Thursday, March 15, 2018

3D Printed iPad Stand - Drone

Design shown from above featuring name plate
Challenge: For student to create a personalised stand to hold his iPhone.  Student who created this print is ten years old and has a shown a talent for 3D Printed design and creation.
Background: Student is able to produce a range of prints and designs and has been increasingly complex and innovative.  In this example he had a desire to create a stand for his iPhone so that he could locate it easily have it promently displayed in his room.
Level of Difficulty: Low-Medium.  The design itself is realatively straight forward.  He took an available template (the drone template) and decided to convert it to personalise it for his use.   He included a name, sunken into the top of the base, added additional backing plate and sunk a design to catch the iPhone. 
Design to hold the iPhone clearly shown by the depression
Time Frame: Twelve hours.   There was a change required to this print, which were the feet on the base of the design.  These were too thin and came away when the rafting at the base of the design was removed.   Taking these out of the design did not alter the design and therefore should have been removed from the plan.  This would have had a significant improvement in the printing time.   As previous prints, 20% infill (internal printing of the printer), Tinkercad used to create the design (including having a design featured from the main Tinkercad interface) followed by being converted to CURA for printing by the Ultimaker 2+. 
Size: The front of the design measures 160mm across and is 180mm long.   The base plate is 100mm by 100mm.   The block that supports the iPhone and has the name of the student on top is 65mm high, 25mm thick and 10mm long.   The depression to base the iPad is 85mm by 35mm and 10mm deep.  Relative to the size of the phone these dimensions would be the minimum that would be required for this particular print to be successful. 
What we would do differently: The issue that needs to be addressed is the legs.  This design needs to potentially be lifted up off the ground, from a display perspective and the student has twice attempted to use legs that have been too thin and removed either partially or fully when the rafting has been taken off.  The student is currently designing additional legs and a base for this design to compliment its creation.
Next Step for students: As above.   The design itself was created by a ten year old student so some conferencing has resulted in more discussion about its shape and production.  The student could have printed parts with seperate PLA filament and then assembled with superglue or other connectors to produce a layered affect with the colours. 

2 comments:

  1. I love the way that the kids are creating things that are actually useful and have a context.

    3D printing is still pretty much a mystery to me!!!

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  2. We'd love to print something off for you! Just let us know and we can customise something for you!

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