BigHeads are Back!! Beautiful, shiny, precision machined BigHeads - real BigHeads - have arrived. 0.5mm, 0.4mm, 0.35mm and 0.25mm sizes will be available soon.

PLA 4042D has been discontinued! We're testing the designated heir - 4043D.

Last but definitely not least, we're testing a new PEEK insulator - solid PEEK, no PTFE - yet it works with ABS and PLA. Testing is going very well. If this insulator shakes-out you can put a fork in it! Simple, compact and super tough!!

First, thank you for your witty, plentiful and creative responses!! The perfect answer for the photo would have been something along the lines of...a "super nice swiss CNC lathe machining awesome MakerGear parts!"  But a rather straight forward guess of 'CNC lathe' or 'CNC machine' was sufficient...

[The heater barrels in this photo were being machined when I took the contest photo. Nozzles and other very high quality parts are in the process of being machined and will be arriving soon...]

But, as fate would have it, we have multiple winners. The first correct answer was privately messaged to me just minutes into the contest. I asked that the guess be posted publicly and during the interim another acceptable answer was submitted. The first two winners are Matt LaBerge and Devlin Thyne. A few days later a really spot-on, insightful guess was submitted by Brian Bartlow (though, Brian, the photo was not rotated). Now there are three winners! As a result we doubled the prize and split it three ways! That's $16.67 per person :) There were several very creative and entertaining guesses...my favorite was that we "made our own PLA"!! Congrats to Sikko! ($10 award) The next time you place an order just remind us...so that we apply the award!!

This contest was just a teaser! The real contest will be announced soon...

Cool stuff is coming! Stay tuned... 

Edit: BTW - that extruder with the green 4042D gears and black 4032D body is a nema 17 stepper extruder aka a Wade. It is the rage on the Mendel side of things. We're bringing it to the CupCake crowd...

 
First person to guess what this is gets $25 off your next MakerGear purchase!! Twitter your guess (to @MakerGear), post a comment here or post your answer on the MakerGear Google Group. Winner and the answer will be announced next week.

Edit: We've received some extremely creative guesses! So there's a new category - the most creative guess gets $10 off :)

...coming very soon. Are you ready?

 ...well we know that many of you are patiently waiting on your orders. We worked ALL weekend (no MakerFaire for us) trying to get caught up. We're not quite there yet but lots of SuperPacks, HBP Kits, Plastruders and other goodies are shipping this week. We've stepped up our game and greatly appreciate your patience!!


SuperPack

HBP v1.1 Kit

And, we've got some great new products in the oven...they'll be out soon too!!

Thank you,
MG Rick

This is the v2 hybrid insulator I've been testing - sliced and diced for your viewing pleasure. For a solid PEEK insulator it would be necessary to turn down the heater barrel a few threads in order to establish a tight seal. I've tried PTFE both ways (with the barrel turned  - yellow background and with a fully threaded barrel, below). Using a turned barrel with PTFE leaves a slight gap along the top edge of barrel. I don't know if this makes a significant difference but PTFE is soft and easily distorted. The objective is to box-in the PTFE so that it provides a low-friction channel for PLA but can't distort.  [The scruff along the threads is from the band saw.]

The following photo of the v1 hybrid (yellow background) shows the damage inflicted during one of the v1 PLA stress tests. First, ABS was extruded at 220C. Then the barrel was allowed to cool and then re-heated to 170C. With the barrel full of softened but unmelted ABS, PLA filament was then forced in. 170C is at the low end for extruding PLA and too low to extrude ABS - though the ABS softened and extruded very slowly. This scenario created a brutal environment where the PLA filament did not strip because the PLA was able to keep moving though very slowly (since the ABS was slowly extruding). This produced substantial pressure within the hot-end and the weakest link was the PTFE / heater barrel seal. The PLA being forced in needed somewhere to go and since the only place to go was up, it stretched the PTFE. Hence the addition of the PEEK plug above the PTFE insert in v2. [The gap/damage between the base of the PTFE insert and PEEK housing was unrelated and occurred while attempting to remove the heater barrel before slicing it on the band saw.]

The Parts that make up a v2

Almost assembled

Finished

Now, add your HeatCore, nozzle, thermistor and insulation. Heat. Print :)

Note: If you are just printing with ABS then you don't need a hybrid insulator - a solid PEEK insulator work great! The hybrids are just needed (at least they are currently needed) when you are using PLA or PLA and ABS.