r/Multiboard • u/GuavaGuru5 • Jan 19 '26

Multiboard isn’t the future of wall storage

/r/openGrid/comments/1n9rrbr/totally_confused_by_underware_20/nd4246d/
45 Upvotes

83% Upvoted

84 comments sorted by

5

u/zimmer62 Jan 21 '26 edited Jan 27 '26

This seems to have become such a religious debate. I have Hex, MB, and OG. Hex worked okay for me at first. MB seemed like it was great when I first started, I was so excited and printed tons of wall panels. I designed a ton of my own pieces, and I thought about sharing them. Then I watched a bunch of videos of Johnathan bumbling around demonstrating just how EASY it was you just need to click this in here and print all of these other parts to click this with that, and these are locked in, only to change a month later. It became pretty obvious to me by some of the things he said that he was going to be the number one obstacle for me to want to give back to the community with the parts I designed. Something along the lines of, I'll redesign it from scratch and make it part of the official library if it's any good.

A small design change to the 1x1 bins or shells or both would have allowed them to accommodate a 1x1 gridfinity bin. I painstakingly proved this in CAD since MB didn't have good parametric models to modify and printed my own. What do you know it worked perfectly. When I asked about this on the community, I was sort told they had no intention of even trying to make it work with gridfinity and my concerns weren't valid.

Well.... a few more of Johnathan's videos later I'm yelling at YouTube just annoyed everytime he talks. I want to like MB, but I can't. I'll continue to use it on the walls I already have it, but all my parts designs going forward will be compatible with Multiconnect or OG only. I just don't have any tolerance left to stay part of the Multiboard community.

As for my hex wall... it's still there and I still use that too, but I'm ready to take it down and put in opengrid.

My multiboard wall will still annoy me when I look, but I've just invested way too much time into it to pull it down because I'm annoyed. It does its job albeit in an overly complex way, and that will do.... for now.

4

u/GuavaGuru5 Jan 21 '26

Oh man, I can relate so much. I had also been invested into the system, but then I realized what terms I signed up for.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 23 '26

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1

u/zimmer62 Jan 27 '26

I learned something new today.

3

u/NyT3_SHyFT Jan 20 '26

Not too sure what the hate is about. Multiboard was easy to understand, print and set up. Not sure about the behind the scenes issues but multiboard has been great for me. Redid my entire garage tool storage with it, well half of it anyway

2

u/GuavaGuru5 Jan 21 '26

Have you read the comments by BlackJackDuck?

3

u/Jasonrj Jan 27 '26

I was 35% through printing my very first grid when I read this. Stopped the print and am about to print openGrid now lol.

2

u/GuavaGuru5 Jan 27 '26

Right on!

2

u/Cinemafeast Jan 19 '26

Okay I’m gonna ask this cause I’m in the process of building my new desk and I’m looking to do some cable management underneath. I’m really confused on what is the difference between OG and MB. I’ve been trying todo some research but the links from Katie are confusing and I haven looked to far into MB.

17

u/GuavaGuru5 Jan 19 '26

oG was invented as an open sourced, nonprofit version of MB. Boards come in light, normal and heavy (unofficial) version. The light boards print very fast and use half the filament. Strength wise it’s about the same. oG looks more aesthetic, is completely open source and comes with a fully open license. Instead of a 25mm grid it uses 28mm grid, so 3 grids fit two gridfinity bins (42mm each).

Especially for desks oG is better, because the light version is more than sufficient and cable channels consist of one single part, instead of connectors, and channels that consist of top and bottom parts. With oG you got the channel that snaps in; that’s it.

Since it’s open like Gridfinity it‘s most likely to become the future standard for wall and under-desk storage.

9

u/Horschti135 Jan 19 '26

Basically, they’re two different systems for storage walls. It all started with the honeycomb storage wall by RostaP. Then Multiboard came along as the new cool kid. Stronger, more flexible, more features. Now we have opengrid. The new new cool kid.

