool. Both machines use two spools at the same time<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The printer on the left is the Snapmaker J1 IDEX<\/a> (Independent Dual Extruder) system. It has two complete printheads that can operate in a number of different configurations. \u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n The printer on the right is the Tiertime CETUS2<\/a> that has two extruders is a single printhead and both extrude through the same single print nozzle. It\u2019s generic name is a single nozzle dual extruder printer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Follow the links in each paragraph above to the product websites for additional information. More detail there than I can ever post in this post.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For me, the printing is just the reward for dreaming up the designs I create in CAD (Computer Aided Design). I only print someone else\u2019s design when it is as good or better than I can create. Or someone asks me to print something they have seen on one of the many free access file sites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I spend most of my time in the design because the printing part is a \u201cload the drawing file and push start\u201d operation. Well, not exactly. But the printer can run for dozens of hours without human action if everything is properly configured.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My creative effort is in the design. The printer just makes my design a tangible item. Many hours of more creative drawing and design time available between pushing start and prying the finished item off the build plate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My current go-to CAD is called Autodesk FUSION 360<\/a>. It is a professional grade CAD software system. Not free.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I will be posting more about the CAD systems I use. I have several more that are used in different applications. RhinoCAD (Rhinoceros)<\/a> and Vectric Aspire<\/a> are the other two biggies.\u00a0 More about my CAD in the future.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n So, I am enjoying full retirement from daily revenue production and can spend all the time I want on designing for the enjoyment of the process. My time to design. 3D printing provides provides a quick prototype or plastic item with a functional use result. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I still have a workshop full of wood and metal working CNC tools that can also be used for production. But the design time must always come first. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" These are my current \u201cdaily drivers\u201d in my stable of 3D printers. I have owned 14 printers of various types. One I donated to a high school and one is brand new still in the shipping box unopened. What\u2019s important is how many are used, not how many have or are owned. I have had […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":67,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-3dprinting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blognasium.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blognasium.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blognasium.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blognasium.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blognasium.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=66"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blognasium.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blognasium.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/67"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blognasium.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=66"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blognasium.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=66"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blognasium.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=66"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}