I was fortunate enough to retire when I wanted to with no debt. My wife and I both have our hobbies and enough income to support them. Mine has become 3D printing. I have a lot of contacts in 3D printing and computers. I do not make any money from my hobbies, but try to keep the expenses under control (somewhat). I find companies that are passionate in making and supporting their products and support them, not all agree with their business and prices, but I’m willing to pay a fair price for a superior product. I am a Patreon to many you-tube channels and enjoy having contacts with them. That’s why I enjoy this group, a bunch of people who like to share their ideas and experiences. I was very fortunate to see Chis Riley this past week and see his basement, he has a great you-tube channel also - just like Dr. Vax. https://www.youtube.com/c/ChrisRiley/videos
I’ve watched some of his videos. If it wasn’t for youtube I wouldn’t know how to run my Ender 3 pro to make anything.
He is a great guy. Chris lives 3 miles from me. That’s why I have a year old Ender 5 that has never been used. We made a swap and that’s what I got. He must have 50-75 printers in his basement and is running out of room. I like sticking with one printer brand and making mods that I can use on all of them. For whatever reason I got into the Ender 5 and like the platform, it provides a lot of possibilities. I just finished installing the Exoslide on the 5 Plus and am very impressed on the movement and smoothness. I may get one for the new Ender 5 and see how it works.
I’m curious as to what you like to print. with so many machines running you could soon run out of room like I do with just one printer. I have to give most of my stuff away to friends.
Yes the Ender 5s looks very smooth compared to my enfrt 3 pro.
Good morning. I have been printing mostly parts for the printers, I have made so many mods using parts that I have modified or designed. It usually takes a number of iterations before they are even close to working. My wife also likes to browse Thingiverse and gives me ideas on projects she would like printed. We will have 4 grandchildren after today (one is being born now) and lots of neighbor kids. I printed over 1000 face shields during the pandemic and donated to a local group who completed them.
Funny, five printers and only print parts for them.
It is time to grow ideas on makes and not on the next printer. 
I currently have two main printers: One for ABS and one for overall printing stuff and they get hardly turned on, until I find a part to design and print. The third is still somewhat unfinished and the pile of stuff for it is growing as I need the build volume for them. So the other printer mainly print printer parts, too, but they are all for design and prototyping stuff.
In fact the ANet A8 is unchanged for about 2 years now. The TronXY X5 was unchanged for about 1,5 years now until recently when I upgraded my camera mount, broke and fixed the display mount, added a raspberry pi case and replaced the stock part cooling by an UFO nose cooling duct I designed.
In between those years I did tons of projects. Partly printing thingiverse stuff, but I also try to keep it even with the amount of parts I designed myself to keep the printer as a tool and not a “fancy item delivery apparatus”
Oh c’mon Dave, when R U gonna finally get around to printing really practical, useful things (ROTFLMAO :D)??
Which, BTW, reminds me of something you might want to print for kids living near you (if you haven’t already): [U]https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:950452[/U]
The bubble machine was very cute. I printed some cell phones for my neighbors who are 7 and 4 and a lot of multicolor prints [ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“large”,“data-attachmentid”:5053}[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“large”,“data-attachmentid”:5054}[/ATTACH]
Actually I get a net positive by giving things to my friends. I did did the Cat Bus and the Totoro family for the niece and nephew of my daughters husband and I guess they loved them. I make lithophanes and lamps for my daughter and will do more for friends eventually, I may even keep one or two for myself.
This is what I like about this hobby, the things you can do are only limited by your imagination. With all of the you-tube channels and Thingiverse and the other design sites you can never run out of projects. Plus we all get to talk.
I need to get some more inspiration. I would relly enjoy learning more 3d modeling but my damaged brain won’t let me concentrate most days. I love reading what you guys are doing.
What got me started was taking a design from Thingiverse and dropping it into Tinercad to make small mods. It is really easy, now I have some Tinkercad designs that are a total mess. One of my next goals is to learn FreeCad, I need something more powerful than Tinkercad, but it is great to get started or a quick mod. Here is one of my terrible mess designs, but it works [ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“large”,“data-attachmentid”:5064}[/ATTACH]
The printed part in clear PETG
[ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“none”,“data-size”:“full”,“title”:“tk 2.jpg”,“data-attachmentid”:5065}[/ATTACH]
I’m taking baby steps through Tinkercad and have had some successes with simple things. Actually I bought a 3d printer to combat the challenges I have to my concentration. I guess as some say it could be old age as I turned 76 this month but I have had this problem since I was hit by lighting again 21 years ago. My frontal lobe is severely damaged but I can still speak three languages fluently and fake a few others. Many things I used to do are very difficult now.
I’m only 69, but still have some of the same problems. I do well staying inside and not communicating in person If I follow your statement that you were hit by lightning again at 21, you were hit before that age? You should be in Guiness - being hit twice and still alive, congratulations. I can barely speak English some days.
21 years ago, 1999. I was hit in 1972 on the Island of St. Lucia but I was ok 15 minutes later as was the other guy that was struck. I nearly goy hit when I was 15 golfing with my friends. A cloud came over and our hair stood on end like in the cartoons but we ran like mad for the club house and didn’t get hit. Both times I was hit I was inside od buildings.
You are a very fortunate person. Good luck with the printing. I’m sure we will talk soon
I’m sure we will.
Well Dave, there are people who’ve been hit by lightning a number of times. There’s the story of “The Human Lightning Rod”, Roy Sullivan: [U]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_Sullivan[/U] for example. Our friend @roon4660 seems to have suffered more from his hits than did Roy.
The difference between him and me is that he was living way up in a fire watch tower that was a natural draw for lightning. I was inside buildings.
Cheers