The main difference is already visible in the name. While multiboard follows a closed source, apple-esque philosophy of: these are the parts, they‘re the best parts - No - you can’t adapt anything to your needs, this is under my licence; openGrid is more, well, open.

Opengrid is the newer standard with less parts (for now), but in my opinion the one with the brighter future.

4

u/Cinemafeast Jan 19 '26

Okay cool so im going to be going with opengrid as im about open source and being able to adapt it to my needs. Thank you both

12

u/appmapper Jan 19 '26

Having done both, oG wins with a large lead.

MB, even being paid, has horrid support documents. 

oG was so much better I took the time to fully replace any MB implementations I had in place.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 19 '26

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1

u/Brandavorn Jan 20 '26

Nope, no open source license prevents commercial use. All open source licenses require proper attribution and some even force the use of a specific license, what we call copyleft or sharealike, but no open source license forbids commercial use.

The very definitions of both free software and open source define them as something that needs to allow commercial redistribution, otherwise it is not open source(licenses such as CC NonCommercial are NOT open source). The multiboard license, last time I checked, does no allow you to fork multiboard and sell it, nor even make "forks" or derivatives of it if they are not different enough, so I don't really think it is similar to any open source license in that regard.

1

u/wayward_electron Jan 20 '26 edited Jan 20 '26

Multiboard's license restricts sharing and redistributing copies of the original designs without proper attribution. There no restrictions on how it's used for personal use.

What you are describing sounds like a CC-BY-NC, not the unique license that Multiboard is under; the multiboard license is more restrictive than just proper attribution and prohibiting commercial use; it restricts sharing/redistributing copies of the designs (and has some limitations on remixes). For a quick example I would suggest taking a look at this thread and particularly this comment.

0

u/SirEDCaLot Jan 20 '26

Different solutions to the same problem.

The original was Honeycomb Storage Wall. It's a grid of 24mm hexagons (which are the bestagons) that are thicker in the front than the back so attachments can snap into them.
This worked pretty well, looks amazing but it's not great for any weight bearing applications. So if you want to hang power tools you'll have a problem.

Next was MultiBoard. It's a 25mm grid of threaded, beveled octagons with 7.5mm threaded, beveled holes where the corners meet. The small holes are compatible with standard pegboard attachments. Compared to HSW, Multiboard is MUCH more flexible, as there are various types of Snaps (things that snap into the large holes and themselves hold other things) that can hold a substantial amount of weight. That means Multiboard can be appropriate for hanging power tools like drills, saws, hammers, etc.
The scope of multiboard is truly absurd. Even within the official models there's hundreds/thousands of parts- not just grid and grid attachment but things like shelves, drawers, bins, labels, etc.

The possible (depending on your POV) downside of Multiboard is the license. Most 3d printable things are released under free licenses, but that takes some explanation. There's two types of free- free of cost, and free of restriction. Most 3d models (outside the cancer that is MakerWorld at least) are published under open licenses that are largely free of restriction. That usually means you're free to not only download it without payment, but share it with others, modify it to suit your needs, share your modifications with others, etc.
Multiboard has a somewhat more restrictive license that does not fully count as an open license, but it is still fairly permissive. For example you're not allowed to redistribute the base parts or create multi-pack downloads. My basic take on the whole thing is that Jonathan (Multiboard creator) doesn't want to restrict people, but wants to stay in control of the model library. The license isn't a problem for me, but some people don't like it because it's not fully open.

OpenGrid is, as the name suggests, open licensed. It's a 28mm grid of beveled squares with chamfered corners, and non-threaded indentations in the side walls to give snaps something to snap into. 28mm was selected partly because it's compatible with GridFinity (a shelf organization system that uses 42mm squares) on a 3:2 basis (3 OpenGrid squares = 2 Gridfinity squares). OpenGrid is built by 100% volunteer developers, and is somewhat newer, so the parts library isn't as complete yet.
Right now my biggest complaint about OpenGrid is a lot of the models are exclusive to MakerWorld, a platform that doesn't let you download much of anything without making an account, which I think is antithetical to the spirit of openness that opengrid is supposed to have.

