Wednesday, February 20, 2013

Excuse me sir, your voxels are showing.

This occurred to me today, as I listened to a podcast at my day job, and the word "voxel" was mentioned, and explained to someone on the show.

Let's play a game.

pixel --> "picture element"
voxel --> "volumetric pixel" or "volumetric picture element"

But 2-dimensional  is to picture as 3-dimensional is to .....volumetric picture?

That just doesn't feel right. Imagine saying, "Hey Sven, that's a nice volumetric picture of The Battle of Gettysburg you built in your dining room, how did you get your wife to agree to that?".

I submit that 2D is to picture as 3D is to model. I don't remember what I got on my verbal SAT, other than it was respectable, and surprising to linguistically challenged dude like myself, but I think that would pass as a feasible answer.

I'd like to propose that henceforth, a three-dimensional counterpart to the pixel be known as a moxel, "model element".

They don't call me Pedantite for nothin'

--P

[UPDATE] After they read this post, ETS contacted me to inform me they are retroactively reducing my verbal SAT score.


Wednesday, February 13, 2013

Milling Hotend Nozzle Mount

How's *that* for a racy post title!

My Zen CNC is fairly usable now, so I've turn my attention to getting the 3D printer functionality. One glaring task is how to mount the nozzle to the extruder. You know what they say, the 7th time's a charm:

I'm not 100% sure that the most recent one will work, either. But I did actually have a lot of fun designing and figuring out how to design and mill parts. The parts above are ordered chronologically from left to right. #5 and #6 were milled using a cheapo 1/8" "Roto-zip" bit, since I was worried about the wear and tear on my one and only carbide end mill. I also experimented with various feed rates. #5 was milled at 1000mm / minute horizontal feed rate, with the cheap bit. I could actually see the bit flex as it moved.

The result was not pretty, you can see how bad it looks. I also think the bit was probaly not the appropriate shape for the job, cheapness aside.

I'm pretty pleased with the final one:

Ugg, what's up with the shadow? Would it kill me to take a decent picture?

The "burrs" on the edges are non-structural, and rub off with your fingernail, I believe its just an artifact of MDF.

--P