silentrunning

7 minutes ago, Xsubmariner said:

Thanks John, this will likely be my first print job. I plan to build an all sky camera and interestingly have a spare Qhy 5L- that needs reassigning. I was thinking I might try one of the all sky lenses that came with my ZWO 120 cameras. Yet another project for the schedule.

The QHY5L is a different beast to the QHY5 which is it's very ancient predecessor. I don't think this adaptor will be of use, it was made for the plate shown in the photo which is totally different from the QHY5L.

1 minute ago, Xsubmariner said:

Hi John,

Congratulations with your first printing experience and successful outcome. May I enquire if your STF file is available for others?  

I also recently acquired a 3D printer but sadly have not yet set it up.  The recent good weather resulted in Astro payback and my wife generated a substantial list of building and maintenance work that I am progressing.

I look at the printer repeatedly but must resist. Soon my precious you and I will build a new world. 😳

Martin

Haha, cheers Martin.

STL file attached...

QHY5Fish.stl

20 minutes ago, tekkydave said:

You do realise you are now on two slippery slopes; astro and 3d printing 😱😊

Ooo yeah I can see the truth in that! 

Having enquired on these forums about 3D printing, one kind member printing of my first design and some success printing a couple of items with a chap running a small print business round the corner I decided to bite the bullet and purchase a 3D printer!

Opted for the Ender 3 pro as it was recommended by the chap round the corner and the internet is full up with mostly high recommendations.

First print was a Benchy which looked perfect with no stringing, blobs or anything else. Then I printed my first custom built thingy. It's a inner  and outer threaded adaptor that allows me to attach aall sky lens to an old QHY5 camera I've had lying around for years. It took me some time to get familiar with metric thread profiles but once I had that down I used FreeCad to design it and export it to an STL file, this is it loaded into Cura slicer...

Saved that to the SD card and set it printing. 4 Minutes later and it's done. Amazing and a perfect fit on both threads, the inner one has a pitch of just 0.5mm and the print quality is amazing, printed at 0.1mm slices.

Here it is connecting the two parts together - lens needs a good clean...

And a picture through the camera of me and the new toy!

Will now either use as an All Sky Camera if I design an enclosure for it and/or put it in the obsy for keeping an eye on slews etc.

2 hours ago, Highburymark said:

A great thread and a phenomenal image. But it looks like Andromeda’s globulars are more spread out than the Milky Way’s - is that correct? In comparison with this picture, our globulars are more concentrated around the central galactic core?

There may be many more than the ones I've noted in this image. Maybe  with fainter ones included they would begin to show a tighter clustering around the core. Also the spiral arms extend a long way further out than this image might indicate.

I love globs I have absolutely no idea how they form and how they remain so spherical and apart from the rather empty statement that the total angular momentum is zero it would appear that others have very little clue either. 

Well it's all coming together just one crucial component missing!!....

I did a little project a few years ago and identified on an image I took the globulers around M31 

Just got the build back and it's a perfect thread and length and can mount inside the filter wheel bringing the camera as close as possible to the wheel...

6 hours ago, JamesF said:

I'm very much still learning my way around FreeCAD, but I think it's very impressive.  I use it for designing all my 3d-printed stuff now.  I even used it to design labels for the plants in my veg plot

James

I've got nothing to compare it to but I've really enjoyed learning it and have various ideas that will need to be implemented using it. It's quite addictive once you get the hang of it....

Success, the second thread modelled on the ISO standard is as good a fit if not better than the adaptor i'm modifying! 

Sadly the resin printed adaptor came out as an oval rather than round so the chap who's printing these things is looking into that but he's gonna print the complete adaptor with the new thread using the standard 3D method. This will allow me to bring the camera closer to the filter wheel whilst the one Julian kindly printed me will bring the lens closer hopefully bringing the FFD down below 44mm.

1 hour ago, NEM said:

That's very impressive.  Can you recommend a tutorial on threads in FreeCad?

Noel

Thanks Noel. I found the Freecad documentation the most concise and easiest to use if your building a thread from scratch

https://wiki.freecadweb.org/Thread_for_Screw_Tutorial

Thanks Noel. I found the Freecad documentation the most concise and easiest to use if your building a thread from scratch

https://wiki.freecadweb.org/Thread_for_Screw_Tutorial

Had some fun constructing a thread profile according to the ISO standard and putting it alongside the rough picture I took. Looks a lot closer than my first free hand attempt....

This has sent me down something of a rabbit hole....

1 minute ago, Dr_Ju_ju said:

Instead of 'wasting' resin, try & print in PLA to ensure the correct fit\spacing, & then print in resin when happy....

Thanks Julian, first one is underway in resin but i'll mention that if I have multiple iterations. The problem will be with the thread so I'll make a cut down with just maybe 5mm of thread to test until it's right and can be recombined with the bracket.

3 minutes ago, Gina said:

My understanding is that resin is better for fine detail but more expensive.

Thanks Gina.

Yes this chap seems like a really good bloke. He said the resin is better for fine detail and usual charges £10 a time but he will do these at £5 as he reckons their will be a few iterations - and he's almost certainly right there.

What's the best printing material for this short of thing with relatively fine pitch threads? The bloke around the corner is going to print this one using a resin printer, is that necessary or desirable. Only ask as I'm sure there are going to be multiple iterations of this. Is it better to get prototypes done with the usual stuff and get the final cut done with resin?

Adaptor No.2 prototype - Ooo listen to me - is off to the bloke  around the corner....

Well thanks to all for comments and advice and special thanks to Julian for printing my first ever 3D thingy!

I have just found a chap 2 miles away who's running a small business from home who will print these for £4 a time which seems really reasonable. He will be receiving this little beasty tomorrow and no doubt a few iterations towards a solution.

Never done any CAD or thready things before, head fills like it's about to explode! 🙂

20 minutes ago, haitch said:

Looks like 5 to me but hard to be sure. What’s it off?

in the absence of anything definitive I’d try it at 0.75.

have you got either T2 or M48 thread you could put up against it to see if it meshes? They’re both 0.75

Pretty sure it's 0.75mm. Having measured inner and outer diamter and angles it matches the relative dimensions in the photo...

8 minutes ago, haitch said:

Looks like 5 to me but hard to be sure. What’s it off?

in the absence of anything definitive I’d try it at 0.75.

have you got either T2 or M48 thread you could put up against it to see if it meshes? They’re both 0.75

Its a Starlight express 54mm Male adapter. I'll have a look around and see what adapters I've got. 

29 minutes ago, haitch said:

If that M48? If so I'm fairly sure the pitch is 0.75 off the top of my head

That was good timing, thanks. It's M54 do you think it's 1mm, I'm just trying to measure it. The height of the threaded bit is 4mm and I'm not sure how many teeth I can see 4 or 5?

Currently analysing the thread I need to duplicate...

20 minutes ago, haitch said:

I can quite easily print t threads and M48 threads on my Ender 3 - I've managed to make an adaptor to fit my Hypercam 269c onto 6.5mm Ef-m lens with the metal camera attachment bit removed (only way to get the backfocus), a baader ufc compatible filter drawer threaded for 2" filters and even Ef to Ef-m adaptor with a built in filter drawer so I can use my STC dual band filter with my 20-200 f2.8L on my Canon M50. 

(I use Tinkercad btw)

Brilliant, something to aspire to. Thanks.