Ezra Harris

Author: ezradharris

  • The Benefits of Plastic

    Plastics (or synthetic polymers) were first introduced back in the 19th century when they were trying to find an alternative to Ivory; ivory is also used in billiard balls (or pool balls in the US) Ivory was more commonly made using Elephant tusks, and was used in the making of small sculpted works of art, mini statues and other uses. Such as this Catholic depiction of Mary holding baby Jesus:

    (credit: Wikipedia)

    In 1907 an inventor Leo Baekeland came up with an utterly artificial type of plastic called Bakelite; bakelite’s main attributes were that it was a good insulator of heat and strong. Later, bakelite aided with the production of electronics due to its ease of production and cheapness. Bakelite inspired others to create different types of polymers.

    Today plastic is used in almost every type of profession. It’s used in computers, wires, safety equipment, tubes, ETC.

    Although some say a downside to plastic is its environmental effects, plastic has a lot better attributes than other materials (glass, wood, etc.), like its lightness and strength. And if we were to replace plastic, we could need more resources for the alternatives, which would result in more storage for those substitutes, thus more storage on trucks and space on freight ships, planes, etc.

    Even if the US and Europe decided to stop using plastic entirely, it wouldn’t even stop 1% of ocean pollution. Over time more and more plastics are invented for specific cases, and over time it may get better for the environment.

  • My Project Printer: A Year in the Making

    For the past almost year, I have been working on a project printer that I bought; the original frame and parts were from a CR-10 S5 (with a 500x500x500 build size) the first couple of test prints worked, but they were not optimal with many issues, elephants foot, layer line issues, and a couple other minor issues, some of the problems I was able to fix by tweaking hardware.

    But most of my issues I could fix by changing my slicer settings; I currently use PrusaSlicer v2.5.0; I used to use Cura slicer; I swapped slicers because of the easier-to-use interface and the number of features built into the base program. Overall I prefer it for its interface and configurability, which makes it easier to swap machine settings from my Ender3 to my project printer. As well as built-in support for Octoprint.

    After an army of calibration cubes and Benchy’s, I could finally tune my prints to the best of my ability. I use a .6 nozzle, and I figured the best results are with a .3 layer height and about 70 mm/s (it can depend on a print-by-print basis) for PLA. I also have changed many more settings, which you can find here:

    https://github.com/BillyDaBones/Project-Covenant-3D-Printer

    The main issue I ran into was warping on the print bed when printing thinner models, and the way I solved it was by having both a higher bed temperature and a short 1-minute pause before printing after the bed had heated.

    I have previous short posts and status updates on the printer projects at my Instagram (here)

  • Octoprint

    Over the year, I’ve used Octoprint for my 3d printers. Octoprint is a server that hosts on a Raspberry Pi (and now even an Android device), which then you connect to your printer, which you can connect using the local IP. Octoprint is mainly used for managing your prints since it’s a lot easier to upload the.GCODE files to a local server and have Octoprint start, stop, and pause the 3D print with a press of a button. Many other features make Octoprint one of the best companions for a 3D Printer.

    One of the other benefits is its plugins; since Octoprint is open-source, they fully support plugins by independent developers; Octoprint has been out for almost a decade now, there are many plugins in its library. Some of my favorites include:

    • PrintTimeGenuis. Which uses an algorithm that can accurately predict how long a print will take, I have used this many times, and after about a month of printing, the plugin can predict the exact time all the way down to the number of minutes a print will take.
    • Octolapse, Octolapse is a plugin that has a highly comprehensive way of taking time-lapses of your print; instead of just taking a video and speeding it up, it can tell the printer at each layer of plastic to move to a fixed point and take a picture, which ends up being similar to a stop-motion video. The amount of options you can change to take time-lapses is fantastic, and why it is a favorite of mine.

    Another valuable tool is Octoapp (android exclusive) Octoapp is a fantastic app by Chris Würthner, who made it work around Android OS. Like many other developers, Chris benefits from a subscription to the app in which the user gains more features, which with a small amount each month, is a great way to support the developer and get valuable upgrades to the app. Many plugins work inside the app, including PSUControl, MultiCam, Octoeverywhere, and many more. What I like is that the app is primarily bug-free when it comes to the interface and is definitely built with the user in mind, such as the quick switch option, pausing and canceling prints, having a swipe to confirm option.

    There are many really nifty and interesting plugins that have been made for every use case available below is a link to every plugin in Octoprint’s public repository, which is constantly being updated with new plugins.

    https://plugins.octoprint.org/by_author/

    Other links:

    Octoapp by Chris

    PrintTimeGenuis plugin by Eyal

    Octolapse plugin by Brad

    Octoprint.com

    Octoprint on Android

    The best Cura plugin for Octoprint

    Note: I am not a developer, nor am I affiliated with Octoprint by any means, just a Octoprint user who is grateful for the many developers who make 3D printing a better experience.

  • Getting Started on Unity with Meta Quest 2 in VR

    Recently I fell down another rabbit hole. And that hole is about using Unity (a game design engine) with VR. Unity by itself is very capable and also complicated for the beginning user. The way I got set up is I used a YouTuber by the name of Justin P Barnett. He made a significant update to one of his original tutorials on how to get started with Unity in VR. He has also, to this day, made excellent tutorials on other aspects of unity configuration with VR, which I highly recommend you watch as they are beneficial for beginners.

    In his video, he has you set up and install Unity and get the correct mods and assets you need to get it working with the Quest 2 controllers and headset. Overall the beginning setup progress is really relatively easy to get set up. Justin also has a free template for just automating the process of getting the quest 2 headsets to work with Unity, which he published here.

    The best way I’ve found is to use Unity with VR and not have to take off the headset every time I want to test the program. I use the oculus menu to open my desktop monitors and usually use my mouse and keyboard.

    I started a C# (pronounced “see sharp”) course on CodeCademy to get the basics of coding with Unity and took their beginner course on coding with C#. To be able to code in Unity, as it runs on C#. Then I can actually write scripts which then can be used to create interactive games.

    (please note I am a beginner with Unity and only have a couple of hours of experience as of writing this)

    And if you’re interested in getting started, a group of Youtubers (including Justin Barnett) created a game jam. A game jam is where you usually have a week or two and try to build a game based on the theme they set. Then the judges decide which game is the best based on the strongest attributes of the game, link to join below:

    https://itch.io/jam/vrjam2022

Privacy Policy