Skateboard Build – Green

This is my first post in quite some time, as many things have eaten up my free time – namely fatherhood, increased work responsibilities, and a worldwide viral pandemic that we’ll be telling our grandkids about.

Between all these strange life-changing moments, I decided I needed to get some more exercise, and relive some of my youth at the same time. So I did the rational thing, and made a skateboard.

My custom-painted deck

 

As I used to skate a decade ago, I thought it would be worth getting back on the old plank, but my busted up old setup needed lots of attention – basically starting from scratch.

The Death of GitHub

So, it’s official – Microsoft has bought GitHub for a whopping $7.5B – enough to make Dr Evil’s pinky head mouth-ward.

I find this, in modern parlance, “problematic”.

i3 Tiling Window Manager – xmonad-style keybindings

This should be a quick post. After spending far too much time lurking on /g/, I finally took the plunge and looked into the world of Tiling Window Managers.

Laptop interface with i3 & i3status

I generally use a laptop at home (and hate touch pads with passion) so avoid the mouse as much as possible. I’d heard lots of talk of them being great for keyboard-only use, so dipped my toe in and tried a few out… [click the image to go straight to config files]

15mm Sci-Fi Barricade – 3D Printed Scenery

I’ve started to design as much 15mm sci-fi scenery/terrain as I can before summer, with the hopes of having a sprawling mess of a gaming table for when I can get a proper group together for a while.

First up was a simple barricade, as pictured above – 4 or 5 of these can really help filter movement on the table! All files available from Thingiverse, as per usual – I’ll update this post if I can get better photos after painting.

Deep Space D-6 – Basic VASSAL Module

Recently I have been looking for board games to play solo, as I don’t always have other players around. Whilst trawling BoardGameGeek lists, I came across Deep Space D-6

And I think it is awesome! It was an entry in their annual Solitaire Print&Play competition, so I grabbed the files, printed out a set and got playing.

Car Phone Holder

Here you will find my latest useful creation, a phone mount for my car. It uses the CD slot for mounting, and from their my phone connects to a bluetooth FM transmitter to allow my music/GPS/phone calls to come in over my car radio.

Silhouette Miniatures

So whilst browsing Google+ one day (yes, someone still uses G+!), I discovered a wargamer playing with some paper miniatures, printed on their normal printer. Just simple silhouettes of modern soldiers, but effective enough for proxies on the cheap.

So I decided to go one better, and 3D print my own equivalent!

3D Printed Squad

3D Printer Setup – Learn from my mistakes!

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything… Since being in the new house, tinkering with my 3D printer has absorbed roughly 75% of my free time. Although I got my printer and kit-form (with oh-so-useful hidden instructions written in Chinese), I was fully expecting some work to be involved. But I wasn’t expecting the learning curve I found! See these failed test prints…

3D printing is a wonderful and interesting new technology, but it is not consumer-ready by any stretch of the imagination. If you decide to invest in a 3D printer, prepare to learn everything about how it works. And if you’re not willing to spend many hours tweaking, learning, and failing repeatedly, I recommend not buying a printer. Just order 3D printed objects from a maker online if you desperately need something.

I faced several issues on my journey to reliable prints (and they could still be improved), but below you’ll find my essential setup tips.

3D Printer Build

I’m finally somewhat settled in the new house, and have simultaneously had the time, space, and motivation to build my Prusa i3 clone!

This is the built printer, before managing cables (not the zip ties in the corner). The build was slow going, as there was no instruction pamphlet in the box, and being a no-name Shenzhen factory special, I had no model name or site to visit. It is similar to many documented kits, but not identical. As I was winging-it during construction, there were times I had to go backwards and rebuild when I’d missed something…

Lament Configuration – 3D Project

Recently, I received a 3D printer kit for my birthday from the ever wonderful ladyfriend (unfortunately, I haven’t been able to assemble it due to space/time constraints, but very shortly will be in my new house with enough room to build it). With that in mind, I started playing around learning how to use FreeCAD, to generate lots to print!

The first object worth sharing is the “Lament Configuration”, AKA the box from Hellraiser

The above picture is how it will supposedly turn out. I will, of course, report when I’ve attempted to print it myself. All the files are available over on my Thingiverse, if you fancy printing it for yourself first. Let me know how that goes if you try!