Monday morning I picked up the 3D printed base of my module and removed the support material.  It looked pretty snazzy and I was generally pleased with how it turned out.  Unfortunately, when I brought it back to my desk and tried fitting the electronics in, I realized that I had not accounted for the fact that most cables (USB, HDMI, etc) have pretty large plastic/rubber parts around the actual metal fitting.  So while I had dimensioned for the male ends of the cables, I had not considered that the plastic surrounding would have to fit through the hole as well to get the cable through the 2mm wall.  This meant that I took a trip to the maker space in CriaLab where I found a drill, a set of Dremel bits, and a small hand saw.  Using the saw I was able to cut off bits of plastic to widen the holes for the cables and then I used sandpaper Dremel bits to file down the edges, as well as to ever so slightly widen one section.  It was slow going, but by the end my pieces all fit into the 3D printed base.

The next step was making final preparations to the CAD file for the top of the module and then set it up to print.  When I took it to FreeZone, we saw that it would take 42 hours to print…oh my!  But since I needed the part, we set it to print Monday evening and I would pick it up Wednesday after lunch.  However, Tuesday Morning Allie sent me the following picture, with the caption “Your print”:

To which I responded, “You’re kidding, right?”  Allie then responded, “No, you better get down here.”  When I arrived in FreeZone I learned than not only had my print failed, but the printer had broken in the middle of the night, resulting in that black blob of plastic.  This also meant that the printer I had been using would be out of commission until a technician from the 3D printer company could come.  And so began my hunt for 3D printers across campus.

I had heard that CriaLab had a 3D printer, so I went to check it out, but unfortunately the bed size was too small for my print.  I then heard that the LabFab in the engineering building had a 3D printer, actually the same model as the one FreeZone has, so I went to the engineering building on Wednesday.  The good news is that they were able to start my print and on Friday, 34 hours later (they changed some settings to make it take less time), I picked it up.  The bad news is that either due to the settings or something with the printer, the quality of the print turned out lower and more “melty”, by which I mean the support material was much more fused to the main print body than it should have been.  Support removal next week may be interesting…

As this print was chugging along, I had also started printing the top of the module in quarters on the not-broken printer in FreeZone.  Due to the bed being ever so slightly imbalanced, the full 16cm x 16cm print would cause problems on this printer, but if I limited myself to one corner of the 3D printer, the prints turned out beautifully.  At this point I have three quarters done and will print the fourth on Monday to see how this version turns out.  Fingers crossed!

While I was trying to survive the 3D printer crisis, Juliane and Guilherme kept improving the code for the LED feedback so that it now shows the color changes Franco wants. Hopefully we can put everything together early next week!

On Saturday, at the suggestion of my boss Franco, Allie and I went to a part of the city called Moinhos de Vento (which literally means windmills).  We first walked around the park and then walked over to the main street, where we walked around and found a cafe.  As I have previously mentioned, I am in love with Brazilian hot chocolate, so of course that is what I ordered, this time with Chantilly cream.  Despite not normally liking hot chocolate, Allie decided to give it a try since I have been loving it so much.  She immediately learned that the reason she didn’t like hot chocolate was because she had just never had good hot chocolate.  Consider her life changed for the better.

Allie com Chocolate Quente

We continued walking around and checking out some of the shops until restaurants opened for dinner–or so we thought.  We chose the restaurant that we did partially because it opened at 6pm, not 7pm like most.  However, when we went to order our meal, we were informed the kitchen didn’t open until 7pm.  I guess they just expect people to sit and have a beer for an hour…so we ordered some cheese crackers and waited it out.  It seems we cannot escape the late dinner trend of Brazil.  To top off a great day, we got decadent dessert at a different restaurant one of my coworkers had recommended (I think everyone I work with is secretly plotting to get me fat–I receive restaurant recommendations almost on a daily basis).  As a self proclaimed chocoholic, my dessert was chocolate-y and delicious.  Certainly a great way to end a slightly frustrating week.

Dessert 🙂