Props from THE SUBSTANCE

[Astyanax]

Okay, printed in resin, and it is a perfect fit!



It slides on a little loosely, but it is not visibly loose. That's a good thing Printing a 72mm-long version now!

The STL is attached to this post for anyone who would like to print it.

NOTE: I have no idea how well it will print in FDM...you might need to scale it up a little!

 

[JANDERS10]

If anyone is interested in the models of the large stabilizer syringes let me know.

Did you find out the models of the syringes?

 

[ZRE1990]

Did you find out the models of the syringes?

No, I modeled them. Message me.

 

[Astyanax]

For the Flash drive...

Full-length sleeves printed:



Text cut from self-adhesive vinyl:



The front-side came not from the font, but from the movie poster, as there are extra-high-res versions out there.
The back-side came from the font, with a couple minor mods for realism.

Time to clean one up and try it out!

 

[Astyanax]

All right, painted the sleeves and applied some cut vinyl...these are the results:



Not bad. I've learned a few things:

• The "The Substance" text is too large; it needs to be reduced a bit.
• The "909-555-1099" text is just about perfect.
• The black matte paint works just fine.
• I will need to come up with a way to align the text on the sleeve a little bit better.
• The quality of the Cricut has its limits. Although the text passes the "three foot test", I would like to try to get the text a little more precisely cut. I've ordered a fresh fine blade, so we'll see.

What do you think?

 

[DudeManGuy1019]

Okay, printed in resin, and it is a perfect fit!

View attachment 1874870 View attachment 1874871

It slides on a little loosely, but it is not visibly loose. That's a good thing Printing a 72mm-long version now!

The STL is attached to this post for anyone who would like to print it.

NOTE: I have no idea how well it will print in FDM...you might need to scale it up a little!

Printed it last night on my ender 3, came out nice! Debating if I want to go through the trouble to paint it or just wrap it in a bit of vinyl.

 

[Astyanax]

The USB lights have arrived, and there are lots of great learnings here. This is going to be easier than expected!

First, the form factor is identical to the Bluetooth ones I was playing with. Good to know if availability of the lights becomes scarce!



I very carefully cut the casing in half with a hacksaw, working all the way around until I could separate the parts. The device comes right out of the case!



Plug it in and put the back half of the case on the back of the sleeve, and it shows plenty of light on the back!



But also notice, the sleeve needs something to block the light, as these lights are bright and hot! I'm thinking some aluminum foil or aluminum tape will do nicely there. The resin seems to be holding up just fine.

 

[Astyanax]

Success with aluminum foil! This was my process:

1. Glued the back of the casing into the sleeve with some CA glue or epoxy. I dabbed it into the sleeve first so that sliding the casing into it would prevent "squeeze-out".
2. Cut a piece of 5cm x 5 cm piece of foil.
3. Wrapped it around the front casing, using a little double-sided Scotch tape on the leading edge.
4. Pushed the foil flat against the BOTTOM of the light board.
5. Using a skewer, "fluffed out" the foil on top of the light board so that light will be projected backward.
6. Dabbed some epoxy into the front of the black sleeve.
7. Gently slid the foil and front casing into the sleeve, trying to keep the back of the foil "fluffed" or "open".
8. Waited for it to cure!

I'm trying something new with lettering. Will need a few days.

 

[ZRE1990]

All right, painted the sleeves and applied some cut vinyl...these are the results:

View attachment 1875430 View attachment 1875431

Not bad. I've learned a few things:

• The "The Substance" text is too large; it needs to be reduced a bit.
• The "909-555-1099" text is just about perfect.
• The black matte paint works just fine.
• I will need to come up with a way to align the text on the sleeve a little bit better.
• The quality of the Cricut has its limits. Although the text passes the "three foot test", I would like to try to get the text a little more precisely cut. I've ordered a fresh fine blade, so we'll see.

What do you think?

Get some light stick clear transfer tape to transfer the vinyl. If that’s what you mean by aligning the text better. I’d say mess with your cricut software to get better cuts. That bad boy should be able to cut those letters at that size perfectly. I’m using an old Cameo cutter and it got the letters for the tiny activator bottle done with no issue. Just had to mess with my trace settings some.

 

[DudeManGuy1019]

Had a big mail day yesterday, my USB lights, syringes, and bottles came in. My one experiment with filling the activator bottles led to a lot of bubbles, I’m not sure if that’s because I used a mixture of iso and distilled water. The coloring has been fairly easy though, a two to one ratio of green to yellow is ideal.

 

[Astyanax]

I have a completed US "drive" that I am happy with!

 

[Astyanax]

This was the final sleeve that I 3D printed. I'm so glad I went with slightly loose...made assembly much easier!

 

[Astyanax]

Annnnnnd look what else I found!

Amazon.com

I'll bet this was what they used! No cutting necessary, just slide on the sleeve!

 

[DudeManGuy1019]

Wish I saw that, thankfully it wasn’t too much of a struggle to mod the smaller ones.

How’d you get your Cricut cutting better? I ran into the same issue of wobbly letters, especially with the activator labels.

 

[Astyanax]

Wish I saw that, thankfully it wasn’t too much of a struggle to mod the smaller ones.

How’d you get your Cricut cutting better? I ran into the same issue of wobbly letters, especially with the activator labels.

I didn't. I ordered some labels from Lettering-dot-com. They cost about $5 per set, plus tax. Attached is the PDF that I used.
They were pretty fast!

 

[Astyanax]

Received some of the longer USB lights, and plugged one in:



Guess what? It's a cool white light instead of warm white like the short ones!

Also, my sleeve is a few millimeters too short. Back to design time! Trying 74.5mm long.

 

[Astyanax]

There are a couple small problems with the light that, for accuracy, are very easy to rectify.

1. The first problem is that the USB plug is backwards from the orientation of the keychain hole. The metal USB plug has a horizontal seam that goes through it, and that should be facing away when the keychain hole is on the top side:
   
   
   In the movie, that is reversed:
   
   
   
2. The second problem is that the last LED on the end, and the metal part of the LED board will show past the sleeve. This causes that end to shine a little too brightly out the back.
   
   
   In the movie, there is no sign of the board or such brightness:
   

To fix these issues, I went through the following steps. It was easy!

1. I inserted a blade into the side seam of the case, and popped it open:
   
   
   
2. I scored the metal board a few times with the blade, and then popped it off with pliers by wiggling it back and forth until the metal separated easily:
   
   
   
3. Had I broken it? I tested with seven lights. Still good!
   
   
   
4. I reversed the board and placed it back in the case:
   
   
   
5. Since the board was shorter now, there was no tension to hold it in place, so I added a few drops of 5-minute epoxy in a few key places:
   
   
   
6. And before the epoxy was cured, I snapped it back together!
   

Looks great now that the epoxy has cured, and still works just fine!

 

[Astyanax]

I am now offering a small run of assembled The Substance USB lights in the Project Runs forum.

 

[SciFirepower]

Any leads on the Stabilizer syringes? Can't figure out if those are found parts or custom made.

 

[Astyanax]

Any leads on the Stabilizer syringes? Can't figure out if those are found parts or custom made.

Custom made, to the best of our knowledge. See above.