I just found my slicer has been improved.
But to make a short-story long, here’s something I think is pretty cool.
I needed an adapter to connect my table saw to my vacuum. Nothing unusual—except the fittings were just slightly incompatible. About 2 mm off, and the ends simply butted together without sealing properly.
Close… but useless. Get out the gaffer tape? But then I need the vacuum for other things and the sticky ends will just piss-me-off.
The First Pass
So I fired up Tinkercad and built a straight adapter.
Simple idea:
- Match both diameters
- Bridge the gap
- Get an airtight seal
Reality? It took 4–5 iterations to get something that actually fit. Tolerances, wall thickness, printer quirks—it all adds up.
Once it worked, I added a nice touch:
I embossed labels on each end in the slicer, so I could see which side went where.
The Problem
A straight adapter works—but it forces the hose straight out, which means I now need an extra half metre of clearance behind the saw.
Not ideal.
A curved connection would be better:
- Less strain on the hose
- Cleaner routing
- Better ergonomics
Here is The Link
The Upgrade (and the Catch)
I found a suitable adaptable elbow design and modified it to match my diameters. Now I had:
- A proper 90° connection
- Better alignment
- A much cleaner setup
But of course… nothing comes free in 3D printing.
A curved elbow means:
- Overhangs
- Supports required
- Extra print time
- Material waste
- The usual post-processing pain
The Fork in the Road
At this point, there were two obvious options:
Option 1 — Print as One Piece
- Use supports
- Accept the waste
- Clean it up afterwards
Option 2 — Split the Model
- Print clean halves (no supports)
- Glue them together
But glue introduces its own problems:
- Alignment
- Strength
- Airtightness (which actually matters here)
The Unexpected Win: Dovetails
Then I noticed something new in my PrusaSlicer update:
A dovetail connector option.
That changed everything.
Instead of fighting supports or relying on glue, I could:
- Split the model cleanly
- Add a mechanical dovetail joint
- Slide the parts together
Result:
- No supports
- No glue
- Minimal waste
- Strong, aligned join
Takeaway
This started as a simple “fix a 2 mm mismatch” job.
It turned into:
- Iterative design learning
- Better ergonomics
- A cleaner printing strategy
- A smarter assembly method
And honestly, that’s the fun of tools like PrusaSlicer—you open them up expecting one thing, and discover they can do something far more useful than you realised.
Here is proof of concept.
