3-D printing checklist for the Any Cubic Mono-X

 I am writing this up to help keep useful tips and items in one area for folks to checkout.

These are things that I have found to be incredibly useful or absolutely necessary.  I am not going to directly link these as I don't want to have to update dead links and I'm not trying to get a commission on sales of these items.

Consumables:

Resin: This will be a post all by itself.

Disposable Gloves.  all the UV resins are said to be skin irritants plus chemicals used in clean up are not exactly skin friendly.

Paper Towels.     

FEP Replacements:

Order 2 you don't want to be waiting on a back order to finish a project.  FEP will wear out and eventually develop a hole.  I recommend these nFEP they are more expensive  however they seem to last longer and release easier allowing for smaller supports on my prints.

LCD Screen Protectors: 

The Mono-X does not have anything between the FEP and the screen. If/when your FEP develops a hole resin will leak onto thee screen and you will probably destroy your screen trying to clean it up.  As of the date of this article, replacement screens run around $180.00 USD and have a very long lead time.  I have been using these from the beginning.  They have not effected my prints, small air bubbles between the screen and protector have not caused any issues in my prints.  

Kapton Tape:

Use this around the edges of the screen protector to add an additional level of protection from resin leaking between the screen and shield.  Kapton does not leave residue and is high heat resistant.

Alchohol:

99% Isopropyl Alcohol or Denatured Alcohol.  With a raging pandemic IPA has gotten expensive add a new demand from every type of hobbyist needing it for print clean up and you get  massive increases in cost and limited availability.  Denatured Alcohol is a great option as it works just as well and its much cheaper.  I buy mine at Lowes in 1 gallon metal cans.  As you clean you prints your alcohol is gonna get dirty. There will be a post on ways to recycle it or at least dispose of it properly.

Filters:

Occasionally you are gonna need to to clean the resin vat, pour the resin trough a filter back into a resin bottle.  The filter will catch any bits of cured resin in the vat.  These will also be useful in filtering big bits out of your used alcohol.  This set came with a silicone funnel, its nice because you can set it in the sun to cure any resin and then it just pops right off.

One time purchases:

Giant Cookie Sheet:

These are huge and are great for catching any spills, leaks, accidents, etc. I have one under my printer, and one in used in my work area for removing prints from the build plate.

Giant Silicone Mat.

UV resin will peel right off of these when cured. When mine gets messy I take it outside, let the sun cure the resin and flex the mat to pop off the resin bits.  Plus it adds a little bit of cushioning to dropped prints as they come off the build plate.

Silicone Brush:

I find these to be great for stirring a vat that has set for a while between prints or for feeling the FEP to see if any thing is stuck to it after a failed print.

 

Wash and Cure Station:

You could try to put together a homemade UV cure box, or leave the prints in the sun.  You can use all kinds of things to hold alcohol while trying to clean your prints, pickle jars ultrasonic cleaners, etc.  I've tried those things and found this to be a better and safer choice.  Anycubic will be releasing a larger model soon

Other useful things:

Space heater, your resin and room the printer is in needs to be warm, cold resin fails often.

Digital Scale, Useful if you ever start mixing resin types or colors

Plastic Razors, good for removing cured resin from surfaces with little or no damage to the surface.

Digital Calipers, I use these all the time, checking prints.

UV flashlight, this one came from Wal-Mart, great for spot curing resin, or using resin as a glue between two printed parts.

Squeeze wash bottles, having clean IPA or water nearby and convenient is a huge help. 

Small USB powered fans, Once I clean a print I set it between a couple of these fans to rapidly remove the alcohol before I UV cure.

Work Station Lights:  

I included these because I have found them to be great for my work table and the light they put out does not cure the resin, I have replaced the overhead light bulb in my room as well and I do not get any unwanted cuing of exposed resin.  My workshop is in a basement room with no windows so I have completely eliminated unwanted UV exposure.

I may be resurrecting this thing.

 Big plans perhaps?  I hope to clean up the dead links, repost pics that are lost, and add some tutorial content.  Let's see how Covid-19 schedule changes and ADHD affect these plans.

40K is dead, long live the new 40K

The sky has fallen and everyone is all hot and bothered about the new daemon factory psychic phase.  Everyone is crying that their favorite Deathstar is nerfed or that they lost Jaws of the World Wolf, etc.

I give you one of the new Deathstars.

Along with the just released FAQ:

There you have it, 5-10 FarSeers that do NOT suffer Perils of the Warp.  There is no restriction that disallows Jetbikes.  They will successfully cast Invisibility along with a handful of other spells.

