We’re digging through the “beautiful failures” set at Cunicode. Anyone who likes the way something looks when it’s made on a MakerBot will appreciate these nice images of failed print processes.

As Ponoko writes, “Even the most well-tuned machine is subject to the occasional plastic jam, crashing nozzle, or build surface separation.” I can attest that these things often come out like nice sculpture.

I would argue that cancelled prints can be quite nice, even when nothing’s wrong. I sometimes rest my coffee cup on a half of Andreas Böhler’s Blobby, winner of the Pet Monster contest. This half-print was made on The Replicator at a high resolution, so the layers feel more natural than part of a manufacturing process. With the top half missing, there’s a flat surface that looks almost like terrain. And I like it.

Geeks have boarded a train in Washington, DC on a route through Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York City, and Boston, in order to celebrate the tech community in the northeastern US.

Geeks on a Train is happening on the 168th anniversary of the first telegraph transmission by Samuel Morse in 1844. Track their progress here, and get in on the tweet-up all day at #geektrain!

Our notable 3D modeler Todd  made a luggage tag/keychain today for the trip. But since the train schedule changed suddenly in the middle of the trip, he had to make a quick adjustment. No problem, says Todd, aka zenix on Thingiverse.

This cracks me up. It’s a dualstrusion file, so make it in whatever two colors you want.

So I have to ask… did anyone attempt to crack the code in this week’s R.Maker Adventure? If you haven’t, I dare you to try it – you just might end up on an adventure of your own!

As I announced in the latest episode of MakerBot TV, Season 2 of our weekly series has come to a close. We’re going to spend the next couple of months getting fresh ideas for Season 3 and we could definitely use your help. Let me know what you’d like to see in Season 3 of MakerBot TV by sending an email to [email protected], a tweet to @MakerBot TV, or by leaving a comment here on the blog.

And if you find yourself jonesing for your weekly dose remember that you can revisit Season 1, Season 2, and the R.Maker Adventures at any time.

We’ve got a handful of extra special video projects coming your way this summer too so be sure to follow us on Twitter or subscribe to our channel on YouTube or iTunes so you can be the first to find out about them.

Thanks for watching! Keep it awesome!

Osamu Iwasaki, the man in Japan¹ who made that great video of his kids creating fun shapes on The Replicator, has another gem for us. Watch him piece together a very simple DIY motor using a battery, some wire, a magnet, a couple beads, and a base made by a Replicator. The video is about 5 minutes long and it shows almost the entire process, and my Estimator in Replicator G (under the GCode menu in the toolbar) tells me it would take about 34 minutes to build the base on The Replicator. I’m calling this a 40 minute project.

The .stl file is available here on Tinkercad. This is a fun project for a rainy day, and maybe you’ll agree with me that the music in this video is just about right for a rainy day, too.

1. that rhymes [↩]