3D Printing

 3D Printing

3/12/2021

For this assignment, we are supposed to 3D Print an object that can not be easily made subtractively. I decided to make a simple Ball in a Box. The ball in a box cannot be made subtractively as it is hard to manufacture a rotatable ball inside the box as the ball is not able to be built into the cube.

DESIGN OF PRODUCT IN FUSION 360

Firstly, under "Create", select "Box" and make a box of dimensions 50mm.

Next, create a "New Sketch" and select one of the faces of the cube and insert a "Centre Rectangle" of 40mm x 40mm.

Extrude the "Centre Rectangle" by 50mm to create "pillars" for the box.

Repeat the previous step on the other face of the box.

However, I wanted to have a base for the box, thus, for the last face, I only extruded by 10mm so that the bottom face is not affected.

Next, under "Create", I added a Sphere of 45mm.

Lastly, I used the "Move" function or "M" to move the sphere into the box.

Finished product

Now, we are ready to 3D Print our product! Launch CURA Ultimaker and import the Fusion360 file. (Remember to save it as an STL File!) Your design should show appear soon.

The estimated time to 3D Print was around 6 hours, thus I had to scale it down to 40% to ensure that it is within the 1-hour time limit and these are the settings I used for the printing.

Reflection:

This activity allowed us to gain more insights into 3D printing. I really enjoyed the process as I learned a valuable skill and the basics of 3D printing. Under the guidance of Y3 students, I was able to learn how to operate the printer. The process to print was quite challenging as there were many things to take note of. Once, the product was printed, I had to remove the supports that were also printed. It was quite challenging as the product was very small and I actually broke my product and had to reprint it again. Despite that, it was overall an enjoyable moment as it was my first 3D Printing experience and I am eager to apply this knowledge to my future projects such as Capstone. Although it might be quite troublesome and challenging, 3D printing is definitely a good skill to have. 

Finished product:

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