Seventy seven point four

Just got back from two weeks running around in the heat and the dust of the woods and weighed in at 77.4kg. Bit of a loss after only ten days or so, though I suspect much of that is water weight as I sweated heaps. Was drinking loads of water (and electrolytes and eating salts with food) but I still feel mega dry - especially on the skin around my fingernails which is all retracted.

Going to take a bit of time to recover (it usually does) so I'm glad we came back in a bit early. Normally we go where it is cold and muddy rather than baking hot. The humidity didn't help either!

3D print

Well, the 3D printed coins I'd ordered back in … June … finally came in.

At 80c each, they aren't too bad. However, I can't say that I'm happy with the level of detail. I'm assuming that the printer (I used the local library) has their settings set up for maximum number of prints with minimum acceptable level of detail (they do after all charge very little, almost less than the cost of the filament as far as I can tell) so can't really complain.

However, I'm not happy with the stepped look and finish on them. If I had my own printer then I could tweak the settings for maximum resolution and just leave it printing overnight. For larger, less detail-intensive prints then it should be pretty good - but for the small, detailed items I want to make, this isn't what I'm aiming for.

I was able to pick up a bunch of plastic poker chips today dirt cheap, they average out to 10c each if I buy them new as part of a set. With these, at 80c each (more if I paint or decorate them) then they aren't really feasible. I had been hoping to get a master or two printed, then use epoxy resin to cast more from a mould. But with the stepped look that these came out with, I don't see that being viable.

The larger things like the lettering came out ok (mostly), but the stars at the top are very stepped, and the little "1" I put on there is pretty much illegible.

Looks like I'm pinning my hopes on the photosensitive film I've ordered, hoping that works with salt etching aluminium. If that works as advertised, I should be able to get the level of detail I'm after.

Hopefully.

Signature item (still)

The last thing I though of to try as a signature item was clay coins.

It would be relatively easy to make poker-chip sized coins with a good relief. The dies could be 3D printed (at the totally reasonable price of $3 an hour, so probably under $20 for a set), then use a wooden base and pusher with a metal collar to keep it all together. The collar sits on the base, the bottom face drops inside. Put in a pre-weighed blob of clay, the top die goes on top and wooden pusher squishes it all together so the clay gets mushed into the design.

That's still too expensive.

The cheapest clay to get hold of is 500g of air drying clay for about $10, which would net me about 30 coins (average 14g per coin, plus wastage). That amounts to 33c per coin, not counting the cost of the dies or paints / sealers to make the clay last longer once dried.

Considering the number of caches that are available locally, it does not look like it is going to be practicable to have a signature item to drop in. Other than just signing. It kind of takes away from the point of doing geocaching, though I guess I can just keep at it for a while until I've done the majority of the caches in the area. Which roughly speaking, seems to be about a thousand or so (roughly guesstimating) within about an hours drive - though around 30% to 45% of those are either nano sized which wouldn't take an item, or are decayed caches awaiting archival.

So looks like I might use up the plastic tokens that I ordered and leave it at that. I'll need to find some other outlet to try and be creative. On the plus side, if I swing around to using epoxy to be creative with, then I wouldn't be limited to small little coin type things.

Or I could just buy a damn 3D printer. :)