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Posted on March 12, 2014April 9, 2014 by Dan

How attending a Saint Patrick’s Day parade helped inspire me to create Celtic jewelry

It is getting close to Saint Patrick’s Day again. Now when this day gets close I think back to 2012 and the first time I attended a St. Patrick’s Day parade as an adult. I don’t know what took me so long! But at the same time I don’t know if it would have had the same meaning to me at a younger age.

I say this because it was also around that time that I was finally starting to gain a real appreciation for my family history though the genealogy work my Dad had done in the years efore and since then. He has done a great job tracing back our roots to Ireland, and their journey to and across the USA. You can read some about that here: The Michael Foley Family Blog.

By 2012 my son, Owen, had turned 7. I had learned from my Dad’s genealogy work that I had a relative named Owen Finnegan. He came over from Ireland with his two brothers as teenagers and settled in St. Louis. When we named our son Owen, we did not know about this family history, so it was a very pleasant surprise. It made me want to learn more. In general, having kids and watching them grow has also increased my appreciation for my heritage. It made me realize just how big of a role our genes play in our lives. Kids have mannerisms and preferences and things that neither my wife nor I have. It’s not like they learned these things by watching us. So, where did they come from, then? Hmmm…

So with all of that going on in my life, going to that parade in 2012 made a big impact on me. The only real requirement for a family to march in the parade is that they be Irish. How often do we simply celebrate our family and heritage like that? Not often enough, I say. I liked how some of the elder Irish were honored in the parade, too, another thing we seem to be lacking too often today. So, if you get a chance, I highly recommend going to the Quad Cities St. Patrick’s Day Parade. It is the only St. Patrick’s Day parade in the USA that goes through 2 states. It starts in Rock Island, IL and goes over the Centennial Bridge to Davenport, IA. This site lists it as one of the top 10 in the country, listed among parades in much bigger places like New York, Chicago, Boston, and San Francisco!

It was just a few months after attending that parade that I discovered Shapeways. When I first I discovered it, I saw some of the other amazing artwork people were doing and it inspired me to try it. I started out doing a number of different things. One of my earliest designs was actually a vase. It did not take me long though to see some of the knots and patterns others were doing, and it inspired me to try making some Celtic knots. I’ve been working on them pretty much since then.

Posted on February 19, 2014January 3, 2015 by Dan

New Arrival: Leaf Pattern Celtic Knot Rings

Leaf Celtic Knot Rings — Leaf Celtic Knot Ring

I got a new shipment from Shapeways with a few new pieces. I’ll be sharing them over the next few days. The first is the leaf pattern Celtic knot rings. This one is a size 6.5 and is made from Shapeways’ raw brass material.

I’ve only gotten a handful of items in this material from them but it is becoming one of my favorites. It has a very high level of detail! It is also one of Shapeways’ most inexpensive materials, at least for their premium metals. It depends on the item, but sometimes the raw bronze and raw brass can be similar in price to their stainless steel material. This is ususally the case for smaller items (like rings!). The bronze and brass metals are much higher quality than their stainless steel, in my opinion.

A lot of people really want the shine that the polished materials have but I find that Shapeways’ raw materials have much better details and still have some sparkle. Some of the details get polished away in the polished versions. I think choosing between the raw brass and polished brass (or any of their raw materials versus their polished versions) is not as obvious as it may seem at first glance. The raw brass, raw bronze and raw silver materials have a lot to offer!

The inspiration for this particular ring was that I really wanted to do something with a Spring and nature theme. I kind of wanted to build on the Tree of Life theme I started. I also have another leaf design I’ll be sharing soon. Click here to purchase this ring in the shop.

Posted on October 11, 2013April 9, 2014 by Dan

3D Printing Tips for Shapeways’ Stainless Steel

Shapeways recently did a blog post on “How to Deal With Rejection“. I’ve been using Shapeways for a while now but many of my new designs are still rejected at first! So this was something I could definitely relate to. I wanted to share some 3D printing tips I’ve learned.

