Vegas Golden Knights Helmet

[tahu505]

I said I wouldn't start any new projects until the two I was currently working on were finished. That ended up being a lie. I'd been debating making a VGK Helmet for a while now. With the Knights making it into the Stanley Cup Finals, I figured now is better than ever! I don't have much experience with modeling organic shapes, but I decided to give it a go. So here's the model I made for the helmet. I made it in Fusion360 then scaled it in Armorsmith.

 

[tahu505]

I started a print this morning and it turned into spaghetti. I don't have enough filament left so I ordered more and am waiting for that to come in. On the bright side, some of the filament I ordered is silk gold, so I don't really need to do any painting or finish work on this. I can just keep it as a quick project. I can always go back to sand and paint if I really want to though.

 

[tahu505]

The silk gold came in today and I started my printed. The tree support shape is a little unfortunate, but it works. The Knight's first game of the Stanley Cup finals is tonight and this helmet should be done in 2 days.

 

[tahu505]

The little nose part fell off while printing. I taped it back in place and will probably have to do a full thing of filling/sanding and painting on this helmet. I'll do another with better supports on that section later.

 

[Dire]

 

[tahu505]

I let the print finish. The nose piece didn't come out well, which was expected. I can still easily salvage this helmet later. I'm going to try reslicing it so I can consistently print more in one piece. Hopefully the new gcode has better looking tree supports.

These supports were the easiest supports I've ever removed from a large print, so that was nice. The helmet does fit perfectly, so that's good to know. This is the first actual piece of armor I've modeled and not an attachment or prop.

A bit weird looking without the nose but that should be fixed with a new print in 2 days. I haven't resliced it yet because the 2nd game of the finals is on right now and I'm making this post during commercials. I'll post another update later.

 

[tahu505]

Knights won 7-2, and we have a 2-0 lead in the series, let's go! Anyway, I found a plug-in for Cura to add custom supports. This little bit supporting the nose should be good enough and doesn't add too much material or time.

I don't know if this fixes the first layer or makes it worse. This is what Cura says is optimal.

 

[tahu505]

The support built up to millimeters away then stopped, so I added tape and used a random screw to tap in some glue from a gluestick.

 

[tahu505]

Print finished and nose stayed on! There's a little bit of layer shifting on the nose but that was expected. If anyone has better ideas for supporting that section, please let me know.

Definitely looks a lot better now

 

[tahu505]

Tried slicing the helmet again. I changed the x/y support gap distance. I also added a 2nd support beam to the nose. About to start the print and we'll see how it goes.

 

[tahu505]

Changing the x/y support gap distance and adding the 2nd support worked!

Here's the helmet with all the support removed!

 

[BinaryHe1ix]

Changing the x/y support gap distance and adding the 2nd support worked!
View attachment 332425

Here's the helmet with all the support removed!
View attachment 332426

I gotta say that filament looks really nice and the helmet is looking awesome! If I can offer some advice though, based on some of your other pictures, I'd spend a lot more time getting your bed level and Z offset dialed in. If your first layer is curling like that it's just asking for trouble later in the print. You can make a flat square in Cura and set it to 1 or 2mm height to test your bed level, if you get curling and adhesion problems, check your offset and level and try again. If there's anything I've learned in my months printing my ODST, it's that if your first layer isn't perfect, the rest of the print is going to have issues. If you can, I highly recommend getting a PEI spring steel bed as well. My Super Racer had a glass bed stock, but after switching to PEI I've had much better results and it's far easier getting prints off after printing. If you're positive your bed level and offset are good, try removing the bed and cleaning it with dish soap and water. It's crazy how much a dish soap clean can improve adhesion.

 

[tahu505]

I gotta say that filament looks really nice and the helmet is looking awesome! If I can offer some advice though, based on some of your other pictures, I'd spend a lot more time getting your bed level and Z offset dialed in. If your first layer is curling like that it's just asking for trouble later in the print. You can make a flat square in Cura and set it to 1 or 2mm height to test your bed level, if you get curling and adhesion problems, check your offset and level and try again. If there's anything I've learned in my months printing my ODST, it's that if your first layer isn't perfect, the rest of the print is going to have issues. If you can, I highly recommend getting a PEI spring steel bed as well. My Super Racer had a glass bed stock, but after switching to PEI I've had much better results and it's far easier getting prints off after printing. If you're positive your bed level and offset are good, try removing the bed and cleaning it with dish soap and water. It's crazy how much a dish soap clean can improve adhesion.

So there wasn't any curling on any of the prints or any that I see in those pictures. I think you might be seeing the first layer of tree supports. The silk gold material I am using reflects light in a weird way on the first couple layers. So sometimes it looks like it's peeling off, but when you run your hand over it, it's perfectly flat. I did use a little glue for adhesion, while I normally don't for other materials, because the silk gold can be a little tricky sometimes. With the thin layer of glue and a heated glass bed there's been no adhesion issues and the print is easy to remove when the bed cools down.

 

[BinaryHe1ix]

So there wasn't any curling on any of the prints or any that I see in those pictures. I think you might be seeing the first layer of tree supports. The silk gold material I am using reflects light in a weird way on the first couple layers. So sometimes it looks like it's peeling off, but when you run your hand over it, it's perfectly flat. I did use a little glue for adhesion, while I normally don't for other materials, because the silk gold can be a little tricky sometimes. With the thin layer of glue and a heated glass bed there's been no adhesion issues and the print is easy to remove when the bed cools down.

I gotcha, my mistake! I pretty much only use matte plain PLA so that silk stuff definitely threw me off.

 

[tahu505]

I gotcha, my mistake! I pretty much only use matte plain PLA so that silk stuff definitely threw me off.

No worries! It's definitely not a common material. It's thrown me off quite a few times before too lol. I still looked back and double checked the pictures just in case. I appreciate the look out.