Hopefully this will be the last article in this mini-series! I have successfully repaired my printer. The thermistor, which cost a crazy 300 CZK, fitted in very well with no issues. There was no friction, so it went into the hole smoothly. I fixed it in place and then spent half an hour wiring and wrapping the wires. I also made some adjustments to prevent similar accidents. On the first try, it printed quite well again. I hope it will continue to print well for a long time.
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As I mentioned, my Prusa MK3 has broken down and I am working on repairs.
I have fixed everything except the thermistors and their wiring. The wires have come loose from the thermistor, so it is completely unrepairable as it comes in a metal case.
So, I have to use the correct imbus screwdriver, as I didn't have the 1.5 mm one at home. I borrowed one from work and spent about half an hour unscrewing the single retaining bolt and taking the old thermistor out. I had to use a lighter to heat the hot end and melt the old plastic to finally get the part out. It was really complicated, but I did it!
The spare part should arrive today. I have to clean the hole very carefully and then carefully insert the new thermistor and mount the wiring to protect it against similar accidents. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I'll be able to fit the new one to the hole without damaging it or its wiring. Keep your fingers crossed for me!
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As I mentioned, I'm printing a lot of Gravitrax parts now. Yesterday, for example, I was printing some connector bridges. Usually, I always arrange the object at the front edge of the baseplate, but this time I possibly flipped my view in Slicer and arranged all the objects at the back of the printer.
I realised this just as I started printing, but I decided not to worry about it because what should be the problem with printing it in the back instead of the front?
Well, it caused a very big problem. There are two small arrestation columns for the hotplate at the back and the printer's head had a dangling wire, so the issue is quite clear.
After a few layers, the dangling wire got caught by the columns and, as the head moved to the front, it broke the wire. So, I have a big quest for the weekend: to get it working again, because my son 'really needs' new Gravitrax parts...
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A quite nice phone from the upper middle class. It has a nice back that looks like glass, but is probably highly polished plastic.
The design as a whole is very nice. It has a dedicated camera button and the lock button is the typical circular silver Sony one. A nice detail.
The 1280 x 720 resolution screen is also really smooth and nice. However, the usability of the device is severely limited by the mere 3 GB of available storage. Of course, you can insert microSD cards of up to 64 GB, but internal storage would be much better.
Honestly, I have never understood why these old Androids had such small internal storage.
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I have successfully unlocked another obsession! I have always liked Gravitrax; I have never owned any, but I have tried it twice and really liked the idea and the system.
However, it was/is quite expensive for me. However, I was looking for a hobby that we could share with my three-year-old son and I remembered this one. One of my colleagues then offered me the basic set and one expansion set for 500 CZK, so I didn't hesitate and accepted.
And as soon as I took it home, my son was overjoyed. Until then, every time I came home from work, he would take me straight to it. We both really enjoy it.
The problem is that I found many interesting pieces online that are compatible and printable, so I guess I have something to print for the next few months. I am starting with columns to support tiles, as we are still missing a lot of these while building. Then I might move on to some special, tricky tiles. The ultimate thing I want to print is a fully automatic, motorised chairlift with pillars that can transport marbles over long distances.
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I am currently working on porting all my apps to iOS. I have finally finished around 95% of the first one. Fortunately, most of the apps share the same core, so I hope the rest will be really easy now that I have done one.
However, I am still frustrated by how unintuitive the Xcode IDE can be. One example of this is when you accidentally define something multiple times in various files. The IDE then cannot build the project and gives you an error saying that there are "multiple declarations of XXX". This is not helpful at all. If you're lucky, you might get the name of the file where the compiler/linker found the duplicate. Unfortunately, in most cases, this file is the file where the declaration should be, but you cannot really find the unintended declaration. So you have to find it yourself. Why?
Another issue I faced a few hours ago, which I then gave up on, was that the current build of the code started to crash the application right after running, without any changes. I tried reverting through many commits in the Git history and cleaning caches, but nothing helped. The app always crashed and I always ...
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I was immediately drawn to this Lumia when I turned it on. The Windows Phone inside was not the Windows Phone I knew. Of course, the changes aren't so drastic — just small changes in colours, fonts and logos — but it's still quite an unusual difference from other sterile Lumias.
To be honest, I'm not usually a fan of branded phones, but this is really interesting as I didn't realise it was possible to make a branded Windows Phone. After some quick research, I found out that this Lumia was sold by a Polish mobile operator called Plus, who made these changes to the OS.
Also, the size and shape of this phone make it incredibly comfortable to hold. With dimensions of 141.3 × 72.2 × 8.9 mm, the phone fits absolutely perfectly in the hand, allowing me to control it with one hand without any issues. I can reach all parts of the screen with my thumb, yet the screen is still quite big enough to fit everything. I did my best to keep the modified OS and still be able to sideload apps, and I succeeded!
So, there are classics like the Asphalt series of ...
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This is a piece of hardware that has been lying on my desk for a long time. I tried many times to install games and software on it, but basically failed.
I have successfully made a jailbreak. It was quite easy; I just clicked a link on a website that exploited a Safari browser vulnerability. However, everything failed after that. I installed Cydia, but there aren't many repositories for the iPhone 4, which is still running.
I have also tried many times to sideload anything via the cable using apploader, but even when the PC software recognised the phone and communicated correctly, every installation of any software package ended in an API error. I am out of ideas as to what I could do about this issue.
The most I have achieved is installing some games from the only repository that offers something, but the games look like elementary school projects. So they are not really games I would play.
But the phone itself is quite nice. The design is unusual, with a robust metal body that fits well in the hand. If it weren't an Apple i-something, but something with Android, it would be quite cool.
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My son has broken his toy tractor. An idea came to my mind. Let's introduce him to model making!
I prepared all the necessary accessories and explained to him what we were going to do. He really enjoyed it!
So I cut and glued all the base materials together. Then I mixed some rusty and black colours and gave him a brush to make a mess on the tractor. He was really good at it and created a nicely weathered surface.
Then, we planted everything around it. He sprinkled the dust and grass onto the glue, planted all the bushes and larger plants, weathered everything a bit more, and was really happy with the result. I am too. I hope he will join me in this hobby and we can build the model railway I have under construction together.
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I'm not brave enough to leave this in our block of flats for 24 hours, so I asked a friend to do it for me. It's quite nice, though. I was really looking forward to showing it to my son because I knew he would love it.
Unfortunately, the steel marbles I have ready are about one millimetre bigger in diameter. I will therefore have to try printing some marbles or searching shops for suitable ones ASAP. To be honest, I am also quite keen to see it working.
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