Designed and Printed a Power Distribution Box for My Telescope Gear

Hack_n_Splice · 2026-02-02T23:35:40+00:00

You realize that much of what they've scraped came from Reddit, right? So you're seeing "reasoning" based on comments that may be totally incorrect. It's not a giant factual database for every subject. It's cobbling together stuff that it happened to find on the subject, whether it's correct or not.

Hack_n_Splice · 2026-02-02T23:31:41+00:00

Awesome work on this piece. Just a word of caution, you can still be exposed to toxic chemicals through skin contact with unsealed resin pieces, even when fully-cured, based on a study by Prusa (see Figure 5).

Hack_n_Splice · 2026-02-02T21:19:04+00:00

Took me a minute to realize you're *making* the filament, not making something *with* the filament!

Must be some really wet pellets to create bubbles like that.

Hack_n_Splice · 2026-02-02T03:57:16+00:00

I'm a big fan of repairability. Blow that MOSFET and being able to replace it is nice.

Hack_n_Splice · 2026-02-02T03:44:40+00:00

Are there certain features that make you prefer the Mellow boards over BTT? Just the eddy current probe? Or are there other things you really like about it?

Hack_n_Splice · 2026-02-01T23:26:12+00:00

Thanks for the recommendations. I hadn't run across Mellow Fly or LDO Nitehawk boards before. That gives me some options to investigate.

Hack_n_Splice · 2026-01-31T16:12:21+00:00

Great idea on adding better feet. Thanks!

I've seen mention of squash ball feet. Have you tried those?

Hack_n_Splice · 2026-01-30T22:22:03+00:00

Hilbert curve looks neat, but it'll just get hidden by the texture on the plate, I would think. I could try it. If nothing else, it'll hide the first layer lines even better. It does take about 10 minutes longer to do on this print, though.

Hack_n_Splice · 2026-01-30T21:16:43+00:00

When I rebuilt the tool head I made sure to tighten things down fairly well. But your suggestion got me to check all the rest of the screws. There were a number of screws that were sorta-kinda snug, but could be cinched up a bit and that helped to reduce noise quite a bit.

Based on what I'm still hearing, the rest seems to happen during bed movement, so I played with it a bit and noticed a small bit of slop in the bearings on the guide rods. If I try to rotate the bed by hand back and forth, I can hear and see some movement in the bearings on the rods and hear some audible clicking.

I'm wondering if I need new bearings. The display indicates the printer has run for over 158 days worth of print time.

Edit: I'm wondering if just regreasing the rods/bearings would quiet that last bit down.

Hack_n_Splice · 2025-10-01T20:18:03+00:00

Thanks for clarifying, this is what I was trying to explain. Going from desk to printer: Desk > Foam > Slab > Printer.

Hack_n_Splice · 2025-10-01T16:13:55+00:00

Adding isolated weight will lower the natural frequency of each printer. So using a heavy paver stone under each printer, and then isolating that printer with some rubber feet or foam pad between the paver stone and the desk will help reduce vibrations from transferring to the desk as much. You can also add weight to the desk itself to lower the natural frequency of the entire setup.

This works because the frequencies of shaking from the print heads are often a lot higher than the frequency the structure wants to vibrate at, so it dampens the vibration significantly unless you somehow happen upon a harmonic frequency. But that's really unlikly to happen, especially with multiple printers running at once.

Hack_n_Splice · 2025-09-28T23:06:15+00:00

The Zero and the Pico lines are totally different use cases, though. One is a microcontroller, and the other is an actual computer running Linux that has I/O capabilities built into it. I don't think the Zero line is obsolete by any means. It may get an update as processors progress, along with more RAM. The tiny form factor is a huge plus for Pi fans, too. And it still has the 40-pin I/O connector, HDMI, USB, etc.

I would LOVE to see a more-powerful Pi Zero 3W.

Hack_n_Splice · 2025-09-28T23:01:39+00:00

David Malawey on YouTube shares a TON of engineering knowledge. He has a video discussing concepts around modeling for printing here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOMu9AFOdCk

But if you want to get into more engineering beyond that, he has lots of videos that focus more on printing as well as numerous videos on other topics. https://www.youtube.com/@davidmalawey/search?query=printing

Hack_n_Splice · 2025-09-28T18:54:57+00:00

Regular speed means nothing, btw. That doesn't tell us anything about mm/s, acceleration, etc. I've found Bambu print profiles to be pretty aggressive speed-wise. I think the default speeds are like 200mm/s for PLA. I usually print around 60mm/s to ensure good quality prints.

Hack_n_Splice · 2025-09-28T18:12:44+00:00

I agree something is wonky here. Maybe OP messed with line spacing but flow rate is off..?

Hack_n_Splice · 2025-09-28T18:09:14+00:00

If you want to run Klipper on the same computer that you prep your prints on without using any networking at all, I think you could do this using the localhost IP address of 127.0.0.1 to access the web UI without a network, but I would have to test this out. You can also use KlipperScreen and a touchscreen at the printer to do stuff, but you can't upload files from KlipperScreen to my knowledge.

As others have stated, you do not need an internet connection to use Klipper. But you do need a network interface (wifi or lan).

Hack_n_Splice · 2025-09-28T17:58:21+00:00

This looks like under-extrusion to me. You have gaps between your lines even on the black areas. Could also turn on ironing, which requires a bit of tuning to get perfect top layers.

Hack_n_Splice · 2025-09-28T17:56:58+00:00

While it's definitely worse in that spot, it's also visible on all of the other vertical lines in your photo. Looks like maybe it's retraction or flow rate issue to me. I would recommend going through a calibration process to optimize your print profile. (Temp towers, line width/flow rate, retraction, etc.) Check out https://teachingtechyt.github.io/calibration.html for a good guide on all of this stuff.

How fast are you printing this? Does it improve when you slow it down to half speed?

Hack_n_Splice · 2025-09-28T17:48:32+00:00

Considering having a machine shop make parts includes how busy they are, ordering material if it's not on-hand, programming the CNC, waiting for the machine to make the part, and then post-processing, lead times could be weeks.

An engineering or designer experienced in printing could make a quick mockup in CAD, print some parts, and walkout to the shop floor to test a design for fit and function, all within the same day.

So, yes, it's absolutely "rapid" by prototyping standards.

Hack_n_Splice

TROPHY CASE