smooth vase mode color changes!

the multicolored splicing jig used in the pictures was printed with all spliced color changes (except one). it would have been way easier to manually pause and change colors but i had to prove it works.
all 7 pcs of the jig were printed at the same time with the same spliced filament.
i found out a bad join may break. or a badly managed length of multiply-spliced filament can cause a break. or 2. or 3? #@&%=*
that is where the jig turns white.
i had to abandon the spliced filament and i printed the rest with plain white filament.

assembly:
Use a piece of filament as a "hinge pin" to join up the hinged halves. see pic for assembly.

how to use it:
see pics for how to use

Straighten the ends of the filament pieces to be joined.
Insert trimmed filament in one end, attach large tight clip.
Insert trimmed filament in other end, attach smaller loose clip.
Insert heat source between the 2. I have a thin leaf-blade type tip on a wood burning tool.
Melt the ends. Push filament in from the loose clip side to get a good straight melty weld joint.
Quickly make any alignment adjustments with a toothpick or something while filament is still warm & flexible.
If possible, use nail clippers to remove some of the extra melted material from the joint while you wait for it to cool & harden.

After it cools, remove it from the jig & trim away excess material.
The trimming block works but BE VERY CAREFUL. THERE IS GREAT POTENTIAL FOR INJURY USING THIS. Always be mindful of where the blade will go when it suddenly cuts through. After a thankfully very minor cut I made the SAFER version of the trimming block.

Be careful to clean the spliced joint enough so it'll feed through your extruder. A little sandpaper will help the final cleanup.

I am using a cheap woodburning tool with no temperature adjustment. It heats to 950°F. This has not caused me any problems.

TPU

To use it with TPU, I don't put on the small loose clip. I loosely hold that end with my fingers to allow pushing the melted ends together. It is harder, but not impossible to get the 2 ends properly aligned. You just have to get more up close & personal. A quick fingertip or two exerting pressure in the right direction helps a lot. BE CAREFUL, molten TPU is very HOT!!

TPU is easier to trim using nail clippers.

made in Tinkercad