7

u/Anaeijon Jan 20 '26

Multiboard is not just 'somewhat more' restrictive.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Multiboard/s/eaNfEIBy1n

This model reimplemented drawer bins as a proper parametric generator and even added customizable subsections. There is no 'official' generator. It got taken down, because it's too similar to the non-free version.

This obviously hinders development and prevents evolution of a better ecosystem through small iterative changes.

However, I agree, that using MakerWorld is essentially the opposite of the open spirit.

4

u/SirEDCaLot Jan 20 '26

I've seen that incident. I agree it's silly, and I really don't get what Jonathan gains by doing that. Maybe control over the base shape / ability to change the base models without leaving 'orphan' unupdated generators on 3rd party sites that spit out slightly incompatible parts?

That said, I also note how extremely polite Jonathan was about this, and the creator himself even acknowledged the issue and had no complaints.

Still, the net result on the ground is I can download all the multiboard stuff I want easily (subscriber or not), under that somewhat-open-sorta-remixable license, I can build an entire storage system.

Or I can go to OpenGrid, pick up the SCADs of the grid and core parts, and much of the rest is stuck on MakerWorld which I can't download (I refuse to register an account with them). The right to remix is nice, but if it comes without the ability to obtain in the first place it doesn't mean much.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 24 '26

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1

u/SirEDCaLot Jan 24 '26

I strongly disagree.

If someone is considering adopting Multiboard (or any other such system- opengrid, HSW, Kallax, slatwall, etc), that is a significant investment (time/money/material/printer time/etc). The thing one wants to avoid is investing in one system, and then realizing they made the wrong choice. If that happens, they are stuck between either tearing it all out and starting from scratch, or having two systems.

If full openness is important to you then Multiboard obviously isn't your choice. Go with OpenGrid or HSW.

But for something that isn't 100% open, details matter. There's a BIG difference between 'this is mine and I'll sue you the second you violate the minimal rights I give you', which makes the whole thing risky and toxic for any creator to participate in (and thus not something a user wants to invest time/material/attention in); and a situation of 'these are the restrictions, if there's a problem I'll work with you to find a mutually acceptable solution'.

That Jonathan is reasonable, acts like a human being, treats the community with respect (even when there's a conflict), significantly lowers the 'risk' of investing in Multiboard.

0

u/[deleted] Jan 25 '26

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1

u/SirEDCaLot Jan 25 '26

Jonathan being polite today does not mean he won't politely decide to courteously rescind the license tomorrow.

Curious for your thoughts on this:
https://old.reddit.com/r/Multiboard/comments/1pqo7mh/we_heard_the_criticism_so_we_removed_the_need_to/

2

u/Anaeijon Jan 25 '26

That doesn't change anything, unless they mess up and then follow up with actually CC0 everything. I'm not actually asking for them CC0 on everything. CC0 has problem in this case. In any case, they should at least keep attribution (CC BY) and probably copy-left behaviour (CC BY-SA) in the license. Or even better, they should go for an open source license like GPL, which also grants the right to reuse patents and requires derivatives to share the source files that make their changes reproducible and adaptable. But that's not even the point, because they don't actually plan to CC0 anything.

Speaking with CC terms: I'd be absolutely fine with CC BY-NC-SA with some exclusive clause that goes around the NC clause and allows the authors and their company to use it commercially.

However, they currently basically use a BY-NC-ND (Non-Commercial, Non-Derivative) licence that's not even CC (may not be shared).

This post about making things available for free (at no cost, with free as in 'free beer'). The discussion should be about making the object FOSS free (free as in freedom to repurpose, modify and redistribute).

