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It's my own community but I've definitely semi-abandoned it... There's a new post from today, but the last one before that was 5 months ago. Every post is from me lol. I could use some help from another textiles person to help grow it and keep it going.

The thing that always made that OLD site valuable to me was the niche knowledge. If only like 5 people in the whole world knew how to do some specific thing in your incredibly rare hobby/job/craft/etc, those 5 people were on the sub devoted to it and probably already had the answer posted. That's what I wanted to see more of here, and the topic where I can contribute to that just happens to be obscure textiles. We have a ton of niche textile RSS sources tracked in our Fediverser profile too.

Just hit me up if you want to be added as a mod! Thank you so much in advance!!

This is the best weather for reading a good book there, under a canopy.

Finally managed to actually design, CAM, and post process something all with just FreeCAD! Just a simple sign for a library patron. This finished item obviously still has lots of issues but they're mostly user error and I think I know how to fix them. HUGGGEEE thanks to clsergent for designing a postprocessor for Snapmaker machines, since the company hasn't bothered to maintain theirs for like years and years lol.

Overall couldn't be more satisfied, 10/10, FreeCAD is amazing 🔥

I've been looking for a long time for a solution to not having a desk, or room for one. This tiny bedside table barely fits anything... I was using a regular mouse on the bed and dangling a regular keyboard half off the table, which didn't work so great as you can imagine lol. Now I've got this Ploopy Adept trackball and a FalbaTech Atreus62_FT keyboard. Switched to Colemak-dh layout just to make the transition as jarring as possible 😝

At least where I live anyway lol. That wondrous single week where we exclusively eat elm samaras before they all disappear. All the ones here are the invasive Siberian ones too so I don't even have to be careful or considerate about harvesting them! This whole big bowl came from a single small branch.

I think they weren't planning to make any more small changes until they were finished rewriting the game engine, but here comes a new patch anyway lol. It's time to craze! 😈

Hopefully memes are ok! The rules didn't say not to. A patron brought this into my library to get digitized and I just couldn't resist lol.

Not sure where he said this, or even if he truly said this. His work has been almost completely lost to time, and it's hard to tell if what's left is even accurate. That said, Wikipedia credits this quote to a book from Princeton University press. The text for anyone who can't read it:

"One hundred years is the limit of a long life. Not one in a thousand ever attains it. Suppose there is one such person. Infancy and feeble old age take almost half of his time. Rest during sleep at night and what is wasted during the waking hours in the daytime take almost half of that. Pain and sickness, sorrow and suffering, death (of relatives) and worry and fear take almost half of the rest. In the ten and some years that is left, I reckon, there is not one moment in which we can be happy, at ease without worry. This being the case, what is life for? What pleasure is there? For beauty and abundance, that is all. For music and sex, that is all. But the desire for beauty and abundance cannot always be satisfied, and music and sex cannot always be enjoyed. Besides, we are prohibited by punishment and exhorted by rewards, pushed by fame and checked by law. We busily strive for the empty praise which is only temporary, and seek extra glory that would come after death. Being alone ourselves, we pay great care to what our ears hear and what our eyes see, and are much concerned with what is right or wrong for our bodies and minds. Thus we lose the great happiness of the present and cannot give ourselves free rein for a single moment. What is the difference between that and many chains and double prisons?"

The .stl and .fcstd files are at the link. All the test joints I printed fit together really nicely, but I'm worried the overall design might have issues that I'm too much of an amateur to identify. It'll need a LOT of filament... Good wooden marudai cost hundreds of dollars, whereas 1500g of my preferred filament is only like $45, but I'd still hate to waste that much of it. The printing itself I'm not too concerned about, it's easy stuff. Just a little bridging and no support. Of course, that doesn't necessarily mean the finished/assembled object will be functional. Thanks in advance if you have any tips!

PS: This is also my first use of the spreadsheet function, I usually just rely on named constraints from prior sketches. It's really neat. FreeCAD rules!

There's nothing super special about this print in particular compared to what people usually post here, just a simple Santa figurine requested by a makerspace patron. However, it's made from 100% pure PHA (polyhydroxyalkanoate), a natural polyester byproduct of common soil bacteria. Unlike PLA, it is fully home compostable. It can break down in any biome, in a very reasonable timeframe. Also unlike PLA, you can make it by feeding the bacteria stuff like old fast food fryer oil, and other waste products. The print settings are pretty similar to PLA, but it has some significant differences in material properties, like being less brittle.

There aren't a whole lot of people making 100% PHA filaments, but if you can find it, definitely give it a shot! It's our staple filament at the makerspace I work in. Hopefully this doesn't sound too much like an ad or something, I just really like this stuff and want it to catch on.

Oh also! The flexible version looks and feels really neat if you run it through a vibratory tumbler:

All in all, I think it came out really well! The finished kōji had this incredible, indescribable taste/smell. Maybe kind of, flowers and mangos and peaches? I used it to make a ton of miso.

I used Modernist Pantry kōji kin and organic basmati white rice, and a makeshift immersion circulator/floating water bath incubator thingy. The rice was steamed in unbleached muslin cloth until just a little undercooked, then the same cloth was used to line a metal tray. The rice was spread into hills and valleys, covered with more muslin, then tented with some aluminum foil over the whole thing. The foil was mostly to keep condensation from dripping off the roof of the incubator onto the muslin cloth.

I put it in the incubator with the circulator st to 90 F.I stirred it at 12 hours and again at 24. It got appropriately matted, and for the most part it wasn't too wet. However, there were a few spots where I think it was getting on towards sporulation already, as you can see here:

Could have been some extra humidity collecting in those darker spots? The tinfoil tent kept the incubator condensation from dripping on it, but I guess nothing prevented the tinfoil condensation from dripping lol... Anyway, the entire process seemed to go way faster than all the guides lead me to believe. I broke it all up as best I could and put it back in set at 84 F with the lid open for lower humidity. By 24 hours it was maintaining about 97 F on its own.

One of my boyfriends is heathen, so I dual-color 3d printed him a set of Futhorc/Anglo-Saxon runes. Hopefully they're correct, very much not an expert lol... The Wikipedia page made me a little unsure on which symbols should or should not be included. These are made from PHA (polyhydroxyalkanoates), a new-ish thermoplastic that's naturally produced by a variety of bacteria, and breaks down harmlessly in any biome. Then, they were polished in a vibratory tumbler and anointed in black walnut oil infused with white pine, bog Labrador tea, yaupon, and sweetfern. I posted the files elsewhere if anybody wants to print their own!