By hand?!?
I was replying to someoneās post on the AD5X
I know 
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"Speed"boat challenge. We should create a āPleasureāboat challenge here. Highest quality under 15 minutes. Or even better, no time limit. That will keep it simple. No resin printers, cf, matte or gf filaments allowed lol
Not sure who or how we would judge them. If we do a poll, it would need to be a blind one somehow. Like, we all send the pic to a specific user and they add it to the challenge. So its not a popularity contest (I would get 1 vote most likely)
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Make a topicā¦ i am in. Canāt wait to put my old toy to the test 
Since itās so common, maybe a hull line could be allowed.
I thought maybe they could be āscoredā like in the olympics, but upon further reflection I couldnāt think of any olympic event which evaluates both quality and time. Then I remembered biathlon. I guess if that can be scored, then so can benchyās.
Iāll let it go though. That competition just is what it is.
With really good scanners, geometric accuracy could be used as a first quality indicator. Also for bridging, overhangs and the chimney. Lowest maximum deviation, least erroneous total volume,ā¦
(Probably @PrinterMcgee has much better insights there than me)
Another could be surface roughness. But that would probably need to look at layer height ācategoriesā.
Just my few quick thoughts.
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Good idea. If that could be done with photogrammetry using your phone camera, then it would keep the competition open to everyone. Or maybe use an AI judge to score it? Any of this would be better than the Olympic model I suppose.
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I fear that using a phone would probably not give the required accuracy. I tried to do something simple (kids busts), but even when upgrading to a much better camera and spending days with Meshroom, I was never able to get results that were worth printing. But I have to admit that I am not very good with a camera. Maybe others have more knowledge as to what it takes to make a really good scan?
As for an AI, that could probably be workable. Purely subjective scoring at first, but with enough models and enough votes, why not?
Defined close-upās of the hull, overhangs, holes, bridges, chimney, deck and roof as entry picās, then a āEurovision Song Contestā to train the AI,ā¦ Sounds reasonable 
I unfortunately do not have sufficient experience in this field. My budget only stretched to the Scan Ferret and no, that was not a successful investment 
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What do you all think of Aliexpress these days? I was tempted by some apparent offers for buying a Flashforge 5m Pro at around $300, but when I looked at the stores selling them it became apparent they were massive scam operations. I donāt understand why Aliexpress would allow such obvious scams to continue running, especially when the last 10 or so reviews are all screaming bloody murder about it, with a lot of other similar reviews behind those. Probably the biggest clue, if you read the reviews, are claims by buyers that the seller is sending the merchandise to wrong addresses and providing the tracking number for that wrong address. I myself fell prey to one of these scams when I was buying some LiFePo4 battery cells last spring. Anyone with half a brain could tell based on the weight of the package in the tracking number alone that it couldnāt possibly be what I had ordered, including the weight in the item description. And add to that was the the tracking went to an entirely different city and state than where I live. I was able to recover my money, but the whole thing was a giant hassle. Ultimately, in my case that seller was shut down not long afterward, but there do seem to be some very large, persistent scam sellers on Aliexpress, a number of which are selling 3D printers. Most often they havenāt been in operation for more than a year, which is clue #2. Third clue is very often (though not always) a weird numerical shop ānameā, which is generally āshop12345ā¦ā i.e. shop+random_number.
All that said, Iāve not had any problems with anything Iāve purchased that is delivered by āchoiceā shipping, because Aliexpress itself takes ownership of those deliveries. For those things, the savings over Amazon can be huge. But, for anything else, Iām just generally doubtful, unless the seller has been around for a long time and has squeaky clean feedback.
Iāve ordered a lot from them over the last year. Most of it 3D printer related and a smaller portion just generic connectors and wires. If itās 3D related I try to get it from the āofficialā stores of the various companies. That in itself is difficult because just BIQU/BTT alone has like 6 official stores. I used to think most of them were fake but then someone pointed out to me they have listed them all on social media. Iām still amazed that the price for some parts from them is so much cheaper than any where else you can find it. One thing I really like about Aliexpress now is theyāve copied a lot Amazonās return policies. Like you can return just about anything and once tracking shows itās in route to them you get the refund automatically.
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Do you have to ship it all the way back to China? And, if so, how much does that cost? China obviously gets a huge deal when it comes to shipping stuff here. Costs them less than for me to ship to the next town in the same state where I live, or maybe even in the same town where I live.
So now you get one free return per order. Every return Iāve done they let me print a free mailing label and as soon as it got scanned that it was in transit I got the refund. About it going back to China, this is what the labels say so I guess this is a US location that ships it back??
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Ive never used them because i assumed the shipping would take forever to the U.Sā¦ Was I wrong?
I find that anything with āchoiceā shipping reliably arrives in less than 2 weeks. It doesnāt matter who the seller is, because Aliexpress is the one who collects and ships it. Itās a copy of the Temu shipping model.
This is a big improvement over how it was prior, where some sellers would drag their feet on shipping.
Iāve about given up on AliExpress. Too many items shown with low prices, only to find that the price shown is for a different item, or quantity, or color, and the pictured item you really want costs 3x more.
Twice, several days after I placed an order, they have removed items from the order without notice. I was not billed for the items, but weeks had gone by before I discovered I needed to find the item elsewhere.
Or, I go to check out a cart full of stuff only to have them reject my credit card. Same card Iāve used before at Ali, same card accepted anywhere else, but Ali wonāt take it. Then Iām bombarded for weeks with emails, āWeāve saved your cartā¦ā, āItems to go with what you purchasedā¦ā Itās like they are taunting me.
Ill just leave this here ;). They are beginning to manufacture in the U.S. too. So, no tariffs, vat, import fees etc (eventually). Figured they wouldnt just roll over and quit.
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I like it, I like it a lot.
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@PrinterMcgee I read you post with a Loyd christmas accent
Checks alot of boxes and is moddable. I like that the spool and plate chambers(dryer and storage mods incoming) use up the internal void as much as possible. Probably heats up super fast and cleans up the footprint for farms. Just need 6 inches or so between printers and dontvneed to access the rear. 20% faster than an MK4S sounds good too.
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