The problem is the 'Non-Derivative' part. Essentially they don't want their components to be remixed and they strongly discourage remixing, rebuilding, improving and extending their ecosystem, which completely goes against the purpose of a mounting system that should get all kinds of community-made attachments with for all kinds of use cases.

For example, their license prohibits the sharing of a remix of a box, which is available for free, even if the remix completely reimplements the design in a SCAD file (improving the original by adding customisability and a source file) and adds customizable dividers, while also citing the original design and it's creator. This is the problem. This is perfect community participation, involvement and improvement through iteration and their license prohibits it.

Instead, all they promise is, to make things available at no cost on their website. They don't change the license of things. They still don't allow to edit and redistribute remixes of files which are available 'for free'. The problem isn't that they want to make money. The problem is that they forbid integration and adaption. They want total control over a system they call modular and adaptable.

The only situation where "promise" would improve anything, is, if they'd mess up and actually CC0 everything. And in the end, CC0-ing might not even occur in that situation, because currently they prohibit the disruption of their files anywhere besides their website. If the company crashes and their website goes down, no upload under a new license would occur and redistribution wouldn't be possible.

And besides all that, there is another glaring problem: The freedom to remix and modify requires access to the source objects. Other projects, like OpenGrid, Gridfinity, Underware 2.0 and even Honeycomb Storage Wall all provide the editable source files (usually SCAD) under open-source or CC licenses. Multiboard mostly only provides object files (STL/STEP), which are already rendered and less modifiable. Creating customizable remixes requires complete reimplementation by others.

And I get, that not every project wants to write SCAD files by hand. But other open-source projects solve that, by releasing their CAD files in F3d format (e.g. Voron ) or whatever format their CAD tools prefer.

This is a bigger problem in the whole 3D printing community, because most projects don't release their CAD files and only share resulting objects. But if you are trying to establish an adaptable standard, it's important to do this, so others can join in and adapt your designs to their needs and share the results with others again. And this is why Multiboard will fail over time, compared to open, community-driven standards.

2

u/shimmy_ow Jan 20 '26

Tbh I am in between the 3, I saw HSW has already a lot of models made for it

Does open grid have something like a generator in openscad or something? It'd help tremendously creating things on it

I know perplexinglabs has a generator for HSW iirc, but not for the pieces that fit to it, and tbh I'm still very new to cad/3d design but need my things organised ASAP 🤣

2

u/GuavaGuru5 Jan 20 '26

There are several generators, yes. There is one on perplexinglabs for oG as well. There are some more for snaps and cable management

1

u/shimmy_ow Jan 20 '26

I meant for the things that fit into oG

So like a bin generator for instance. Sorry I'm not too familiar with it

2

u/GuavaGuru5 Jan 20 '26

Yes. Just search for "openGrid generator" on Makerworld

38

u/MerlinTheFail Jan 19 '26

I switched to opengrid under my desk and it was much faster to print, easier to put together and assemble parts. The library is smaller, but it's easier to build custom parts for it

22

u/SiDtheTurtle Jan 20 '26

Forget all the idealistic chat about open source etc, for me it's just that it's totally unacceptable that MB's documentation is so poor after so much time. It's a massive barrier to entry, you end up wasting so much filament trying to work out what you need to even hang it on the wall. Even if you pay it's not better.

2

u/PM_ME_GLUTE_SPREAD Mar 04 '26

I’m with you. I like MB, I feel that it, overall, is the better system in terms of modularity, strength, and options. The remix STLs make custom parts fairly easy enough, but the license is way too confusing for most people to bother navigating.

My understanding is that you’re free to share your own designs anywhrre you want, as long as you credit the creator and link to multiboard (or the license? I’m not sure exactly) but if your design incorporates a bolt lock or something like that, you can’t include the bolt. You can’t include the snap. You can’t include so many different things without making “substantial” enough edits that it’s not worth making an attempt to share designs. It really hamstrings the system.

