3D Filament, keeping it dry

I built a cabinet that holds under 40% RH.

I wanted a better solution for my open pack filament storage. I have tried several different things over the years. Here is my latest.

I went out to Lowe’s and bought a Project Source 27 inch plastic cabinet:

Project Source 27 inch plastic storage cabinet with two doors, newly bought from Lowe's

I had a couple different size foam sheets that I use as sacrificial when I am cutting up large sheets of plywood.

Sheets of scrap foam board in different sizes, used as a sacrificial surface when cutting plywood

I cut them to fit into the inside of the doors and sides, adhered them with Liquid Nails 10 oz Heavy Duty Construction Adhesive (available on Amazon or at any hardware store):

Foam board cut to fit and glued with Liquid Nails to the inside of the cabinet doors and sides

I added some weight on top and let it dry overnight:

Weight stacked on top of the glued foam while the adhesive cures overnight

I then put the cabinet together:

Cabinet reassembled with the foam insulation installed inside

Then I cut the ends off the shelf. In hindsight I would not do this, I would assemble the cabinet, set the shelves and then insulate. I think it would make the shelf stronger. But…here is what it looked like:

Cabinet shelf with its ends trimmed off, shown inside the insulated cabinet

I had to cut a new slot in to adjust the shelf to where I wanted it, measured so they are all the same and cut out with a razor.

New shelf slot cut into the foam with a razor so the shelf sits at the desired height

Drilled some holes in them to help with circulation:

Shelf with holes drilled through it to allow air circulation

I put the shelves in place and used some Great Stuff Gaps and Cracks Insulating Foam Sealant (available on Amazon or at any hardware store) and foamed any gaps I could find.

Shelves set in place with Great Stuff spray foam filling the gaps around the edges

Let the spray foam dry and put the filament in. I did not put any weather sealing around the doors, I wanted to see how it did first. You can see the slight sag in the 2 shelves. But it worked. You can also see the 2 gauges showing the humidity 20% on top and 19% in the middle. Now that is with fresh desiccant, so the RH will go up.

Finished insulated filament cabinet loaded with spools, with two humidity gauges reading 20% on the top shelf and 19% in the middle

I have 4 of these desiccant boxes on each shelf, as well as one Dollar Tree moisture eliminator.

Desiccant holder boxes and a Dollar Tree moisture eliminator sitting on a cabinet shelf

It has been staying well below 40% which is great for PLA. This is a storage cabinet, not a drying cabinet. When it gets closer I will re-generate the desiccant and see how it goes.

Line chart of cabinet relative humidity readings, rising from about 12.5% on 11/04 to about 26% on 11/10

11/04 started at 12.5% RH 11/10 we are at ~26% RH.

The chart shows 12.5% – 45% RH on the left column and dates starting with 11/04 to 11/10 on the bottom. You can start to see a gradual humidity increase.

I will wait and see how often I need to change out the desiccant, I am hoping for once every 30 days. If I do it again, I will build it, set the shelves how I want them and then add the foam board and spray foam.

Dusting Off the Bench

It’s been a while. The last post here was March 2024. COVID got in the way, and after that we were busy getting all the farm work done. Things have finally slowed down at work, so I’m ready to kick this back off.

The shop never stopped, though. We’ve been expanding the office, 3D printing and laser area. Here’s a look at the office rebuild:

New Office Look
The office rebuild, one of the projects we’ve been working on

There have been plenty of other builds, fixes, and “well, that didn’t work” moments along the way. More on those soon.

First, I cleaned up the site a bit. There’s a new banner, a new tagline, and a cleanup of some older posts that had broken links and odd gaps. Everything from the last decade-plus is still here. It’s just easier to read now.

Here’s what to expect going forward. More of the same, which is the point:

  • Woodworking and shop builds
  • Reloading and gunsmithing projects
  • 3D printing and laser work: what I’m making, what works, and what doesn’t
  • Linux and home-server notes, mostly so I can find them again later
  • Whatever else ends up on the bench

Nothing here is for sale. It’s notes, builds, and lessons learned, shared in case they help someone else.

If you have questions about anything you see, or ideas for what I should tackle next, reach out on the Contact page.

Good to be back.

— Hohenfels Joe a.k.a Erik

Pistol Cleaning!

This is what I do for deep cleaning my pistols. I do not do this after every range day. I don’t want to get into the endless debate over how over you should clean, that’s up to you.

This is a shot of one of my setup before initial take down.

Gun cleaning before take down
Gun cleaning before take down

I use my Harbor Freight ultra sonic cleaner with a 30:1 ratio of distilled water:Simple Green set on heat for 16 minutes. 8 minutes flip / adjust parts another 8 minutes. Small parts go into a jar or solution filled zip lock bag.

Gun Cleaning Simple Green HF Ultra Sonic
Gun Cleaning Simple Green HF Ultra Sonic

 

Then I blow everything off:

Gun Cleaning Blowing Parts Off
Gun Cleaning Blowing Parts Off

Then I drop the parts in my Bald Eagle ultra sonic cleaner with a 20:1 ratio of Distilled water:Ballistol set on 122 degrees for 20 minutes. 10 minutes flip / adjust parts another 10 minutes. I put the small parts in a jar with the same solution.

Gun Cleaning Bald Eagle in Ballistol
Gun Cleaning Bald Eagle in Ballistol

I blow and wipe everything off then lay the parts out back on the work bench.