This is a design I had to tweak several time to make it 3D printable

The material I use most often is their stainless steel material. It is a great material because it is relatively inexpensive, but is available with nice finishes like gold-plating. There are challenges in designing with this material, though.

Their material page says designs must conform to the “Sandcastle Rule”. This means that weak, unsupported features may “crumble” during their manufacturing process. Their page also says the minimum wall thickness for this material is 3mm. Many of my designs are closer to 1mm wall thickness, and yet they still come out OK. What gives? I have worked with Shapeways’ excellent customer service and gotten some feedback on this. I have been told that for small objects (like jewelry) you can go down as low as 0.7mm wall thickness. How small is a “small” object? Well, that is kind of a judgment call by the engineers at Shapeways. 3D printing is still somewhat of an art.

I’ve also been told that “details” can go down to 0.5mm with this material. What is the difference between a “wall” and a “detail”? They use a rule of thumb that a feature is considered a “wall” if it is more than twice as tall as it is thick. What does this mean for designing? If you have a feature that is less than 0.7mm thick, then it must be shorter or it may be at risk for crumbling. I generally will make features less than 0.7mm wide only about 0.5mm or 0.6mm tall. That being said, you don’t want to go much less than 0.5mm tall, because then you are pushing the limits of resolution. This is especially true if you are getting the gold or bronze plating. The plating is thin, but it can cover up or blur tiny details.

Here are some tips in designing for Shapeways’ stainless steel material:

Don’t get discouraged if a design is rejected. From my experience, Shapeways views challenging designs as an opportunity for them to stretch what is possible, so they are very willing to help you figure it out.
Check your features with NetFabb. This free tool will tell you wall thicknesses and heights of features, and let you check problem areas closer.
Make your walls thick up front. This is not always an option, but it is the most important thing to keep in mind when designing.
Make details shorter. A design could be rejected because your “details” were actually too tall and were considered “walls”.
Add support. You can only use the smaller 0.7mm wall thickness if it has enough support. Otherwise you will have to be closer to the 3mm limit.
Go with the plain stainless steel if detail is more important than finish. The gold and bronze plating are thin but they can cover up tiny details. The trade off is the finish is not as nice.
Go with the matte finish if your design has many nooks and crannies. Their polishing process can’t get into all the corners, and honestly, I think the matte finish looks great. The polished finish looks great for flat, even surfaces.
Consider using a different material. If all else fails, the plastics and their silver and brass materials do not have to meet the “Sandcastle Rule”, and can handle thin walls and details better.

I hope this helps, and good luck!

Posted on September 28, 2013April 9, 2014 by Dan

Dying O’ The Prints – How to Dye 3D prints

I’m extremely happy with the 3D printing services I use, but there are certain colors of plastic that they don’t offer. I bet you’d never guess that I’ve been looking for green.

I found these excellent instructions from Make: Magazine on how to dye 3D prints. I decided to give it a shot.

First I tried to brush off the pieces to make sure that any residual dust from the printing process was removed. Next, I soaked them in water overnight as recommended in the instructions.

The next morning I opened up the dye. I used Rit dark green fabric dye. I got this at a fabric store for

$1.99 plus tax. I put about a teaspoon of the powder into a bowl. I got some water boiling and then added the water to the bowl. I added the pieces and let them soak for about 15 minutes.

The water had cooled off a bit too much and so the pieces were not as dark as I would have liked at this time. So I repeated the process, and added hot water a couple more times. The whole process took about 30 minutes, but it will go faster next time now that I realize how important it is to keep the water hot.

Finally, I dried them off a bit and then rinsed them off to make sure any residual dye was off. Since these are jewelry pieces I didn’t want excess dye getting on anyone. And since these pieces have some corners and details, there definitely was some dye leftover on them.

The pieces seem a little more substantial now, not sure why. For the most part they turned out as good as I’d hoped. On the large pendant, there is some “marbling” going on with the color. Some of the ridges left over from the 3D printing process turned out darker than others. This might not be desireable for all pieces, but it looks kind of cool on this one.