Having knocked up a home made 3D printer, I’ve been putting it to good use on the Bambi.

It seems that every time I open the cupboard above the cooker, a coffee jar or glass pepper grinder falls out and hits the hob. I haven’t succeeded in smashing a jar yet, but there are numerous chunks missing out of the enamel where high speed contact has been made.

A small plastic basket (imagine a linen basket about 8 inches long) seemed to contain things but it was ugly and the items still moved around. Enter the 3D printer – some dimensions were taken from Heinz ketchup, HP sauce, my favourite Nescafe 100 gram coffee jar and so on and fed into a Computer Aided Design package.

After a few hours grunt, the 3D printer turned up the goods and produced something which was made to measure. Two containers; a round one, and a square one to ensure a good fit for the various condiments I carry around. Neat, eh?

It didn’t stop there. While on the Ireland trip, the bad roads did cause damage to various parts of the van. One of the victims was the rear shelf in the fridge which had basically snapped down the middle. It had been repaired before with epoxy, but basically it was too flimsy for the beating it had taken.

Out came the ruler and the CAD package and before too long I had another shelf, this time with a much sturdier design.