Home Automation with Home Assistant and ESP8266, 3D Printing, and other Technology
It’s been a while since I have posted, but someone on Reddit asked me about my Android widget that shows information from my 3D printers. This will be a quick write up to point you in the right direction, so I won’t have step by step instructions. Keep in mind that this only works when your phone can actually connect to Moonraker. So if you are away from home, it won’t work unless you have a VPN.
I recently saw this on Amazon and figured I could print that. I’ve also been wondering about embedding an object into the middle of a 3D print, so I figured this would be a good project. So I bought these blades, and measured them, and started working in Fusion 360. In hindsight, I think that some jigsaw blades would have been easier when modeling since there aren’t any weird angles to deal with. Either way, it wasn’t too difficult.
Note: This printer is pretty much the same as the Creativity Elf (AliExpress) and Sapphire Plus, so if you are searching for any details about this printer, searching for the Elf or Sapphire might be useful as well. I think there might be slight differences though. The frame is a different color, and the Coreception comes with LED lighting, which the ELF doesn’t appear to have.
So Amazon has the Sainsmart Coreception for $100 off (I just created a subReddit for it). And since I’ve been looking for a larger CoreXY printer to replace/compliment my Ender 5, I decided to buy it. And while I wait for it to arrive, I wanted to figure out if there was a better way to directly upload my timelapses to YouTube. My old method, stopped working. And since it was a little complicated I figured I would create a better solution that would be more reliable.
After a few months of owing my first 3D printer, I wrote a blog post talking about things that I wish I knew when I first got it. It’s now a year later, and I’ve learned a lot since then, so I figured I would share that.
Set your expectations on quality
So I’m seeing a lot of posts on Reddit and other places about people wanting to compile Marlin and having a tough time with, or more commonly, many people just aren’t doing it because it seems intimidating. I’m hoping to put together a walkthrough that simplifies the process as much as possible for people that aren’t really comfortable compiling something. Many people think you need to be a programmer to do it. You don’t.
So if you are looking for a webcam right now (I am writing this article during the COVID-19 pandemic), then you might discover that you are literally going to spend about 3 times the normal price. The Logitech C920 costs $200 right now, and the popular budget C270 will cost you $100.
You can currently get popular WiFi WyzeCam for around $25. And even the pan/tilt version for $35. However, those cams are WiFi only, and won't work out the box with your computer as a webcam for video conferencing(or for OctoPrint, which is what I plan on using it for). However, Wyze recently released a special firmware that allows that function.
For a few months now, I've been looking for a way to upload videos from OctoPrint (This link is to my previous write-up on OctoPrint and its plugins. Please check it out.) to YouTube automatically. I was optimistic when I learned about the OctoPrint-Dropbox-Timelapse plugin, and Zapier, I was optimistic that they would be able to do what I wanted. However, I was not able to get it working. But the OctoPrint-Dropbox plugin had a recent update, and all of a sudden, it all just started working. So I figured there might be others that wanted this, so i did a write-up on it.
About 8 months ago I purchased a Creality Ender 5. I wrote a mini getting started guide about it. In that guide, I mentioned OctoPrint, and how I would do a separate write-up on that. I installed OctoPrint after a few prints. I wanted to be able to monitor the prints remotely since the printer is down in the basement. This write-up goes through my setup and settings along with the plugins I used.
I was recently messing around with my Infrared Thermometer to make sure the air coming out of the heating vents was the right temperature. While doing that, I of course had to point it at random things throughout the house, when I finally got to the 3D printer, which was currently running. I figured that would be a good way to verify that the reading on the sensors was close to the IR thermometer. And it was close enough. The glass bed was reading a few degrees cooler, but I figured that was to be expected since the printer sensor is not on top of the glass where I was taking my reading.