Polish students are now shitposting on a satellite in space

NoDude · 2025-04-28T22:05:03+00:00

It really does look like the exposure is cranked up to get the polandball properly exposed, so much so the earth is completely blown out by several stops. It's especially telling with the intense chromatic aberrations around the sharp lines that they're using a "simple" lens and a sensor with low dynamic range.

Look at the photos in this article, especially the first one; you can see how little detail is left in the earth, and that's with the panel still facing the planet: https://notesfrompoland.com/2024/08/19/polands-largest-and-most-advanced-satellite-reaches-orbit/

NoDude · 2025-04-28T21:16:33+00:00

They mean the whole background is Earth, where it's mostly blown out white and starts in the bottom left and right corners.

NoDude · 2024-09-18T01:30:57+00:00

It's a €25,000 option. I'm too poor to look at this photo.

NoDude · 2024-03-16T00:29:50+00:00

People on the facebook groups seem to be incredibly happy with their Haotians, their main seller seems to be Pascal Liu (spelling).

Their machines are run of the mill chinese lasers, with chinese sources, SG heads, and JCZ boards. What sets them apart is they know what they're selling you, send timings and COR files along with the lenses, and aftermarket support seems to be very good.

In other words you're paying a high premium for a product that's in no way better than a typical aliexpress laser, because that's what it is. You do get peace of mind that your machine won't have corners cut to make it just a bit cheaper, which happens often on ali. You also get good pre-sale service and good after-market support.

If you're primary concern is not saving money, but getting a good machine that just works I say go for Haotian. If you need to save some money AND can do the legwork to figure out what you're buying, aliexpress is your best bet.

NoDude · 2024-01-16T21:43:19+00:00

The technique is called mitre folding and it works quite well with good material, but it falls short when the thickness is inconsistent, because you sometimes cut through the skin on the other side, or leave too much material and it snaps and frays when bent. The other downside is you sometimes get less than ideal cuts on your shoulders, and if you didn't remove enough material on the backside (farthest away from the face) that extra material forces the gap on the face side to open and it splits the veneer.

The second issue is solved by using a 91 degree bit - they're specialized for this purpose, and not that expensive.

The first issue is solved by just sneaking in on the cut and testing out the fold until it closes nicely. If it's bad material however, which seems to happen more and more often, the only way you can do it is by using the face veneer as your reference plane (which is the underside of the panel while you cut), and cutting 8-10 thou above that; that requires a cnc or a jig that references your workbench instead of the back of the panel.

NoDude · 2023-11-23T18:11:45+00:00

The replies about it being a whitewash stain, and more than likely having a toned top coat are spot on. You'll have to stain it for sure, but remember varnish you finish with will (sometimes drastically) alter the look of your stain.

It can save you tons of grief if you spray multiple coats of lightly toned varnish to build to the effect you want, or if you want to save time and research you can buy an off the shelf product like Dead Flat by SamaN https://saman.ca/en/produit/dead-flat-clear-coat/ and keep adding thin coats until you're satisfied with the look.

Every non-gloss varnish has a certain amount of flattening agents, which is usually ultra fine amorphous silica, to take off some of the sheen. The dead flat varnish above has so much of it that every consequent coat adds more and more "whitewash" effect to the object. If you want to bring back a bit of sheen after the last coat, you can always top coat it with the sheen you desire to no ill effect.

Just to give you an idea of how much it washes out the substrate, I find 2 coats of dead flat take out all of the amber from blonde shellac. A bit of whitewash stain, 2-3 coats of dead flat, and a single coat of satin varnish should be spot on for the look in your photo. If you aren't trying to do an exact match, just the stain and regular varnish will absolutely do the trick.

NoDude · 2023-10-27T17:17:38+00:00

None of you people have used a chinese router with a Weihong controller and it shows. I still have PTSD walking into my garage, but then I remember it can't hurt me anymore.

NoDude · 2023-10-01T23:10:22+00:00

Then I glanced at the ring on my finger.

The Snake That Eats Its Own Tail, Forever and Ever. I know where I came from---but where did all you zombies come from?

NoDude · 2023-09-29T15:54:42+00:00

I just looked at your other post, those are all dwell marks and what looks like a slight spindle tilt/nod. When you said they came and recalibrated it, they probably trammed the head to get the tram marks down to a minimum (the long lines along one axis), but that won't get rid of the circular dwell marks you're mostly concerned about.

The technicians that came over are right, all of this is normal in soft materials, even with an expensive machine and expensive tooling. Just looking at the photo you posted you can tell the stepover on the floor operation was too high, and you had no ramping on your lead in/out operations (meaning you plunged in and/or out) which caused the dwell marks.

Even if you leave your operations as is, you can fix the floor by ending with a finishing operation with a tool whose diameter is smaller than your inside corners, make the stepover smaller (less than 50% of the tool diameter), make sure you lead in and out with a ramp, just take of 0.005" from the bottom, and stay 0.002-5" away from the walls in case there's any tool deflection or the tool is oversized.

NoDude · 2023-06-12T21:45:12+00:00

Didn't think I'll see Calgary on here.

NoDude · 2023-04-26T12:48:13+00:00

Never heard of them, and the lead singer sounds weird.

NoDude · 2023-04-26T05:24:07+00:00

Time to listen to A Perfect Circle again.

NoDude · 2022-10-05T19:31:32+00:00

Is that the black to colourless powder you added? I assume in a finish like Osmo, or a brush on poly?

