Make a mold from your 3D prints

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In this article I am going to show you how to make a mold from your 3D print. With a mold you can easily make as much copies of your print as you like. The technique shown here can easily be used for your own designs.

Remember the shackleguard I designed and 3D printed ?? You can find that story here: http://lucstechblog.blogspot.com/2022/07/build-shackle-guard.html  

Well what if you wanted more as one piece. You could print several of course. That would take a lot of time. So how about making a mold from it and produce as many as you want. That was the idea and I set out to try to realise it.

Building the mold



I started with examining the original shackleguard. It appeared that it was a bit smaller at the top and wider at the base. Give this some thought as that will make it more difficult if not impossible to get out of the mold.



So I selected the rotate tool in Tinkercad



And I rotated the guard 180 degrees. As you can see the top is now wider as the bottom. That will make it easier to get them out of the mold.



Next step was to make a box which is a bit larger as the shackleguard. For convenience give the box a different color.



lift the shackleguard so that the top of it is a bit higher as the top of the box.



Move your model into the box. It is neat if it is centered but no worries if it is a bit off.



Carefully lower the model into the box so the top of both the model and the box are at the same hight.



Turn the model into a hole.



And group the two items.
That's it.



In Tinkercad export the mold as an STL file. Import it in your favorite slicer. I used the Creality slicer as this is not a very complicated model and I sliced it at .3 mm The slicer shows that it will take 1 hour and 36 miniutes to print.



And here is the finished mold !!

Oogoo

Back in 2016 I wrote a story on this weblog about Oogoo. Oogoo is a rubber-like substance made from a mixture of cornstarch and Silicone caulk. This would be ideal for my project. Re read the story on Oogoo here: https://lucstechblog.blogspot.com/2016/04/oogoo-and-oobleck.html



I mixed 2 parts of Silicone caulk to one part of cornstarch. That gives a thick paste.



The mold was liberally filled with the paste.



I waited a day to let the substance cure then I cleaned the surface of the mold.



And here is the finished product after I got it out of the mold and cleaned it up a bit with a sharp knife. Removing the part from the mold was actually easier as I thought.



This picture shows the original printed version on the right and the Oogoo one on the left. The Oogoo version still needs a bit of cleaning up at the bottom of the holes. but you can see they are identical.

Actually the Oogoo version is better for this purpose as it is more rubbery. It bounces nicely and therefore is ideal as a shackleguard as it will not damage your boat if it hits the boat.

This was more fun as I expected. The oogoo shackleguard could nicely be removed from the mold and the mold can be used to produce some more.

Till next time
have fun

Luc Volders

Build a shackle guard

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An acquaintance told me that he needed a shackleguard. And I never had heard about it. A bit of investigating (Google is your friend) and I found it online. A shackleguard is a disc with some holes in it. In the middle is a hole where you put a rope through. Lead the rope from the top through the hole. At the bottom you then tie a shackle to the rope. The shackleguard is wider as the shackle. The purpose is to prevent the metal shackle to slap against te boat and damage it. The guard is made of plastic and that is softer as the metal of the shackle and will not damage the boat. So it is a typical marine thing.

I would have posted a picture but they are (as I presume) copyrighted by the manufacturer, so Google it yourself and you will see how it works: https://www.google.com/search?q=shackle+guard&client=firefox-b-d&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiPgcL_-rT3AhWtgf0HHQbFBHAQ_AUoAnoECAEQBA&biw=1211&bih=891&dpr=1

Challenge accepted. How difficult could it be to make one myself.



I started with drawing a solid circle in the Gimp (free picture editing software) and then put some holes in it.



Next I used the online website Convertio ( https://convertio.co/ ) to convert my jpg file to an SVG file.



Then the SVG file was imported in Tinkercad and given a hight of a few cm and a diameter of 58 mm and a hight of 16mm. This process was described in detail in a previous story which you can find here: http://lucstechblog.blogspot.com/2020/10/3d-printed-anchor-hook.html I did use different converting software in that story but the priciple stays the same.

When that was done I made a sphere with a diameter of 58 mm.



Then I created two boxes functioning as holes. One box was positioned about half a cm from the middle of the sphere and the other one about half a cem below the middle of the sphere.



The sphere and the boxes were grouped and a nice disc is that way created.



Lower the disc on the workplane.



Now put the model next to the sphere



Rotate the vieuw till you are looking on top of the model.



Create some cilinders that fit the holes and place them into the holes.



Select all 5 cilinders and convert them to holes.