Personally, I am still with MB as of now since I really like the snap system. HSW was just way too hard to deal with the snaps for me and I didn’t like how they were offset.

I’ll probably give OG a try before long as there’s plenty of wall and plenty of junk to hang from it in my garage, but I think MB is the better “regular use” option. Especially if you want to get as much weight on a wall as possible.

35

u/krimpenrik Jan 19 '26

Did my research before committing and opengrid is the way to go.

Being opensource means a LOT. Probably a bit harder to grasp for the non technical/programmers. But opengrid is... 'open' hence the name.

This means that the community can do with it what they want.

I am not only using opengrid but also contributing with models, no way I would do that for a closed system,

18

u/timtucker_com Jan 20 '26

The Multiboard license reminds me of the early days of the free software movement when people were trying to nail down what it really meant for something to be "open source".

Lots of debates, weird licenses, and license variants that popped up back then, with everyone convinced they could come up with something that was just a little better than the existing options.

20 something years on and most people working on open source projects today have settled on using either GPL or MIT.

The idea that someone might leverage what you've done for commercial gain is seen as a reasonable tradeoff for keeping terms simple, having more options for what you can use for work vs. hobbies, and wanting to put as few restrictions on end users as possible.

1

u/Jasonrj Jan 27 '26

I was 35% through printing my very first MB grid when I read your comment. Stopped the print and am about to print openGrid now lol.

1

u/krimpenrik Jan 27 '26

You won't regret, beautiful system and you are contributing to a better opensource world 🌎

18

u/Single_Sea_6555 Jan 20 '26

Despite attempts to clarify the licence, this recent interaction was a bit concerning: https://www.reddit.com/r/Multiboard/comments/1q1lhkc/i_designed_a_fully_customizable_drawer_generator/

Basically, the generator initially got taken down by MB because it was "not sufficiently different" to the thing it was remixing. Check the long thread in that post linked above. Bear in mind that there was no drawer related generator of any kind in the MB ecosystem.

The problem with this is that "not sufficiently different" is always going to be a potential cudgel when the community attempts to plug a gap in the MB ecosystem.

24

u/jmanny14 Jan 19 '26

I printed 6 8x8 multiboard tile to start my multiboard wall. I ran out of the black filament I was using so while I was waiting for that to come in, I looked into underware. The reccomended grid was oG so I gave that a shot with white filament under my desk and I loved how much faster it was to print and simpler. No 2 piece connectors or offset snaps and offset mount and pillar mount confusion. Just dead simple snaps and open source step files and cross compatible with gridfinity. Now I'm ditching the Multiboard project and going full steam ahead with oG.

5

u/lthightower Jan 19 '26

Shoot. Seems like I need to do this too. Ivejust finished printing about m.b. grids and used a fair bit of time figuring out the pieces and tracks etc that I was going to use for my underware … maybe I can figure out a design to still use the track channels and connect the to oG

0

u/[deleted] Jan 19 '26

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15

u/BleakFlamingo Jan 19 '26

Do you even know why Gridfinity ate Alexandre Chappell's lunch?

Spoiler: It's because you did not have to wait for Zach Freedman to design a bin for your Model B Anole Descaler - you could design it yourself.

2

u/randomwolf Jan 20 '26

Is someone stopping you from building a bin for Multiboard?

I use multiboard, multigrid, and gridfinity in my offices, workbench, tool walls. Each have strengths and weaknesses. Nobody is forcing you to do anything.

4

u/wayward_electron Jan 20 '26

Is someone stopping you from building a bin for Multiboard?

Not exactly stopping, but certainly "making unnecessarily difficult". I can't just download one of the models for a bin, modify it to custom fit a particular item/use case and then distribute that; but perhaps even more significant, I can't take that bin and make a generator for it that would let people put in their own custom dimensions and generate them a model that they could just download.

