The finish. Okay, your part is printed, but are you done with it? Depending on the role you have for that printed part, you may be at the beginning, not the end of your journey. This final stage groups together items related to finishing techniques, plans for what to do with the part after you've printed it. And what you need to do with the physical parts and digital files to allow you to recreate the part, exchange information about it, and perform further work related to it. We will be covering best practices related to these three topics, presenting the project, documenting and archiving, and post-processing. First, presenting the project, which includes the moment that brings a project to a conclusion, delivering the project. I suggest you use this stage to answer the question, what did we learn from this project? How does the result that you are delivering relate to your original plan for using 3D printing to deliver this part? Under this topic, we will address three subtopics, present and deliver project, process and design review, share the project assets. Present and deliver project, this, of all of the subtopics for the finish, is the required one. You aren't done with the project until you deliver the final part. Even if you are delivering the part to yourself, just picking it up and saying, this aspect of the sequence is critical. Otherwise, the process never comes to an end. Most of the time, when you are using 3D printing to help develop a product or deliver a solution to a problem, this element of presenting and delivering the project has additional teeth to it. Because this is where your work is evaluated by those who paid or will pay for the results. One piece of advice regarding how to kit up your final parts. You want the pieces to arrive to their final destination without breaking, so you wrap them carefully. But given that you have the CAD for your parts, you can actually use the 3D printer to produce little stays and brackets to make it easier to ship and store your project. It takes a little extra effort, but also adds an additional wow. Process and design review. As valuable and important as it is to share the project with a final client, stakeholder or, well, yourself, the reason that I selected what did we learn from this project as the overarching question of this section is to remind you to go a step further with your goals. While 3D printing is a great tool, and can help you accomplish quite a bit, at the end of the day, it's just a means to an end. I wanted to remind you and remind myself to take a moment and evaluate how the design and fabrication came together. Did 3D printing help you take the design further, and bring you successful results? On bigger teams, this is the moment to have an internal design review, especially if the process of iteration is continuing. Or you might take a moment for an after-the-project postmortem discussion, where you can examine the results, as well as the means of producing those results. And take note of the achievements and obstacles to help you carry the torch even further with future projects. Share the project assets. Once a project is well and truly done, if you control the rights for what you created, now is the moment to share it with the world via online repositories. This is an optional activity, but a rewarding one if done right. If you didn't plan from the outset to share your design files and printable files, you'll want to sketch a quick plan immediately upon finishing your version of the project. Including any instructions that another person would need to follow to repeat the process you went through to produce your project. Here are some questions you might want to ask about your files to make the roadmap easier for others to follow and reproduce. Is this project more about a single copy or sets of multiples? Is the project a one-off, or can you add a parametric element so that others can adapt this to suit a different fastener or diameter of pipe, etc? And to that end, does it take a little effort or a lot of effort to tweak or rework the design for a new purpose? Does it take expertise to fabricate the object, or is it clear enough for anyone to create? Documenting and archiving. The next major topic in the finish is documenting and archiving. The key question for this topic is, what can we save and reuse from this project? It is pretty typical for most designers and engineers to complain that they never have time to document, share, and archive their projects. When I say document in a 3D printing context, I mean to photograph and shoot video of parts, to collect and put the digital files in order, and to collect 3D printing project files for the components. Sure, people are busy, but the easiest time to document and archive a project is when it takes the least amount of time, ie, during the course of completing the project. Every day that passes after you finish your project, you lose more of the critical information in regard to the machine settings, mesh repair, material choices, and post-processing techniques. Move fast so that the world can benefit from what you created. Three subtopics for documenting and archiving are collect and archive files, component, libraries and kitbashing, photograph and store part. Even if you never intend to share, it still behooves you to photograph and document your work as you go so that you can draw on what you learn from this project for the next one. Consider this creating a virtual trail, from idea to execution, captured in digital files. Collect and archive files. The key process of archiving a 3D printing project is to collect and archive the digital files related to it. While every team has their own plan for how to do this, I recommend that you pick something and follow it consistently, and not just to keep your files tidy, making it easier to back them up. If you are working with a client or collaborator, then formalizing a process for backing up and storing critical design files, job files, and other references can really save your bacon. You know that at some distant moment in the future, when you've completely forgotten this project, that will be the precise moment you get a call asking for copy of the second to last design version, or similarly impossible request. It is handy to review which files are worth keeping, and which are no longer helpful, and backing up the useful bits. That way, you can locate these assets even after you've moved on from computer to computer and drive to drive a few times. If this sounds too much like homework you don't want to do, consider this. We've already talked about delivering parts and sharing digital assets. But really, establishing an archiving approach is your chance to wrap things up neat and tidy to better serve the future you. Components, libraries, and kitbashing. Was there a particular tricky feature in there that you might want to use as a reference for future projects? Did you collect some great materials reference data or critical tolerances measurements? In addition to saving a snapshot of the work you completed, it can be very helpful to preserve and create searchable references for what you learned and what was helpful to you to make future projects easier to complete, and to build more firmly on your experience and sweat. Photograph and store part. While I've already mentioned photography as an aspect of documenting, it is worth mentioning again here. You might not want to keep every iteration of every printed model you have ever created. If you are using this technology the right way, that would be way too many models. I recommend to those who are doing extensive design work that requires a process audit, architecture, medical, and contractor product design are great examples, that they get in the habit of shooting representative photos of the parts they have produced. And throw them in a folder with the job file, project file, and design file. Then you can chuck the print itself into a 3D printing recycling bin, and free up your desks, and shelves, and storage boxes for things that aren't as easy to reproduce. Post-processing. Post-processing could easily be the biggest topic in this course, but we'll have to save a deep dive for a future lecture. There's a never-ending catalog of techniques you can employ at this stage. Crafts used for making architectural models, miniatures, scale models, cosplay, accessories, replica props, actual props, special effects makeup, and sculptures. There are techniques we're studying through the entire histories of art, design, and manufactured goods. While a professional model maker is a wealth of brilliant hidden arcana on this topic, a typical designer and engineer can do decently with picking up a technique or two as needed. Always keeping aware of what is out there, what is possible, and hunting for resources to help them bring this technique to 3D printed models. The core question to the topic of post-processing is, what must we do to present this project as intended? And identifying that intention is always the first step before exploring all the ways that a part can be post-processed. I mention this to fight against my own instincts to spend way too much time refining a model in a manner that doesn't match its actual use. So remember that your primary goal is to bring the printed part in line with its purpose, which might mean no post-processing at all. Or it might mean 80 hours of grueling grinding, sanding, painting, and detailing. The secondary goal is to bring prints in line with ideal models, ie, digital designs as rendered in the way the client expects. But remember that there is also the opportunity to update that ideal virtual model to match the authentic surfaces and textures of real-world prints, which can also help to reduce or eliminate guesswork in finishing stages as a secondary effect. The four core subtopics of post-processing are cleanup and repair, polish, prime, paint, assemble, molding and casting. Cleanup and repair. Okay, so this will be patch BB, cut it.