From your Main force take an Autarch on a jetbike for grenades and other goodies, and to kick it up a notch consider giving one of this unit's FarSeers the Mantle of the Laughing God. for Stealth & Shrouded plus Hit & Run.  You can add rune of warding to each FarSeer for a 10 points each to get 5(or more) one shot +2 buffs to deny the witch. Fully loaded the Farseers are 130 points each plus 40 points for the Mantle, so yes its a minimum of 690 points for just the 5 dudes.

Now this list should not win you any friends, but it is far more cost effective ( in terms of real money) than buying a shipping container full of daemons.

Forgeworld Hornets Arrive

New Arrivals

So I got a package of goodies in the mail today and quickly assembled 3 Eldar Hornets.  These are the best sculpts and best casts I have ever got.  The mold lines were minimal, there was no warpage other than a few of the gun barrels.  I have never had a Forgeworld kit go together so easily.  

Here Unassembled.

Nice little heat sealed baggies!

Now some of you might be saying, hey FW uses printed ziplock baggies.  You would be right. They also have never sent me anything this well cast.  FW has a habit of using molds well past the point at which they should have been replaced. As well as pulling casts before the model has completely cured.  These suffer from none of those issues.

Move over jetbike hoard fresh new resin from a distant land that has no IP laws has arrived.  

Neverness happens to work with me in the real world, he jokingly suggested that working in an environment where your overseers may be armed with AK-47s might contribute to the quality of the product.

Sadly the company I would like to buy these from does not respect its customers and have driven the costs of its product up while allowing the quality to suffer. When you allow this to happen you open the door to others that will offer better quality at a better price.

Size comparison against a standard Eldar Falcon

Also in the box a Revenant titan with pulsars.  It to is a very well cast kit, and shall be gracing this blog over the next few posts.

I spoke to the supplier of these kits and he is ok with me listing his contact info.  He has worked in the States and speaks English.  I got these in the mail within 10 days of paying for them.  For my order it worked out to about one third of the cost vs ordering from the UK.

If you want to find out more email wargames.discount@gmail.com and tell him that the Warfrog sent you.

FW Lynx Conversion

Follow up on a previous post where I repaired some minor issues.

After looking at how the cannon assembly works on the standard Lynx I realized that a hull brace like the FW Cobra would be a great modification.

Stock photo from FW's site, showing mount style I am hoping to build.

Here you can see where I have ground down the existing hull and added in a piece of plastic card to form the mount.

Here the Gun has bee glued into place and is resting on the mount strut.

Here the mount has been melted with a heat gun and wrapped up around the barrel.

Here the mount ring has been completed 100% around the barrel using Pro-Create.
















Now the cannon barrel will stay secure in while transporting the model, and the barrel wont droop under its own weight.

Some final sanding and details will follow shortly.

Bring on 7th Ed

So I spent the weekend working on some FW models getting ready for no FOC lists.

Very happy with this kit. like most FW it will look great on the shelf.  Maybe FW will see more table time in 7th.  I have a hard time making a 6th list including this because of the current D-strength rules.

I say this was prepping for unbound glory and spam but truth is I have a few models lying around that needed work done to make it to shelves.


The Warp Hunter on the other hand Fits nicely into 6th.  I like the 36 inch barrage, and it seems a little toned down compared to the 24 barrage range from the support weapons.

One of these is not like the others, is it real or is it a recast?

Again round 2 of is it real or is it a recast.

Hopefully I will get these 50 or so Eldar guardian jetbikes based and primed along with the FW Lynx repair and conversion in the next post or two.

Resin Model Repair

So I have been working on a few ForgeWorld or possibly FW knockoffs in an attempt to catch up on my backlog of unassembled models.

Eldar Lynx partially assembled












Repair needed

Here you can see the white area just lower and left of the cockpit.











There was a small break here and I did not have the piece that broke off.  I used a very thin piece of plastic card (from a yardsale sign) I glued it to the underside and trimmed it to fit the old curve of the piece.

I then dropped a few drops of superglue onto the piece, followed up with sprinkling baking soda on the glue.  The baking soda makes the glue cure almost instantly, and when it dries you can sand it.  It it much harder than GreenStuff.  Making it ideal for this fix.

Other fixes needed too.

3 different areas needed repairs here.












1 The engine cover got snapped off, I reinforced it from below with thin plasticard.
2 The engine cover and stabilizer seen far right had broken in transit.  I rebuilt the cowl using thin plasticard from underneath and using ProCreate grey putty on the visible side of the model.
3 The white half of the stabilizer mount is thick plasticard cut and sanded to fit the original missing piece.

Warpage

The barrel of the gun was significantly warped.

I glues a magnet to the mounting end and hung it from my work bench.  Then I used the heat gun to soften the resin and bend it back into shape.  Because it was hanging gravity helped keep it straight while the resin cooled.