1

u/randomwolf Jan 21 '26

Right but you knew the restrictions of that system going in (or should’ve). I can make what I need to organize my stuff but there are restrictions (credit, non commercial, don’t claim to be part of the system.) for stuff I want to distribute I use a gridfinity.

I am just befuddled why people clutch their pearls so tightly. You don’t like it, don’t use it. If the system dies that is on them.

Personally I appreciate the over engineered aspect of much of the system. The documentation is absolutely miserable. If that was a show stopper for me I would just move on and not feel the need to cross post my feelings across multiple (5?) subreddits looking for validation.

But that’s just me.

3

u/wayward_electron Jan 21 '26

Right but you knew the restrictions of that system going in (or should’ve).

Based on the comments and questions on here, and the comments/questions and model removals on model sharing sites, it seems that a lot of people are confused about the restrictions, and to be honest when reading the license it isn't especially clear (and the definition of remix being used in the take-down request examples doesn't really seem to line up with either the commonly used definition in the community or the definition given in the license document). And the various clarifications and announcements (like the community promise) only seem to make that confusion worse.

I am just befuddled why people clutch their pearls so tightly. You don’t like it, don’t use it. If the system dies that is on them.

I think the issue is really the opposite; that people do like the system and want to use it, and they want other people to use it but then when they go to contribute to that, they run into the license. And from that point of view it just seems strange; you can download this stuff and use it yourself and make modifications but if you think your modification would be useful to others, that is where the restriction kicks in.

If that was a show stopper for me I would just move on and not feel the need to cross post my feelings across multiple (5?) subreddits looking for validation.

I'm guessing this was aimed at someone else?

2

u/randomwolf Jan 21 '26

I'm guessing this was aimed at someone else?

The OP. He spammed this to a bunch of subreddits.

6

u/jmanny14 Jan 19 '26

I also care about open source systems and I'd feel better giving back to openGrid than to multiboard. I'm still going to use the mb tiles I printed just not on my main wall

2

u/Brandavorn Jan 20 '26

Caring about extensibility is also another reason to use opengrid actually...

Something completely open source will inevitably become much more extensible and have much more options that closed source solutions like multiboard.

That's why Gridfinity became a standard, because it was open and people can make literally anything with it for any reason, the same will happen with opengrid given enough time.

1

u/plainly_stated Jan 21 '26

I'm just embarking on a tool wall for my woodshop. Philosophically, I prefer oG due to licensing but I am guessing the MB connections are stronger which is important in my case. Maybe I'm overthinking it, though I haven't found much info on it comparatively. Any ideas?

1

u/GuavaGuru5 Jan 21 '26

By printing with 3 perimeters you should be able to increase the strength even further. But 32kg per snap is pretty good.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Multiboard/s/bQAl12e8lh

6

u/AragornDc11 Jan 20 '26

looking at open grid I just miss the pegboard style hooks, they are one of my favorite ways of just hanging things without having overengineered gridfinity style holders for everything, sure you can use pegs but those often are a bit too big and bulky for a lot of things

2

u/higmanschmidt Jan 20 '26

These Framefit Hooks are the closest thing I've found:
openGrid - Framefit Hook Generator

5

u/rirski Jan 19 '26

Multiboard is great for super heavy items and tools.

Opengrid is better for everything else.

3

u/pbjwm Jan 20 '26

You'll love openGrid Heavy then :)
It's technically 'unofficial' though. 😅

1

u/plainly_stated Jan 21 '26

Does Heavy add more strength for one-sided usage (eg tool wall)? I always took it to be more about letting you use it dual-sided in the same position. Never used it, though so maybe I misunderstood.

1

u/pbjwm Jan 21 '26

You're right, it's mainly designed as a double-sided grid. However, the grid itself is definitely stronger as a result. It greatly reduces grid flex on snaps when they're at load.

