Volunteers support Ukrainians by printing “tails” charge / Article

Before turning on the 3D printer, you need to connect electricity to the country house. Jānis Ozols, who is the author of the “tail” printing idea, says that nothing much is needed. Now he has taken his 3D printer with him to the rural property and after a few minutes, after completing the calibration of the printer, he will be able to resume printing.

“You can come anywhere, set up quickly and start working. I bought this one for about 300 euros, but nothing is original, everything has been rebuilt,” says the “Facebook” page.3D Wild bees” leader Jānis Ozols.

This is what the final product looks like. In Ukraine, it is attached to the charge. There are currently two types of “tails” being printed, two different types of charges. The task of the tail is the same in both cases.

“They have different models of grenades. This is a VOG-17 and this is a VOG-25. The places where the tail is attached and the thicknesses are different, so we make different ones. The grenade is cut and it does not roll when it falls. If it falls to the side, then doesn’t explode. It has to fall directly with its tip against a solid object,” Ozols explains.

Everything can be customized. Not only the compatibility of the 3D model with the types of charges, but also, if necessary, the speed and quality of the print.

“How quickly it will happen, how thick the walls will be. I can adjust all this to achieve higher or lower quality. In this case, it is important that the part is quite durable and also prints quickly,” Ozols says.

Therefore, one tail print takes 40 minutes. Currently, around 10 people are engaged in printing. Everyone does it voluntarily, buying the necessary material for printing themselves. Printing 100 tails consumes about 6 euros worth of electricity.

“In the beginning, I wanted to make drones and send them ready-made to Ukraine, but since the parts were not available, I started looking for other ways to help,” Ozol says. “The most people who applied to us were people who have 3D printers at home. We all have 20 printers in total. We asked the Ukrainians what we can do to help. We told them what our options are. (..) They asked to make a lot of tails, hundreds. Now there are thousands to leave.”

Everyone has their own motivation, but “Facebook” groups “3D wild bees” leader Jānis Ozols says that he is a patriot of Latvia and because of past events, he is very motivated to help Ukrainians win this war.

“My relatives died in exile in Siberia. Likewise, my great-grandfather’s brother also died in the freedom struggle, so I owe “thanks” to the red invaders and do not remember them with good thoughts. Invading another country and destroying, killing the peaceful inhabitants is not the right thing to do. But they must understand that , suffering losses at the front,” Ozols explains.

He is sure that tails help. This has been said by both representatives of the Latvian Armed Forces and Ukrainians who use them on the battlefield. The name of the group “Wild bees” was also borrowed from the Ukrainians, the same is the name of the Ukrainian engineering unit, which has already been helped several times. Those who choose to join and help print tails are always highly valued. They are still needed. The Ukrainians have asked for something else, but it is not yet clear how to implement it.

“We also want to make an order from the Ukrainian drone unit, which makes its own drones. They asked us to make detonators that explode two meters above the ground. But we haven’t been able to do that yet. It’s quite complex electronics. We could use someone, who could help with this high-tech project,” says Ozols.

Today, the final tails are being finished on the printer’s hot surface, marking a great deal of work that has already been done. The 1500th tail is currently being printed. It is planned to be auctioned, and the funds will be transferred to the Ukrainian unit in order to provide drone pilot training.

Where the tails go and how you can help print them, you can find out on the volunteer’s Facebook page “3D Wild bees”.

CONTEXT:

On February 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered to start invasion of Russian troops in Ukraine. Putin claimed that NATO was going to use Ukraine as a springboard for aggression against Russia, although there was no evidence for these claims. Ukraine believes that Putin’s real goal is to destroy Ukrainian statehood and bring the territory under Moscow’s control.

Russia’s aggression against Ukraine has caused a general condemnation of the international communityagainst Russia is done more and more sanctions are introduced. Many western companies have decided to leave the Russian market.

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