Gun Cleaning Parts Trays
Gun Cleaning Parts Trays

Then I put it back together and function test. Ready for the range.

Small(er) drawer cabinet

wanted a a tool cabinet with smaller drawers to hold tools. I got tired of looking in a drawer that was over full with junk or wasting space with only one small item.

Started by making a standard box out of ¾ ply:

Tool Cabinet Box

Then I gave it the seal and sand, nothing fancy, just a couple coats to keep the Kool-Aid stains off it.

Tool Box 2 Kool-Aid

I cut up the wood for 5 drawers:

Drawers all cut up

Glued them together, ignore the ugly ones….

Drawer pieces glued together

Mounted them up with full extension drawer slides. Shout out to habitat re-stores!

Cabinet drawers mounted with full extension slides

Put the faces on and finished it up with some pulls I had.

Finished tool cabinet with drawer faces and pulls installed

Here is an action shot before the face plates made it on:

Questions? Reach out on the Contact page

Ansible Tower / Automation Platform Install / Upgrade NOTES

As root:

#Remove old ‘latest’

rm ansible-tower-setup-bundle-latest.el8.tar.gz

#Run a backup

ansible-tower-setup-bundle-n.n.n-n/setup.sh -b

#Copy the backup to /root I remove the colons in the cp

cp ansible-tower-setup-bundle-n.n.n-n/tower-backup-2022-05-26-13\:28\:57.tar.gz /root/tower-backup-2022-05-26-13-28-57.tar.gz

#Copy the inventory to /root

cp ansible-tower-setup-bundle-n.n.n-n/inventory /root

#get the new latest

wget https://releases.ansible.com/ansible-tower/setup-bundle/ansible-tower-setup-bundle-latest.el8.tar.gz

#Un-tar it

tar xzvf ansible-tower-setup-bundle-latest.el8.tar.gz

#Copy inventory to latest

cp inventory ansible-tower-setup-bundle-n.n.n-n/

#Upgrade

ansible-tower-setup-bundle-n.n.n-n/setup.sh

Questions? Reach out on the Contact page

 

Installing Ansible Tower – NOTES

##Get the tar to /root

wget https://releases.ansible.com/ansible-tower/setup-bundle/ansible-tower-setup-bundle-latest.el8.tar.gz

## Make Sure your hosts file has it self in it

vi /etc/hosts

192.168.1.5 localhost myservername myservername.fqdn

##untar it

tar xzvf ansible-tower-setup-bundle-latest.el8.tar.gz

##get in the directory

cd ansible-tower-setup-bundle-n.n.n.n/

##edit the inventory file

vi inventory

##EDIT

[automationcontroller]

vmyservername.fqdn ansible_connection=local

[all:vars]

admin_password=’PASSWORD_GOES_HERE’

pg_password=’PASSWORD_GOES_HERE’

automationhub_admin_password=’PASSWORD_GOES_HERE’

automationhub_pg_password=’PASSWORD_GOES_HERE’

#save

:wq

##Attach the subscription

# subscription-manager list –available –all | grep “Ansible Automation Platform” -B 3 -A 6

subscription-manager attach –pool=<pool_id>

##run setup

./setup.sh

##################################################

NOTES:

https://docs.ansible.com/ansible-tower/latest/html/quickinstall/prepare.html#prerequisites-and-requirements

18. Bubblewrap functionality and variables — Ansible Tower Administration Guide v3.8.3

##FOR Ansible Automation Platform:

sudo vi /etc/sysctl.d/52-app.conf

#added for AAP

user.max_user_namespaces=15000

## sudo sysctl –system or reboot

##To Verify:

cat /proc/sys/user/max_user_namespaces

or

dzdo sysctl user.max_user_namespaces=15000

user.max_user_namespaces = 15000

Questions? Reach out on the Contact page

Drill Press Table

I made a new DIY Drill Press table to replace the very small one that came with it.

First thing I did was cut a piece of ¾ inch plywood 24 x 18 inches, cut a notch in the back for the support tube and drop in 4 carriage bolts spaced to fit through the existing table. I used the wing nuts and washers to temporary hold them in place.

Plywood drill press table blank with carriage bolts temporarily held in place with wing nuts

Counter sunk and glued in place

Carriage bolts counter-sunk and glued into the drill press table blank

Cut and glued the top plate to it.

clam-a-geton

Also notched and cut out a square area for a sacrificial block.

Square notch cut into the drill press table for a sacrificial block insert

Sanded and added the T-Track

Drill press table sanded with T-Track channel installed

Sealed it up:

Drill press table sealed with finish

Created a base plate and added some knobs I had laying around

Base plate added to the drill press table with mounting knobs attached

Added the fence, and she is done!

Finished drill press table with fence installed

Questions? Reach out on the Contact page

Storage bins

I found some neat storage bin plans here: https://wilkerdos.com/product/storage-bins With some extra plywood I had laying around, I made some.

Made a couple large:

Pair of large plywood storage bins built from scrap wood

And a couple small:

Pair of small plywood storage bins built from scrap wood

I think they came out pretty good, just going to use them in the shop. The scrap I had was ¾ “ so the will hold just about anything .

After you get the build down, you can make any size to fit your needs.

Questions? Reach out on the Contact page