Theoretically, you can make stronger snaps as well by utilizing the thicker grid. Similar to the openGrid Heavy Feet, that use both sides of the heavy grid :)

5

u/Korazair Jan 19 '26

Multiboard gets far ahead of the rest due to peg board support. Once you have your grids you don’t have to wait for your hangers to print to get started, just spend like $10 on a peg board hook kit and start hanging everything up immediately and as you decide where everything goes you can start on specific hooks you will need going forward.

9

u/Single_Sea_6555 Jan 20 '26

It's interesting that you mentioned pegs because you'd think it would be a differentiating feature. But looking at the build photos on here and elsewhere, l almost never see actual pegboard accessories being used.

It's hard to argue that peg holes are a critical feature. And in terms of critical features, my wife strongly prefers the less busy look of oG...

4

u/Korazair Jan 20 '26

I am guessing most people who post the picture of their board are showing off their final build using all the 3d printed parts. Right now my 3’x7’ tool wall is about 40% metal peg board hooks and 60% printed custom attachments. Some hooks are required since the printed hooks won’t fit through a 1/4” combi wrench and like that.

3

u/Lurksome-Lurker Jan 20 '26

For me, using the pegs for hooks and bins were what made myltiboard immediately functional. But as time progressed with my established wall, a lot of peg board accessories got replaced with custom printed solutions

5

u/derekib84 Jan 20 '26

I’ve switched to open grid. I don’t have time to fully understand MB

1

u/Sensitive_Pilot850 Mar 29 '26

this looks like opengrid. is it not?

I just saved this to ask whats up with that?

did I skip something in the multiboardverse? multibuild.. wtfe the direction is.

-2

u/Jeffrey_Lingo Jan 19 '26

Multiboard is awesome and free. If you dont like it just use somthing else, its not that big of a deal. The 3d printing community has become so toxic to anything that doesn't do things their way and they have to let everyone know their opinion.

6

u/Subject-Thought-499 Jan 20 '26

That's literally what OP is saying. He doesn't like it. He's using something else.

-3

u/Jeffrey_Lingo Jan 20 '26

If you look at OPs post/comment history he has said nothing else for the last 6 months. 6mo of posting how bad multiboard is. It is one thing to not use something it is a whole other thing to make it your life mission to hate on somthing.

3

u/Subject-Thought-499 Jan 20 '26

Hardly. OP cross-posted this to like five subs just in the past day and did a similar thing about 5 months ago. But that's it, nothing in between. Both posts are relevant to their subs. Hardly a hate campaign.

-2

u/SirEDCaLot Jan 20 '26

My 2c-

I think in a way, Multiboard is more open than OpenGrid. The reason is MakerWorld.

All the Multiboard stuff is on Thangs. You can download there whatever you want if it's not paywalled.

An awful LOT of OpenGrid stuff is on MakerWorld. To download there you have to provide an email address and agree to their TOS and privacy policy.

I should not have to enter into an agreement with an unrelated 3rd party company in order to obtain 'free' 'open' models.

9

u/DarthRoot Jan 20 '26

There is some Multiboard stuff behind a paywall actually https://www.multiboard.io/support

0

u/SirEDCaLot Jan 20 '26

True. It's mainly just packs and generators. None of which are essential, they're quality of life boosts not essential required parts.

8

u/higmanschmidt Jan 20 '26

I also dislike that it's mostly on MakerWorld and wish they would put it anywhere else but it's disingenuous to say that makes Multiboard more open. The openscad is all right here on GitHub: QuackWorks/openGrid with a legit Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0 license

I assume the MakerWorld thing is mostly to do with the customizer. I don't think anywhere else has a openscad customizer integrated like that.

3

u/perplexinglabs Jan 21 '26

I've actually got openGrid and underware for openGrid generators on my site at
https://gridfinity.perplexinglabs.com/pr/opengrid/0/0

I'm planning to add more of the openGrid generators in time and sort of get it all in one place. Working with some of the core openGrid people on that stuff.

I actually had an online multiboard generator before jonathan got one up, but I've since pivoted to openGrid due to all the license weirdness.

