ANYCUBIC wash and cure station/hurry up and wait

 

A number of months ago I bought an Anycubic wash station. I think it was on sale for $130. If you read my blog you know that I purchased a Phrozen 4K to try and print some jewelry pieces. While messy it is a great printer.  It has its quirks but for the resolution and price it is hard to beat. As far as I can tell it's direct competition is the Anycubic Photon. While being a lot cheaper but it doesn't come close to the resolution I need for 3D printing parts that require stone setting or fine texture. So when I was shopping around the Phrozen was the one I landed on.  

Now that the studio is all setup I can start setting up my print area again. So far everything with the wash station seems to be working well. It seemed to be packed well. It comes with a couple accessories specific to the Anycubic photon (I will skip those). There is what I will call the "dangler" which allows you to take the platter off the Photon and put it right in the wash station....which is great but unfortunately doesn't fit the screw for the Phorzen platter. I will probably just file it to fit. There is also a dunk basket for larger parts (which will I probably use more often than the dangler until I figure out the dangler) 

From what I can tell it is just a magnetic stir station with a propeller in the bottom of the container. If you take the container out you can put in a small platter that rotates slowly to cure your part. It looks to all be anodized aluminum with parts that neatly nest into place.

So far this is what I like:

• Small foot print: I am printing jewelry so it is perfect size
• You can rinse and cure at the same time: It does one thing at a time. No chance of messing it up
• The cure station will not work if the shroud it off: you wont accidentally zap yourself with UV rays. 
• It is about the same size as the Phorzen 4K: which means the lunch trays that I bought from Amazon will fit under both just incase something leaks when I am not around.

Things I don't like:

• I can't use it yet because there is a shortage of IPA 
• It is a lot of IPA: It is 3500 ml that is almost a gallon of IPA just hanging out
• It came with a spare bearing :This makes me think that might be a problem in the future (maybe this is a pro?)

So there is no happy ending currently.  I don't have a place that I can source IPA.  If anyone has used something else to clean resin parts successfully, please let me know.  Once I start printing (which will be very soon) and find some IPA. I will circle back and post the results. Also I need to buy some gloves and paper towels to process the prints. Who would have thought that a virus would bring resin printing to its knees!

SendCutSend

So Liz and I are piloting a new laser cutting service.  As you may recall I was using another company based out of Barcelona! I loved them but the shipping takes a bit. So lately we have been using SendCutSent So far they have been great and I have been very happy with their parts. My only complaint is that the polished stainless is so polished the final product is hard to photograph as it picks up all the fingerprints.  

  As you can see below I have been making these production earrings for a while now.  I am starting to get organized in the new studio and I have the fusion welder setup (I finally organized all of earring findings) .  This will make short work of welding on the earring backs! I am about to update some inventory on the site www.arthurhash.com so check back soon.  Also a portion of all sales will go to a charity of my choosing (probably to help the world heal in one way or another! We need it right now!)

I would highly recommend SendCutSend for any laser cutting project.  I actually need some new house numbers and some panels for the soldering station so I will be placing another order soon!

I am adding new updated images of the studio at the end of the post! Also Liz bought me a canoe as an early birthday prezzy!  Stoked to take it out on the water! 

 

O-rings and flowers

Since our last day of camping got rained out we decided to go out on an adventure.  Again, in our attempt to source our veggies locally we found a farm that has a "pick your own" policy and flowers were in season!  You basically get a mason jar and for one price you fit as many as you can in the jar. Much like our lavender picking adventure it was fun to be outside "harvesting" our own. It provided some inspiration for Liz's work (lots of flowers if you haven't seen it!) We also went for a short hike on a birdwatching trail. 

More workshops and camping!

Soon. I will be offering more Rhino workshops through the Bench here in good Old Rhody Rhode Island!  We are finally getting around to doing a Nerd hangout session (more news on that later).  This last week Liz and I took a couple days off of work to go glamping (I guess camping at a camp site is not real camping, according to Liz) 

The last time we went camping was about ten years ago.  We just packed all of our camping gear that we dutifully organized from our last trip not realizing that we were missing come crucial components like something the make coffee with, a frying pan or a tent big enough for two grown ass adults. Liz said: " the best thing about camping is the problem solving!"  I think I agree with her.  

I have included some highlights from the trip:

• Me being impatient with the coffee apparatus Liz cobbled together
• Cooking everything on a sheet-pan because we forgot our frying pan
• Suffering through the kid size tent we brought
• Our double dog bun situation
• The surprisingly empty Narraganset beach! (whoop whoop private beach party!)
• Whale bones
• Beers at the Whalers brewery (again no one was there! whoop whoop)
• And our fancy campsite (with RVs in the background)

While were there we went to the local museum which was mind blowing. It looked to have a fully functioning type setting studio including a type casting machine?  Also you could eat off the machines.  As far as I could tell they didn't have AC or heat so I am not exactly sure how they kept all these machines from rusting into the ground so I concluded they actually use all this stuff! I desperately wanted to see it all going.  With Covid the place was empty and all the windows and doors were open and the tours were self guided. They also had a blacksmithing shop but it was obviously staged and not in use. Unlike a letter press studio I can recognize when a metal studio is not in use.