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Pizza Napoletana

I’m here to (once again) share the progress of my pizza journey. Back in 2020 I shared the dough recipe I had been using for at least 10 years, and it’s okay but not amazing. There’s probably a number of things wrong with the recipe but it was still always better than frozen pizza.

Back in December of 2023 I got a book recommended by a friend, The Elements of Pizza: Unlocking the Secrets to World-Class Pies at Home and I then got a pizza steel, and you can read about that in this pizza steel post.

For my birthday this year Dana asked me where I wanted to go so I did some searching and discovered we have a Pizzeria Napoletana certified restaurant right here in Milwaukee… San Giorgio. So we went there! (All the photos in this post are from San Giorgio… these were not made by me!)

Was it good? Yes, it was damn good. There are only five certified Pizzeria Napoletana places in Wisconsin as of this writing. Two in Madison and two in Sheboygan(?). Oddly enough, I think I’ve been to one of the Sheboygan ones years ago. Anyway, San Giorgio in Milwaukee is not to be missed if you’re a fan of Napoletana style pies.

And hey, there are many different styles and it may not be what you like, but that soft pillowy crust is what I find really amazing, and it’s what I chase after in my pizza making. I am not at all interested in going the Ooni route with an outdoor woodburning oven, but between the book mentioned above and a pizza steel I think I can make some pretty decent pies. So far, so good!

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Mouse Click Space Controller

Someone who got one of my S1D Controllers and was using it with MAME got in touch with me and wanted a version with a few buttons added on. They said the knob programmed as a mouse scroll wheel was working great, but wished it also had a left and right mouse button so (based on a provided sketch) I adjusted the case, added two buttons, programmed the knob/button to send a space character, and that was it.

I’m glad I rewrite all my OpenSCAD code for generating enclosures a while back as that made things a bit easier, but honestly I can already think of some improvements, and may end up rewriting it all again in the future…

You can find out more about the S1D Controller on this wiki page. And yes, I did in fact create a wiki for all the products I’ve created, which you can find at codex.2xlnetworks.net. It also has links to custom projects a few guides, and other things. I want it to serve as a support site for the products I build.

Etsy has worked quite well for me, but I also want a separate space, and not necessarily a separate shop, so this was a good compromise and allows me to easily update things, add new stuff, etc. All the classic wiki jazz. (It’s sometimes hard to believe I’ve been using wikis for close to 25 years!)

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Fan Repair (Again)

Remember when I made a shelf for my fan? What I forgot to mention is that I repaired that fan back in June of 2020. I should note that I’ve had this fan for at least 20 years and honestly I’m sort of surprised it’s still going. The repair in 2020 involved replacing the oscillating motor which I was able to determine was a “OEM TYJ50-8A19 Universal Microwave Turntable Motor 4 / 4.8 RPM”. I found one on eBay for less than $10 USD and replacing it was pretty straightforward.

And it worked great! For a while… and then the fan stopped oscillating properly again, and I just sort of let it sit like that for a long time. I prefer fans that oscillate but if they don’t I can live with it…

Well, I got sick of living with it so I popped it open again and discovered the gear was missing a tooth. I used the OpenSCAD Gear Library with Customizer to create a new gear that matched the old one and put it in place and it is oscillating again. Huzzah!

I figured if the gear wears out again I can just print a new one. I used PLA but if needed I could do ASA or ABS or whatever else I have on hand. Also, it occasionally “clicks” when oscillating so the repairs might not be completely done, so this is probably not the end of the stupid fan story. Sorry!

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Properly Sorting Bambu Lab SD Card Files

For some production printers I want to be able to walk up to the printer and use the control pad to start a print. The P1S doesn’t have the most beautiful easy to use control, but it does work.

I’ve basically got about ten different parts that we regularly print, with variations. For instance, you can print one of each part, or run a print that is 8 hours long, or 4 hours, or 2, etc. This allows us to run jobs that match up with the work day easily so we can start a longer job before we leave at 5pm. (There are some 8+ hour jobs that can run overnight as well.)

The issue is, the sorting order of the files on the SD cards shown on the display is by date modified, which works in some cases, but I’ve got files named like so: A001, A002, A005… B001, B002, B004, etc. So here’s what I did.

I have a folder with all the GCODE files in it, which I will copy to the SD card once they’re ready. I sort them in the Finder in reverse alphabetical order, then select them all and drop them into a terminal where I’ve typed the word touch

The touch command sets the last modified time to right now, and with the list of files in reverse order for the command it means the A files will be “newer” than the B files, which will be newer than the C files, etc.

So once we run the touch command all the dates will change, and you can sort the files by last modified and it will also sort them alphabetically due to the file dates.

So that’s what works for me. It allows me to walk up to the printer and easily scroll through the list in alphabetical order. Now, if I change one file and add a new version it will screw this up, so you have to repeat the process. As I mentioned though, these are production files, so once they are good to run they probably won’t change. If they do, I just do the fix again.

And yes, I know you can manage all prints from a computer, a mobile device, and even some control pads, but at some point I will hand off the printing to someone else, and having really clear instructions about what buttons to press and what files to choose should make things very simple.

Note! If you do this on macOS don’t forget to run dot_clean to remove all the dot underscore files.

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Komelon Tape Measure Sketch

It’s a tape measure… it’s not too exciting. I remember hanging out at Milwaukee Makerspace in 2017 doing something with Maks and he had complained that the tape measures there were all imperial. I got on the mobile and found this Komelon tape measure that had Metric and Imperial measurements and I ordered four of them as they were less than $5 USD each! I think I kept two and gave one to Maks and maybe one to Marcus. (Maks and Marcus both grew up outside the US and were fans of the Metric System.)

The Komelon quickly became my favorite tape measure. I still have both of mine in my shop and use them all the time. We do have a bunch of other tape measures around the house but I’ve had a favorite. We’ve also got Komelons at work, which is nice. It’s also worth noting that Komelon US is located in Waukesha, not far from where I am in Milwaukee.

I really enjoy doing these sketches! I do them with an Apple Pencil on an iPad using Procreate. If you ever want a framed print of any of my sketches get in touch with me and we’ll work something out… Also, check out the Illustration page to see them all!