I'm having a problem with what is technically a non-twisty puzzle, but this is the only place I really know to post about it.

I have what amounts to a cylinder and shaft which needs a tight fit but to allow smooth motion as well. Technically that isn't quite right - the 'piston' is actually curved, but it's about the same thing. The last two prototypes I did of this both make the piston be .13 mm smaller than exact in order to allow it to move. The weird thing is, one of them is very loose, and the other requires significant force to move, even though that part of the puzzle is exactly the same in both of them. (Yes, they're both properly worn in).

Does anybody know which of these runs is more typical, and if there's anything I can do to get consistent results in the future?

I've had a recent puzzle (Radio Jam) where about 1/10 of the pieces were very obviously printed with wacky tolerances in a way that made me think of an unfocused laser being used.
I just order extra parts and pick the best these days.

I haven't run into this problem for quite some time, now, but maybe I'm just lucky. I'm sure this is something the Shapeways team would like to know. If they aren't told, they won't be aware of the problem, and I doubt anyone from Shapeways browses this forum. Perhaps someone can post about it on the Shapeways forum?

-Eitan

I'd post to the shapeways forum, but their forum posting is broken right now.

Are those 'wacky tolerances' generally looser or tighter than the standard value? If it's one or the other I can guess what to do next.

Not exactly a scientific study with a control and all that but I've noticed a significant increase in errors / mistake from Shapeways recently.

I've had many orders with missing parts. Orders with parts from other customer's orders. Bad prints off all sorts (moisture bubbles, parts truncated because they were sticking outside the printer's bounding box, parts where an entire layer wasn't sintered and so parts are split in two, parts where the laser seemed "unfocused" and all features were a bit larger and much more grainy, etc).

I think Shapeways is having trouble keeping up with volume / experiencing startup growing pains.

To their credit, working with their support has always resolved the issue.

Inconsistent. But when wrong they seem inflated slightly.

About 10% of my Shapeways prints have such tolerance problem (too fat print) that they need to be reprinted. I have had split pieces (missing layer) several times. In one case I had one puzzle with parts from two different print runs, differing a percent or so in size. This sounds small, but it is the difference between fitting and not. In one batch I had pieces printed too thin, such that the puzzle rattled. In all cases, the problems have been effectively solved by Shapeways by making reprints.

In case of problems, always send photos to Shapeways and the number of the order and model on the invoice. This helps them zoom in to the problem.

Oskar