Tread Bot – Printed on a Form-1

A few weeks ago I had to send my Afinia H479 back to its home for a repair. Nothing major. The heating element for the print bed failed, and was intermittently usable until one day it just stopped working altogether. While I was able to print small things on an unheated bed, large things were impossible. They lifted off the bed ruining the print.

Tomorrow I get it back.

Before I sent it away I did a test to see how small I could create a reasonable little robot, with the final intent of using it as a game piece.

Here’s the result.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

With some changes, I made it better, and I printed it in multiple colors:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

You can see that it printed remarkably well for an additive extrusion printer.

However, Thingiverse user Brian Evans made one using a Form-1, which prints by laser-hardening light-sensitive liquid resin. The resolution is far superior to most home-priced extrusion printers, but they’re also not easily available yet.

Here’s his result:

robotanddodecahedronx1280_preview_featured

I was pretty impressed. This is the first, early version of Treadbot, not the improved one, but you can see by the angles of the body and the curves of every piece that it’s next to impossible to notice any layer striations at all.

My ultimate goal now is to have my Afinia for quick, iterative prototyping and printing larger things, but to have a Form-1 to make model kits I can actually sell.

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