clockspring3D

Filament Fidget! Twisty Turbine!

All inspired by requests - Two fidgety models and a rubbery tablet stand foot!

Filament Fidget

First up, a request from my good friends at Filament Stories!  Part torture test (but not really), part fidget toy, part "maker coin", this mechanical contraption involves two large and two small bevel gear cogs that all move independently thanks to hidden swivel mechanisms inside!

It's not really a torture test, since it's designed for maximum prin...

Sector Drawers

You might remember the Sector Caddy in the very recent past - well it's back, in drawer form!  That's right, all your irregular, non-rectangular tiny drawer storage needs have come true!  

The outer part has the same profile as the original Sector Caddy, but the inner ridge that held the lid in place is omitted and the back (that was previously the base) now has countersunk holes and keyholes for screws, and allowance for up to six cylindrical magnets.

The drawer itself ...

Planar Dish

Howdy, wonderful people!

Swapping filaments early in a print is an easy way to add some style to a print and bring out details, but how do you achieve that on something like a dish?  That was the question that led to this design - a geometric dish made from hinged panels that print flat before being folded in at an angle by a screw-on base.

There are two versions of this model provid...

Strategist Vase

Hey there, wonderful people!

Back to the magical world of vase mode printing!  We have here a very robust, stoic looking vase that unintentionally reminds me of chess pieces, hence the name.  It started out as a pair of vases twisting around each other but at some point they merged into a single twisty, ribby structure.  It's funny how these things evolve!

The ribs achieve more than just a decorative purpose, though - they are instrumental in building strength, whic...

Exoball

Howdy, wonderful people!

Tessellation is the best, and I really wanted to find an interesting way to apply the concept to a sphere!  So, that's what this is - a hollow sphere comprised of eight curvy shapes that mesh together and look vaguely retro-science-fictiony!  It's held together with a bunch of bolts, but there's also the option of using magnets.

As you can probably guess, this one is all about the geometry!  The main constraint wasn't so much that the repeat...

Positubes! (Single, Multi, and Assembly!)

Hey there, wonderful people!

Could we make a non-squishy form of the squishy tubes that are everywhere in the modern world, I wondered?  And then print it in flexible filament anyway and make it squishy!  This one was quite a journey!

Here's what's filling up the folder on Dropbox:

A) Three sizes of wide-mouthed tubes and a matching lid.

B) Three multimaterial print versions of those tubes with stripes meant for MMU, Palette, etc.

C) One tube that print...

Knurled Case

Texture is a wonderful thing!  Not just the knurling, but the smooth curves of the inside of the small version of this cylindrical screw-top case - it's yet another model that can double as a tactile fidget object.

I often make things that never really see the light of day, either because they're ideas that never really worked out in practice or because it simply doesn't occur to me that anyone else might be interested in some little container.  This one is an example of the l...

Sharktooth Boxes

Hello there, my favourite people!

Twisty triangular boxes!  It's fun to take a fairly conventional shape and distort it into something more fun and less practical!  All this actually started with the small version of the box, a little triangular case with a significant twist to it that includes spots for magnets to hold it closed.  Once I'd worked out an approach to the geometry for the small one, though, I wondered how things would scale up.

2022-08-22 14:32:24 +0000 UTC View Post

Sector Caddy (Vase and Regular!)

Howdy, wonderful people!

Tessellating shapes are something that have always fascinated me.  The idea of strange shapes that happen to mesh together with complete precision and tile a plane is just such a cool thing, especially when the shapes involved are odd and indistinct at first glance, like this one!  

As you can no doubt work out from the tiling pattern, these are fundamen...

Twine Bowl (single- and multi-material)

It's a hanging basket!  And also there's a non-hanging version, too.  It's funny the things that inspire us.  Sometimes there's a long and abstract chain of creative thought that leads to some unlikely place.  Other times, there's a hanging basket that makes you think "hey, it would be fun to make a hanging basket!"

I tend to stylise things and really like working out what the essential elements are that make something look like the thing that it is, and this was a g...

Updates! Slant Caddy, Clamp Hooks, and Other Stuff!

Hey hey!  Updates ahoy!

Wider Slant Caddy Model

This new Slant Caddy element (see photo above) is the equivalent size of the existing piece that has that orientation plus one of the rhombus-style non-pointy ones joined together into one more voluminous caddy part!  There's also a version (as you can see) that has no front, to act more like a shelf.

These new models are Caddy E and Caddy F, and there's also a lid that isn't shown in those photos! 2022-08-03 07:21:50 +0000 UTC View Post

Bobble Tub

Hi there, wonderful people!

You might see some conceptual parallels with the Arboreal Vase here!  Like that vase, this Bobble Tub is a vase mode model that plays with the idea of depth illusions in the outer perimeter.  Well, it's not really an illusion at all, there really is a great deal of depth there, but the illusion is in the appearance of those bubbly bobbly bits on the outside, which are of course still connected to the main body, that being a fundamental constraint of...

Null Capsule

Howdy, wonderful people!

There are so many ways to approach making boxes!  This one started as a pointy diamond, believe it or not!  Imagine an elongated cube with one point chopped off and turned into a lid - that's what this was!  I had curved all the edges and points, though, and really liked the feel of it, but it wasn't very practical (okay, okay, it's creative 3D printing, things don't really have to be practical, but still!).  So, I reworked the concept into s...

The Torture Brolly!

Howdy, wonderful people!

This one's going to be publicly available, but I'm posting it here regardless! :)

It's amazing what 3D printers can handle!  But let's put things to the test with an umbrella that folds and extends with all sorts of complicated linkages, sliding components and folding bits, all of which prints assembled, without supports, and is ready to go, right off the print bed!

