![\"2016-02-21](\"http:\/\/tinker.eccentrify.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/2016-02-21-22.29.12.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nI’m not actually certain why I own a lab coat. If I were a scientist, I’m not sure I’d spend much time in an actual lab. So mostly, I guess, just for the pimping.<\/p>\n
Because why not?Also today, adventures in more 3D printing. I bought a Lulzbot Mini recently, no the grounds that I’m too old to fuck about with the things. The Lulzbot range are notorious for working *well* out of the box. More on that later, but for now, I’ve had it printing the replacement for my digital patch. When I bought my backpack, it had a space on the back crying out for an embroidered patch. But I didn’t want to choose. So I made a little screen to sit there and cycle through pictures – the Weyland Yutani logo, a rabbit or two, whatever. But it was pretty lo-rez, and could only do one color at a time. So I’m building a new version:<\/p>\n The old one is top right – I like the way the case and finish came out. the new one is on the left – it even has space for a speaker, and 8 Gb of files on the SD card.<\/p>\n Pretty good fit. 3D printed case – tolerances are pretty much spot on. The speaker grill needs cleaning, but that’s easy enough.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n This past weekend I made the mistake of popping into an antique shop. Expensive *and* heavy:<\/p>\n But exquisite, and containing a lot of tooling I would otherwise have to buy. A heap of boring bars, and chunks of tool steel, and some lovely calipers. I love old school stuff like that – some machinist used that every day, and put hours into making the tooling in it for individual jobs. Piece of history.<\/p>\n Speaking of machining, Lachlan has been building a Robot Hand at uni, and I got to fire up the lathe to do some little bushings for tendons to run on.<\/p>\n The tolerances on the printing weren’t quite right, and the bushings were, I think, a touch large (0.1 mm matters!!). But it was good to actually use it, and to be able to say “Oh sure, I’ll just whip those up…”. And then machining Delrin was an interesting learning curve. Slow spindle, aggressive feed rate seemed to work.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n And at some point, weeks ago, I actually had a garage day, and turned this<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a> <\/a> <\/a> <\/a><\/p>\n<\/a> <\/a><\/p>\n