3D Printed Pencil Topper - Junior School Printing Challenge.

 

The concept for this idea came from a student bringing an object into the classroom and into school that we were able to use as a model or inspiration and apply some of our design and creation techniques too.

A student brought a comedy monster figure, that was wrapped around a pencil and was light enough not to affect the writing for the student.

We felt that our students given the opportunity would be able to replicate this design but put their own spin on it.    As a project the print time for each of the prints that the students develop would be minimal which would allow the project to be completed with the students being able to produce a print each (remembering of course that there are 27 students who are present in our class).

The PLA as evidence by our first prints has held up quite well.   One of the issues that has been coming up already is the balance between having the prints snug and allowing them to clasp onto the pencils.   We want the design to be able to used across multiple pencils depending on the students wish.    

As we have been doing when its appropriate as our students use iPads they have the option of using Tinkercad to AR/VR their designs into place how they could potentially look, which allows them to check their viability prior to printing.   In the example shown left the student was able to create a design and then test how it might look by placing it on a pencil as an example.

One of our tasks at present is the preparation for Market Day 2025, we discussed this design with students but discussion at present showed a limit to thinking that this could potentially be a business.   While there is some variation in the amount of PLA and print time it is amongst some of the shortest or smallest designs that we have featured for a while - with early examples taking twenty minutes or so.

In the coming days we are going to look to the students to refine their designs.  We have the example, we have the ideas but we would be looking for expression, details, characters and exaggerated features.   In addition to the regular PLA we also have some special PLA like rubber, which would perhaps be ideally suited for something like this.

Students also need to consider features of the pencils like erasers or how the tops can sometimes differ.  The key to this task is precision measuring to ensure that everything fits.    

Some designs like the one shown left have a spiral that fits perfectly but the star that is going to be at the top of the design certainly needs to be more robust or have strength to survive repeated use and changing of positions, which the student has already completed.