Anet A8 Plus customisation

Today I have been doing various things to prepare for some work at the weekend. I'm hoping to install the upgraded LED bar, so I spent some time earlier in the day trying to get the diffuser to print in PETG.I got very close, but as it's only 0.4mm thick with a lot of bridging, it wasn't quite there. I shall probably try again just because it's a challenge. I think that if I push the extrusion multiplier up a notch, I may get there. I printed a new base successfully, but the diffuser is very thin indeed and it has only one extrusion width to hold to the bed too.  In my defence, the photo shows the print after I deliberately overflexed it to see how much give it had. It's now on my to-do list (under "printing challenges"). In the meantime, I can continue with the PLA version.  In order to get to power to the new DC-DC converter, I need to splice the 24V rail. I thought that using some lever connectors would be nice, so I've been prototyping a mount for ...

The main plan for today was to start printing the new cable chain. I set up the print for 40 sets Everything seemed to be going very well until... There was a nasty snapping noise and I saw that the filament had broken. Luckily I spotted it before the loose end disappeared into the extruder. I managed to pause the job and replace the filament, until... There was another snap as one of the prints broke loose and the whole spool of filament looked like an ugly macramé experiment. I paused the job again, stuck down the loose print with tape and spent about five minutes untangling the filament.  I restarted the job and everything was fine, until... a whole raft of other prints then detached themselves and went pinging around the room. This time I decided that pausing wasn't helping, so I cleared out the loose prints as best I could while it continued and let it carry on, waiting to see how many good prints I'd get. It's still running as I write.  Oh, did I mention that this all...