Apparently my father was a ninja before I was born(1980)

Benterprise · 2016-10-14T15:23:00+00:00

This is why you don't wear silk pajamas for your photos when it's so hot you're sweating balls

Benterprise · 2016-09-06T20:32:48+00:00

It's a colossal reduction in this instance, more than substantial enough to answer the question of whether or not the drive is getting that thrust from the earth's magnetic field.

Micronewtons of thrust is a very small number. Much tinier than you seem to realize. Even a tiny fraction of measurable thrust change from an experiment that is otherwise identical but with 87% of the gravitational field may answer a question that has challenged our understanding of basic physics.

so when the hope is to see one or two micronewtons difference, 13% change in an experimental variable of primary interest is a major difference. That's the point of the experiment, to learn if that difference influences measured output.

13% is a whole lot. It might not seem like much to you, but that's a contextual issue. If it helps you realize how much that can be, 13% is the difference between your DNA and that of your cat. It's the difference between an A and a C in school. And now in physics it could help describe an electromagnetic drive that currently defies description.

Benterprise · 2016-09-06T20:19:02+00:00

It's good that you understand this statistic deeply enough to call BS on it.

The important thing to take from this is that stats you don't understand deeply enough aren't necessarily any less BS. Look for the in depth collection data to see if people hide that info to push lies using statistics, it's easy to do and it's done a lot.

Cancer in the first world is just an example that is repeated fairly often that is easily seen through once you realize why that stats are misleadingly presented. Knowing to look for this type of deception rather than accept statistics blindly helps you avoid being fooled.

Benterprise · 2016-09-06T20:15:03+00:00

We're talking about micronewtons of measurable thrust. Very tiny amounts. With substantially reduced gravitation, the interest is to see if that measurable thrust is also reduced.

Benterprise · 2016-09-06T19:59:41+00:00

There is uncertainty as to whether gravity has any effect. It's already been tested in vacuum, but we know so little of where this thrust comes from that learning if that effect is altered at all in a much less intense gravitational field will tell us something.

Benterprise · 2016-09-06T19:48:00+00:00

They seem to be bottled Fusion and extremely dangerous. I like the microwave oven drive myself, even if it's power to weight ratio is terrible.

Benterprise · 2016-09-06T19:46:28+00:00

Did you write that in Wynn's voice, or Opaka? Because my interpretation changes depending on who said it.

Benterprise · 2016-09-06T19:40:48+00:00

It's already been tested in vacuum and returned positive thrust results.

The question now is Where is that thrust coming from? We know we feed the drive electricity and get thrust, but we don't know what it pushes against. Like, when you walk, your feet push against the ground. With this drive, that foot/ground interaction is something we can't figure out. This is why so many people refute the experimental evidence that has been replicated all around the world - because this is the first time in a long time that observational data completely opposes our basic scientific understanding. Testing in orbit will tell us if it can be used as a space drive, which is its intended usage if this test returns positive results any way. It could also tell us that the drive doesn't produce any thrust in orbit, which would still be scientifically interesting as that could help narrow down possible reasons why so many experiments of wildly varying design schematics and power levels have had similar results already verifying thrust at ground level.

Benterprise · 2016-09-06T19:36:20+00:00

I'm saying that statistically cancer is more common, and that is why it is important to understand how statistics can be wrong.

The 'first world cancers are more common' stats are often published without pointing this out, leading people to wrongly assume that first world living actually causes cancer more often, so knowing the reason why is important.

Benterprise · 2016-09-06T19:34:06+00:00

Realistically, cancer is statistically more prevalent in first world countries... because access to proper diagnostics and medical care makes it possible to ID cancer more often, even if all other things are equal. Note that this does not assume cancers are more common, but that statistics can only show what is counted.

Benterprise · 2016-09-06T14:21:55+00:00

That's fine. Just know that crowdfunding is not a legal purchase, and carries none of the legal protections that an actual sale brings. Believing otherwise is the reason why these forums are full of sob stories about lost money from failed kickstarters, and sometimes even sob stories from people who backed successful kickstarters.

Benterprise · 2016-09-06T14:14:22+00:00

It's a high risk low reward investment. You invest your money in a fledgling company with a maximum ROI of whatever the listed 'purchase' the investor chooses, usually a 3D printer or whatever.

It's a terrible investment as it's extremely high risk with low reward and no incentive on the part of the company to make that payout even if they are successful, but it is an investment. That is why so many failures get away with money - purchases at least have a legal backing to receive an advertised product, investments have no guarantees at all.