Remove the model by selecting it and clicking delete.



Group the holes.



Move the holes as a group and center them on your disc.



Group the disc and the cilinder-ho;es and you are done.

You can now export your shackle guard as an STL file.



I imported the STL file in my creality slicer and sliced the design at .3mm That is a bit course but this design does not need details. It needs to be functional. The slicer shows that printing will take 47 minutes and that is a bit optimistic.



And here you go, the completed print.

All in all the designing took me about 45 minutes, and printing about an hour.
Please note that my design has a rounded edge while the original has a straight edge.

I printed this in PLA, because it is what I had at hand.
PLA is said to be deteriorating in the open. However my experience is different. My fence caps which I printed in 2015 still show no sign of falling apart:
http://lucstechblog.blogspot.com/2015/07/fence-caps-few-moths-ago-my-son-in-law.html

I don't know if any of you are interested in the STL file to print it yourself. If you want it, just drop me a note by e-mail.

Mission accomplished, my aquiantance glad and guess what: I earned myself a few boat trips this summer.

Till next time.
Have fun

Luc Volders

Watch your print orientation to save some time

For an index to all my stories click this text.

I was working on a project that needed a frame to hold a servo. A prototype of the frame was made in cardboard. And then I drew the frame in Tinkercad and imported it into my slicer for 3D printing.


 

The slicer indicated that it would take 5 hours and 48 minutes to print the design. Well as it is a hobby I do not care too much about time. And besides that, I can do other things while the printer is busy.

Then I decided to rotate the frame so that it would lay on its back. And guess what.....the print time reduced with about an hour !!! The print would take now 4 hours 59 minutes.

Like said I do not care too much for print time, however I do not like to leave my printer unattended. There are a few stories around about a 3D printer cathing a fire. So I am cautious.

Just be aware that changing the print orientation might influence the strength of your print. So this will not work out well for every print. But in this case it did not matter.

So experiment with your print orientation and you might save some time.

And remember that if your print is to big for your printbed, or takes too long to print in one day you can always cut it up in several parts:
http://lucstechblog.blogspot.com/2015/03/cutting-up-designs-in-tinkercad-in-my.html

Till next time.
Have fun

Luc Volders

Hook for paintings

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My girlfriend asked me for some help. She is a painter and needed a fast solution to hang some paintings. Mind you she makes miniature paintings. 

In this case it were miniature winter landscapes. They measure about 6 x 4 cm and are frameless. They are painted on wood and it would be allright if I could design something that could be glued on.Wanna see more ? Here is the link to her site: http://elsmulder.weebly.com/

Well that is an easy assignment. I designed it in Tinkercad and within an hour I had printed a few test samples.

Don't be fooled by the picture. The hook just measures 2 x 2 cm and the hole where the rope goes through is just 3 mm.

It works like a charm, and she is very pleased with it.

For larger objects you can glue multiple of these hooks to the back.



You can download the design from Tinkercad and adjust it to your own needs.

Till next time,
have fun.

Luc Volders

Build your own button caps

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I needed some square push buttons for a project. They had to be around 2 x 2 cm and off course I did not have those in stock.

I do have a large pile of tactile buttons that measure 1 x 1 cm and have a round cap. The buttons would do fine, but the caps were round and too small. So I started searching the internet.

I found a replacement cap for my tactile buttons but that was also round and too small. And then I found a nice square cap. Unfortunately the size was too small and it was made for a different push button so it would not fit.

Tinkercad to the rescue.

I started with importing the square tactile button.

I resized it to the size I needed and then cut out the part that connected the cap with the button.

Next I imported the round button.

Next step was to make a hollow tube that was about the diameter of the round cap.

Merging the two would cut away the edge of the round button so only the middle part would be left over and that is the part I needed.

I moved the inner part of the round cap into the square cap.

The last step was to adjust the hight of the square cap to the right hight and merge the two items.

 

 

And here is the result. I printed the cap in different colors to see which one would be best for my project. The last picture shows how big they are compared to the original round caps.

I printed an extra 3 pieces in white PLA and then painted them with bronze, silver and gold acrylic paint. This was the first time I painted any of my 3D prints. I had to put 3 layers of paint on them to get the best coverage and I think they came out rather well. The picture does not do justice, in real life they look much better !!!

If you want to print these for your own purposes. Here is the link:
 https://www.tinkercad.com/things/7PGkLoa9JoA

Till next time.

Keep tinkering and have fun !!

Luc Volders