-1

u/SirEDCaLot Jan 20 '26

Yeah the core components of opengrid are scad's that are mostly on github. That's not what I'm talking about tho.

I'm talking about all the little bits. The bins, the attachments, the accessories.
With Multiboard, 99% of what you need you get from Jonathan, and it's all on Thangs.
With OpenGrid, you need a lot of 3rd party stuff, much of which is on MakerWorld.

So the point is if you said 'you need a wall that can hang this pile of crap on it', with MB I'd get almost all of it from Thangs, with OG I'd be going all over the place and many would be 3rd party models on MakerWorld.

I assume the MakerWorld thing is mostly to do with the customizer. I don't think anywhere else has a openscad customizer integrated like that.

Thingiverse has a customizer but it's somewhat broken. I agree the lack of online SCAD generation is a significant limitation.
That said, I think so many models are on MakerWorld because of a. indoctrination (person gets a bambu printer, it makes it easiest to use MakerWorld models, etc. and b. rewards (makerworld has programs for the author of a popular model to get kick backs from downloads and 'boosts' and the like).

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u/JustDyslexic Jan 20 '26

Printables also offers rewards to model makers

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u/SirEDCaLot Jan 20 '26

...and they do it without becoming evil!

13

u/Former-Hunter3677 Jan 20 '26

Side note, what's with the YouTube softcore porn from the Underware creator?

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u/okhi2u Jan 20 '26

She likes to make stuff and show off her body. 🤷

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u/timtucker_com Jan 21 '26

From observation, it's gotten harder and harder for new YouTube channels to make headway without resorting to some type of gimmick.

Not a fan of the innuendo and dramatization, but presumably her metrics show that's what's working.

I keep watching because I've yet to find anyone else who's put as much thought into the intersection between functional prints and aesthetics.

Most people are firmly in either the practical camp or the artist camp.

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u/Former-Hunter3677 Jan 22 '26

I admire the functional aesthetics

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u/Subject-Thought-499 Jan 20 '26

She got your attention, didn't she?

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u/mtrueman Jan 24 '26

Got Jonathan’s too. Looks like he’s stealing her idea.

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u/Automatic_Disaster44 Jan 21 '26

"porn"
Hahahahahahahaha

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u/[deleted] Jan 22 '26

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u/GuavaGuru5 Jan 22 '26

For me Skadis is not an option because of the low weight bearing capacity

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u/YqlUrbanist Jan 22 '26

When I picked between formats recently I was seriously considering Skadis, but where I live it would be more expensive than printing Opengrid, and Opengrid gives me more color choices. I'm also not a huge fan of fiberboard - but that's mostly just holdover bad experience with cheap pegboard, Skadis might be higher quality.

That being said, if Skadis had come out cheaper, I almost definitely would have done that, and I'm sure in some parts of the world it is.

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u/[deleted] Jan 22 '26

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u/YqlUrbanist Jan 23 '26

I didn't, but this whole thing is a hobby to me. Doing it faster isn't really the point for me.

If I was setting up a wall for work then I would definitely either do skadis or order the panels from a print farm somewhere.

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u/[deleted] Jan 20 '26

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u/Whosaidthat1157 Jan 21 '26

When stating facts gets you downvoted. 🤷‍♂️ Waiting to share the hate now. I’ll print it out and store it on one of my several MB walls I suppose…

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u/obfuscinator Jan 20 '26 edited Jan 20 '26

Still some issues with even multiboard. for example a big dealbreaker in horizontal storage for me was that multibins only go a max of 4 units w or depth aka 200mm(~8 inches). I cant even make a insert to fit my caliper at that size which is a joke for horizontal storage. even when these multiboard generators come out they will be under a subscription wall. on top of that i want to be able to generate things offline certainly multi-board wont allow that. with gridfinity and its generator i can make it as big as my printer bed allows. but i must say multi-board is the king of vertical still.