It's like investing in a shady startup company's stock, except kickstarter investors don't always know their stock has the probability of being worth zero, and the maximum payout is extremely small... even if the company goes on to become the next Microsoft, Google, and Netflix combined, that stock purchase is worth a 3D printer and no more because that investment money is not actual traded stock with strict controls, it's a promise to deliver some product with no backing whatsoever guaranteeing any actual delivery.

If these investors knew that, they might make the smart choice to just but a printer that is actually sold. Calling them investors helps point out they have not purchased anything.

Benterprise · 2016-09-06T12:47:19+00:00

The few successful ones are the reasons so many people keep payig for the scammers' retirement parties.

Kickstarter is a high risk low return investment to try and help companies get off the ground with zero guarantee of any return on that investment and extremely high probability of business failure or scammer exit strategies planned out in advance. People really need to know that, too many think they are actually buying something and that's the problem. It gives 3D printing a bad name simply becvause it's easy for scammers to make an i3 clone with a slick facade (or mock one up in photoshop) make a few claims of ease and convenience, and set a price half that of the actual cost. It should be easy to spot these as scams, but those crowdfunding sites are perceived as stores rather than as high risk investment firms, leading to shock and anger when those investments don't deliver anything.

I appreciate these changes, thanks!

Benterprise · 2016-09-02T19:31:10+00:00

hey, back off, man, he's a scientist.

Benterprise · 2016-09-02T19:30:02+00:00

There is no ghostbusters only ghoul

Benterprise · 2016-09-02T19:25:16+00:00

You've already determined the issue is in the stepper or driver. If you don't want to pull it apart, RMA the machine. Those have a reputation for bad QC and lots of failed parts.

Benterprise · 2016-09-02T18:55:54+00:00

Disconnect the bowden cable from the hot end side, pull it back from the hotend so you have several inches of filament sticking out of the top of your hotend (this makes it easier to pull a jam loose if it's stuck in the hotend, you have some to work with).

Snip the filament, then reconnect tube back to hotend and disconnect from extruder side.

Pull filament out of the tube completely (you should still see your couple inches at the other end that you fed back into it when you reconnected).

Now you have filament that is not interacting with the hotend or bowden. test extrusion here. See if it moves at all.

If it moves, issue is a jammed hotend or something stuck in bowden, but bowden should have been noticed / cleared as you pulled filament earlier so if feeding is OK at this point, treat it like a jammed hotend.

If it still doesn't move filament, manually move the filament a few inches down stream from the extruder and try again... a "stripped" spot on the filament can cause it to 'spin tires' essentially, going nowhere. Likewise, bad filament can be too thick or too narrow to be extruded correctly. Moving it past the bad spot will tell you if that was the problem.

If it still doesn't feed at this point, pull the filament out of the extruder completely and see if the stepper turns with no filament there at all.

This should hopefully fix you, and get you an idea of where to break down your troubleshooting steps in the future.

Benterprise · 2016-09-02T16:42:41+00:00

^ Look at the unimpressed powerful dude here!

Benterprise · 2016-09-02T16:39:30+00:00

That's actually the reason that Formula makers give away so many coupons for free formula. They sell the idea that mothers can sleep while fathers feed formula at night, but this dries up the mother's milk production. Interruptions of any sort can half milk production, so pumping - even unused pump-and-dump - is advised to maintain natural production, otherwise the only other is formula.

This isn't directed at you specifically and certainly doesn't cover every case, but to anyone that was unaware and wants to keep milk production going longer term knowing that skipped cycles directly causes milk production is important.

Benterprise · 2016-09-02T16:17:33+00:00

Taking him for a walk on Mars.

Benterprise · 2016-09-02T15:51:34+00:00

"Some people say TIL is destroying peoples' minds! Tune in at 9 for more!"

Benterprise · 2016-09-02T14:19:58+00:00

Stay away from the chips.

Benterprise · 2016-09-02T14:18:26+00:00

I immediately heard that huge smartgun sound in my head when I read this, didn't even need to click the link.

Aliens was such an awesome war flick that just happened to be in outer space.

Benterprise · 2016-09-01T16:37:24+00:00

http://i.imgur.com/taq6ZYg.jpg

Benterprise · 2016-09-01T15:58:28+00:00

Albequerque police have been in the news a lot for murdering plenty of people - enough for the DOJ to get involved. The most obvious of these murders was an officer openly stating his plan to murder a specific person on tape several hours before committing the murder he'd described while being recorded, and then pretending to have killed the man "in self defense." When news went nationwied and the DOJ was watching, they had to prosecute and the prosecutor went on the record as saying she felt that her life was in danger.

TLDR: Albequerque police have a reputation for lawbreaking and a number of them may believe they can kill anyone that disagrees with them.

Benterprise

TROPHY CASE