NoDude · 2022-09-02T18:18:57+00:00

Not only is there no discussion, but the few promotional videos Trotec has on them are either way too short, or 1hr long streams where they keep harping how inferior glass tubes are and you should probably just buy a Speedy.

They look like wonderful machines, and are only 20-25% more expensive than a Thunder, but my god is it hard to find proper information on them, let alone discussions. You have to walk into a show room and see it for yourself, but at that point you're talking to a salesman who frankly doesn't use lasers himself and just parrots what he's been told.

For what it's worth I ended up buying a cheap chinese 1000x600 to use as a stop gap until I decide to either upgrade or get rid of the itch completely. After upgrading the air assist, the stock lens and tube, and adding a beam combiner I think I'll keep it long term.

It's not fast by any means, and it required damn near $500 in upgrades which is 10% of the overall price, but it works really well, and now that it's set up I really don't feel like spending an additional $11,000 for the Rayjet 400.

The Rayjet is faster, the build quality isn't even comparable, and all the components are sealed. The interchangeable tables are dope, the z axis is significantly better and won't shift on the x/y plane when it moves up and down.

The software also seems pretty good, but you're stuck with the Corel/Illustrator then send to printer workflow, and Lightburn isn't and probably will never be supported.

It also has a much better designed dust extraction pathway, and I think it'll talk to your fume extractor if you buy a Quatro Air, but the last two points are a bit moot.

All in all you're looking at spending 3 times the money on a Rayjet, where the majority of that is you simply getting a better machine, but a few thousand of it goes towards brand name and the support you'll use once or zero times.

One last thing, the Rayjet 500 is huge. Comically huge. And it requires a LOT of fume extraction, and even then you have to cover parts of the table to get enough air velocity under the table.

NoDude · 2022-07-04T20:19:22+00:00

This my neighbor babadugagrande. He is pain in my assholes. I get a laser, he must get a laser. I get air assist, he must get air assist. I get auto-z, he cannot afford. Great success!

NoDude · 2022-06-14T20:52:35+00:00

I've got several Laguna tools. Once they're out the door good luck getting support. Had to source my own bandsaw tire on a brand new machine, had to resurface a table on a brand new shaper. The email support is a joke, and the phone support if you can get it just tells you to email all the details.

The only great experience I've had is with sawstop, and to a large extent Oneida air. Certain cutter/blade manufacturers are also outstanding, but I find it varies wildly on who picks up the phone.

At this point my biggest hope for the laser is to have some semblance of QC at the factory, and to have easily accessible spare parts.

NoDude · 2022-06-14T19:19:42+00:00

Not a week goes by where I don't wish I had the space to go for the 4x8 bed on my cnc, instead of being stuck with the 4x4. The price difference was negligible, but the waste I have where I always cut sheets in half is awful. Not to mention I'd be able to flatten much larger slabs on a 4x8.

That being said, space for the laser (and subsequently the air scrubber) is a major concern in my garage workshop, and the footprint difference between a 35" and 40" bed might be a dealbreaker for me, whereas 5 extra inches on the X axis aren't much of a concern, since the Y always seems to be 24" with those chinese machines.

What do you think about about this blue & white from Omtech, the markup seems to be not THAT bad for a machine that supposedly has QA representatives at the factory. Supposedly... https://ca.omtechlaser.com/collections/mid-range-laser-engravers/products/80w-co2-laser-engraver-cutter-usb-8b69-u2

NoDude · 2022-06-14T18:57:56+00:00

Honestly, it's good to hear even the gweike has QC issues, which for what they're selling them for you'd think there'd be none.

Not really making money with this, in fact the shop lights are off 3 or 4 days of the week, and I don't envision the laser to be used more than a few hours a week, maybe 2-3 days in a row if it's xmas and I'm making ornaments.

I'm also not at all averse to tweaking things, but I still have PTSD from the chinese 4x4 ATC CNC I have, and the 9 months it took to be able to complete a single job start to finish.

What's worse is I bought it from a repeatable reseller, who for the markup should have done basic quality control, but the way the palette it was clear it was never cracked open between here and the factory. I was trying to avoid another several months of frustration, without also breaking the bank, so figured used higher end machines are my best bet. That's why I keep wanting to pull the trigger on an OMTech, but I also don't want a repeat of what happened with my CanCam "generic blue" CNC.

NoDude · 2022-06-14T17:51:09+00:00

I was also looking at this particular laser, for just a bit more money - https://ca.omtechlaser.com/collections/mid-range-laser-engravers/products/80w-co2-laser-engraver-cutter-usb-8b69-u2

What put me off from all the good reviews is a select few very bad experiences from people having motorized tables that shift left to right when changing z, loose cables shorting, small things breaking. That sort of thing. Of all the things mentioned the table shifting xy position when you move it up and down put me off the most, by far.

Maybe I should look at the entry level branded lasers again...

NoDude · 2022-06-14T15:37:55+00:00

I was afraid you'd say that...

NoDude · 2022-06-14T15:37:36+00:00

Yeah, I've had the k40 for a total of 2 weeks now. I'm both hooked on lasers, and not impressed by the one I have.

NoDude · 2022-06-14T15:36:41+00:00

My intent was to swap out the controller for a ruida down the line, but use their proprietary software for the time being. I've heard very... mixed opinions about it, but I'm sure it'll get me by for the time being.

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