For this project a 3D-printed 4 FDM Kobayashi Fidget Cubes and 1 SLA Kobayashi Fidget Cube created by markinthebox on Thingiverse and sized them to fit into gumball containers. I had no experience 3D-printing and now I know the process fairly good and I am very proud of how my cubes turned out.

Process

I originally choose to do a Air Spinner, however, my first print, though functional turned out too thready. I printed another version that was thicker however this version did not spin fully when blown. I had a third option that the creator made that was hollow, however, this like the one one came out quite messy. So, I decided to change my object to be a Kobayashi Fidget Cube.

 

After downloading the STL file, I opened it in 3D Printer ios. I changed the size of the print to fit the container by changing the scale down to 70%. I originally printed with a brim. The first one I printed turned out okay, it just have bit of rough edges were the brim was and the base of the brim didn’t really come off. I printed it again, this time on a different printer, however, this one came out worse and I wasn’t being able to fold the cube as it should be. These first two cubes was using the FDM process on  Original Prusa i3 MK3(S/S+) printers. I originally was going to keep these cubes and just file the edges some, however, my next prints turned out way better.

I tried once again and this time I decided to not use a brim. I printed two more: one on the first printer I used and another on one I hadn’t used before. I think the one that came out worse was probably because of some issue of the printer itself. These next two with brim turned out great and so I printed two more for my final gumball products. The only issue I could see is a small amount of threadiness on the side of the hinges that faced the platform. But this was minimal and you really have to look to notice.

For the SLA process, I uploaded the STL file on a preform application where I scaled a cube to 70% and another cube to 55%. The 55% scaling allowed for to have a print small enough to fit in the gumball container without folding. I had heard from my peers it would be difficult for the hinges to work using the Form Lab printer and so making a copy that would fit without working would be enough. And sure enough when it came out the hinges did not work, but good thing I had printed a smaller one. I washed and curated the prints before taking out the supports. It was very difficult to remove the 3D prints from the Form Lab printer and took a lot of man power which I wasn’t expecting. Also my supports left some uncomfortable groves on my design because the 3D printer seemed to have filled in the gaps. I tried sanding these groves to have a better touch. I talked to  Lab Assistant to get advice on how to get the hinges to work, however, he said that the supports would fill in the gaps instead of support them and I could try a different orientation and printer. I tried the Form Lab printer on the left this time, however, after 3hrs of waiting nothing ended up printing. So I have tried again with a group on the printer on the right but as I am writing this it is still not done.

Here is my final products and a video of me fidgeting with the cube:

Video

Cost Estimate

Material Cost:

$0.13 per FDM print (air spinner): $0.13 x 3 prints = 0.39

$0.17 per FDM print: $0.17 x 6 prints = $1.02

$200 per each 1 L grey pro resin for the SLA printer and each 1 L can print around 120 to 14o figures, so $200/130 is $1.54 per SLA print: $1.54 x 1 print = $1.54

Labor Cost:

1.5 hours for each FDM print (13.5 hours) and 3 hours for each SLA print (6 hours): 19.5 hours x $15 (A goodish pay I would say) = $292.5

Machine and Tools Cost:

$1 per hour = $20

Total to make these 5 objects: $315.45

Reflection

I really proud of my FDM prints, both the appearance and the functionality of the print is great. I feel a lot more knowledgeable and comfortable with 3D printing. I also feel more comfortable with uploading and downloading prints into different applications to3D print and I know more about the optimal settings in these applications. I feel my cost estimate is fairly high however, printing and iterating in this project was a lot work and I required assistance from others which I think the real world would definitely increase cost.