Here is the replica, mounted on our Garden Shed:

New decoration for our garden shed.

And a closer view:

Here’s a closer view of the branch and ButterFly

And finally the Butterfly:

Closeup of Butterfly

Details of how this was made are down below.

The other recent addition to the Yard is some livestock to entertain our Granddaughter when she comes to visit.

Here is the Sheep looking longingly at the front lawn…

Closeup of the Sheep:

Sheep painted.

The two large pieces, the Sheep and, especially, the Stylized Branch, both required some special cutting techniques because both of them were too large to fit on the CNC Plasma Table.  The table can only cut  23″ in one direction and 25″ in the other.  The good news is that the table is open on the ends of the 23″ axis so, theoretically ^{(see Note [1] below)}, I could cut something as long as will fit in my Workshop.

However, this required multiple steps in both processing the artwork and the cutting process. Each step allowed me to cut a region of the metal, the cutting was paused while I re-positioned and aligned the steel for the next cut, and then cutting was resumed at the next section with the software offsetting the coordinates to match the new position.  The alignment is critical as the cut line is only about 0.050″ wide so any error in positioning would, at best, leave a jog in the cut line, or, worse, an uncut section of steel that would need manual cutting and fixing.

The sheep was used to test and prove the process.  It could have been done by limiting the size to 23″, but using a full sheet gave me a bigger sheep and tested the process.

The first step was to rework the art work:

Maximized Sheep Artwork, rotated and scaled to fit 24×24 piece of steel.

You can see the split line between the two halves of the drawing.  That’s where the art work needed to be separated into to independent groups.  Note that the art work has internal cuts and they had to be separated into the two different cut phases as well.

Using the Sheep project to refine the process turned out to be a wise decision as I learned enough from the Sheep project to do the Stylized branch, which required three sections over a 72 piece of steel, and 4 joints.

Branch Artwork showing three sections and mounting hole locations.

Cutting a 6 foot long piece of steel also required some re-arrangement of my workshop, not only to make room for the workpiece but also to provide support for the portions of steel that were on either side of the table during the cut.   It also concerned me that my Plasma cutter, which is normally kept in a little alcove surrounded by fiberglass welding blankets where most of the sparks are contained by the blankets, would now be out in the open during all the cuts with sparks flying in all directions!  As a precaution I put my fire extinguisher right at my side during the whole operation!

Here is the setup prior to cut:

I had to rearrange my workshop to manage a 6 foot long piece of steel!

And here is the result after the cut:

And here is the finished cut. Notice the lead in and lead out cuts at the joint of each section.

And the final piece cleaned up and ready to paint.

Branch ready for painting!

All in all, the cutting went very well with probably no more than 1/32″ misalignment in the worst case.  As a result of this project, I’m confident that I can reliably do larger pieces still!

I ordered one about 8 weeks ago and it finally arrived last week!  Having built the previous one, with the help of the entire family, this one was a breeze to assemble, although it did take longer in elapsed time doing it single handedly (about 5-6 hours).

I considered going with a different printer, lower cost and not a long lead time, but the quality and features (Auto calibrate being the most significant) of the Prusa convinced me to stick with a winner!

I noticed a few improvements or tweaks in the design since the previous unit telling me that the company is constantly monitoring their product and continuously making improvements – a very good sign!

So here it is:

Finished Printer with miscellaneous parts. Note the mounted camera to the left.

I did make a mistake in assembly that cost me during the calibration cycle (you can see a nasty dig in the right hand side of the platen).  This can be replaced, but, so far, I haven’t printed anything so wide that I would need that area of the bed.  Since then I was able to realign the assembly and was able to perform a good calibration of the unit.  I think this unit has much better print quality than the first one.

I switched cameras on this one, using the small camera designed specifically for the Raspberry Pi.  The reason for this is that I discovered that the camera really needs to be mounted on the platen, otherwise the timelapse videos will drive you nuts as the workpiece keeps moving with respect to the camera.  With this arrangement, the camera and workpiece have the same frame of reference and you can easily see it being ‘built’.

The camera mount came from www.thingiverse.com/thing:2113975.  However I made a mistake printing this in PLA.  The part connected to the platen ‘drooped’ after I printed a couple of ABS parts (which has a much hotter platen).  I’ve since reprinted the one piece in ABS.

