I started setup last night with one of the CNAs who unboxed it for me and we got as far as getting the control cable hooked to the touch screen, but he then got called away to wipe somebody's ass and no further progress. Then this morning I had an appointment at the prosthetic clinic where he inished up the mods to the pegleg which aren't going to make it much more useful, but may work for some cosmetic purposes when I start my meetings with The Suits around Jan 1st if my planned schedule holds up.
After returning just before dinner I snagged the Acting Activities Director, a former CNA who was enlisted to be the Asst Activities Director after the last one quit, and now got bumped up to Directorr since that person also quit. Just about the entire admin staff has quit in the last 3 months since the gulag here was bought by another corporation. More on that soap opera in a future post. Together with her we got the platform freed up from the screws which pin it in place for transportation and got it hooked to the wifi network of my Hotspot on my phone. Not using the facility network for this because I don't have Admin privileges to add hardware, nor am I likely to get them from the new chief administrator, who is a total witch. I can see why people have quit just based on her personality and body language.
We got hung up trying to load the Flashforge App onto my phone, it seems to only be available with AppleOS, I can't find it for Android. I'm going to see what I an turn up for Windows next. So, I haven't yet actually printed my first 3D part for one of my inventions, but I'm hopeful I will have something by the end of TG Weekend. If I can start making parts, I'll have no trouble with keeping on my timetable since I have most of the parts already drawn up. I'll mainly be tweaking dimensions to make sure everything fits right. A lot of the stuff has very small tolerances on the order of 1mm or less, which is why I had to get a 3D printer and quit trying to do the cutting and gluing by hand. For models done with balsa and cardboard, they're pretty fucking good, but not good enough to really demonstrate how the stuff works. Think of it like the Bridge set of the original Star Trek. It looks OK from a distance, but up close you can see it's just a cheap mockup.
Anyhow, I'm really excited about getting the 3D printer and getting going with this. Even if the Big Idea Bizness doesn't fly, I can do a small biz with the printer making some of my designs and selling them individually, as well as doing custom 3D work for people who need parts made fot things. Even if I just use it for that and make a little side cash income, it will easily pay for itself in no time.
Definitely a fabulous toy. Once I get it working, anyhow.
RE