Closeup of camera (Raspberry Pi Camera V2.1) and filament dust filter enclosure. This is a hinged piece printed in a single pass.

The 3D Print server works very well with this camera:

View of screen running 3D Printer server, complete with video!

Having a queue of projects and add-ons for the printer, I spent the next couple of days printing various items…

Close up of Extruder Filament guide adapter plate. Teflon tubing connects this to the filament dryer filament feed guide. Also note the filament dust filter. Normally this will be located just before the upper feed guide as the tubing will keep the filament dust free after that.

3D printed drip valve, just waiting for the PCB to control it.

Miscellaneous parts printed on the new printer. Overall the quality appears better than the printer at the House In The Woods. Probably due to better calibration and newer printer firmware.

With my limited space at LHV, I knew that the printer would be relegated to the garage/workshop, which is both dusty and humid.  Humidity and 3D filaments don’t mix well – or, I should say, they mix TOO well with 3D filaments LOVING to absorb any moisture in the air.  So, I needed a setup where the filament was kept in a dry spot.  After some research, I discovered that Food Dehydrators are very popular mods for 3D printers and this led me to this next series of photos…

Filament dryer base (Cake Transporter) with final modifications sitting on top of unmodified Food Dehydrator. Note lazy susan bearing and 3D printed hub to keep spool aligned and turning easily.

I found a Food Dehydrator and a plastic Cake Transporter that appeared to be ‘right sized’ for this application.  The Food Dehydrator was PERFECTLY sized with the cake transporter base fitting just inside the rim of the dehydrator, I didn’t need any modifications for the dehydrator base.

I was then able to cut out openings in the cake transporter base with a flush cutting router bit in my trim router.  The lazy susan, used to allow the spool to spin freely, was also ‘off the shelf’ and it just took a couple of simple 3D printed add-ons to complete the dryer!

Filament dryer base (Cake Transporter) with final modifications sitting on top of unmodified Food Dehydrator. Note lazy susan bearing and 3D printed hub to keep spool aligned and turning easily.

Filament Dryer with spool and filament guide. The fitting holds a teflon tube that guides the filament down to the extruder.

Completed Filament Dryer, drying a spool of PLA.

I’m trying a simpler enclosure (a large cardboard box) this time around, but I may go the same route as HIW as the cardboard box is a bit too rickety.  We’ll see and I’ll update this when I reach a conclusion…

I used a single piece of wood to make both rails and selected the section to maximize the grain continuity between the two sides. You can see the center line following the center of the grain pattern.

Hunk of Cherry used to make side rails for back of chair.

Close up of grain pattern.

The section sliced and laminated.

The section has been sliced into multiple thin layers, glued back together, and pressed into a vacuum bag against a form shaping the piece into the curve for the back.  The diagonal lines were used to keep the pieces in order in case they were dropped before gluing.  This is a trick from the old punched card days

Side rails sliced into two rails and being fitted to head and bottom boards.

Note the extra slice on the side, this will be used as a guide to make the inside support form.  Also note the curve of the tailboard marked on the wooden block.

Sides with Tenons, ready for gluing back frame.

Using Domino floating tenons made this job a lot easier!

Assembled form for back support.

The support followed the curve of the rails, with the horizontal curves changing slightly from top to bottom to give lumbar support.

The form filled with expanding foam.

I used a stiff formulation of expanding foam to provide solid support for the fiberglass shaping.

Filled form shaved to level surface.

Needed a few repairs to fill some gaps.

Form covered with heat shrink covering.

This covering is used on model aircraft.  It is stuck to the surface with an hot iron and then shrunk to fit tightly.

Form, all ready for fiberglass!

Fiberglass all cured.

Note the curved clamp on the top.  This was done to squeeze the fiberglass to a uniformly flat flange that will be used to attach to the rabbet in the back frame.

Back support removed from form.

Unfortunately, even though I used an epoxy release agent on the form, the material still stuck to the back support enough that it tore away from the form when the cured fiberglass was pulled away.  It’s not a huge problem, I can easily put another cover on the form should I make another chair.

Fiberglass back support attached to the Back frame.

Note that I used tee nuts attached to the fiberglass ‘flange’.  They had to be trimmed to flatten the outside to get them to fit within the rabbet but this also prevented the nuts from spinning when the screws were tightened after upholstering the back support.

That’s pretty much it!  I did bring the pieces to a professional upholstery shop, I know my limitations!

Take care!