Now, how much torture is involved in printing this?  It's actually not that...

Inflection Vase

Once again I had loaded up the printers with multi-coloured "toothpaste"-style filament, and wondered what kind of elements might show off the fact that the print surface bears a different colour depending on the orientation of the model with respect to the printer.  

You'd never know to look at this but the first version of this idea was very angular, with flat planes tilting in different directions up the height of the vase, but it occurred to me that I could make that a continuo...

Ozone Glasses Case

If there's one thing that 3D printing is good at, it's making hard cases for things!  In this case, a hard case for glasses.  This vaguely-triangular-prism-shaped box features a lid that hinges over the top and room to add magnets if you want a little extra security.  

Both sides are build to support adding felt or other cloth to protect against scratching, with the lid incorporating a low border to keep the felt from getting in the way of the moving parts.

And, imp...

X-Mesh Containers

Hey there, wonderful people!

Expanded metal mesh is such a clever invention - sheet metal sliced and stretched into that characteristic diamond mesh pattern.  Having a fondness for industrial stylings I wondered if it would be possible to design a printable version, and here we are!

There are five models: two circular and three rectangular.  The rectangular versions came first, and it was a fun exercise working out how to transform that into a rounded shape without causi...

Arboreal Vase

I love making vase mode do strange things!  This leafy construction still abides by all the cardinal rules of vase-mode-ery, namely that every horizontal slice can be traced as a single profile that differs only slightly from those above and below, but it gives the impression of independent columns standing out from a cylindrical inner!

If you load this up in your slicer and run the layer preview up and down, you'll see how it's all put together.  Getting all those interior an...

Gamma Pod (multi- and single-material versions)

I think I was channelling 70's sci-fi motifs when I put this one together.  Okay, so that's not the first time that such stylings have invaded my thoughts!  Those louvre-style panels and borders definitely say "space lounge" to me.  But what this thing really is is an excuse to play around with multimaterial printing! 

The process of designing and test printing things often reveals interesting ways in which things can go wrong, and this one is no exception.  As ...

Sprocket Column Vase

Cogs and vase mode!  These cogs and rack gears, while faithfully based on legitimate gear profiles, are forever locked into place by their vase-mode-ish-ness.  Gears just look cool, though, and I'd been meaning to try to work them into a vase design forever!

This one went though a bunch of different concepts before it ended up in its final triangular prism shape.  The cogs were twisted around a cylinder (boy did that look silly), and tiled around a hexagonal prism (not ba...

King Skull Case (For Dice and Other Stuff)

Skulls and dice, together at last!  Okay, so maybe skulls are an eternally popular partner to dice.  In fact, the first dice were made from tiny skulls!  Okay, I made that up.  Regardless, now there's a convenient way to store dice in skulls thanks to the King Skull Case!

The King Skull case (it could be a Queen Skull, too - I looked up crown traditions and a spiky one like that can really go either direction) features a hollow skull with a crown that screws onto the...

Fandango Box

Who doesn't love gratuitously -complicated mechanisms, right?  Why have a simple hinged lid when you can have a multi-part articulated lid that opens like a fan, with hinges at one side and slots at the other that move in a constrained arc?!

Yes, when you pull the outermost part of the lid up by its protruding handle each panel will move up then catch its neighbour in turn, and it'll make satisfying clackety sounds in the process!  

2022-06-12 09:07:17 +0000 UTC View Post

Illusionist Vase

Howdy wonderful people [who love geometry]!  

Another vase in the growing family that includes the Reciprocal and Inversion vases, the Illusionist Vase dispenses with the twists but keeps the same sense of contrasting texture and that same kind of double-shell style.  Where it really differs, though, is that internal texture, which features a kind of scooped-out, scalloped profile that looks very different to the twisty ribs of its brethren!  

The scoops are curved,...

Hex Sweep Tablet and Phone Stands

Howdy, wonderful people!

That recent planetary-geared tablet stand works very nicely, but there's also something to be said for the other end of the complexity spectrum, so I set out to make some single-piece, stylish phone and tablet stands.  

The result is a set of chunky slabs that bend into an (incomplete) triangle and feature big hexagonal imprints.  There are three sizes!  One intended for large tablets, one for phones, and another one in between for, well, bi...

Barbershop Cup and Stacking Slot Cups!

Howdy, wonderful people!

I do love things that stack.  So, I made some cups, though the shorter one looks more like a tray than a cup, and there's a taller one that's more like a caddy than a cup.  Anyway, suffice to say, roughly-cylindrical-shaped thingies that stack nicely on each other.  Those are the Stacking Slot Cups.

While that was fun, I couldn't help vee...

Knitted Vase (vase and regular modes)

Hey there, wonderful people!

The name says it all on this one - very much inspired by the textures of chunky knitting!  Someone with more expertise in such textiles would probably also know what kind of stitch that's based on, but I just aimed to replicate the kind of patterns that always strike me as so tactile and recognisable.

Of course, we can't simply model such things directly, because overhangs are a thing, and because I was aiming for this to be printable in vase mode...

Clamp Hooks (horizontal and vertical)

Hooks!  I do love hooks!  Such useful, practical things, and I've made quite a number over the years.  There are plenty of random printed hooks around my house, hung over the tops of things, screwed into things or zip-tied to poles.  Printed hooks are one of those things that can be really practical.

Actually attaching hooks to things isn't always simple, though, which is what inspired these designs.  These two big hooks have integrated print-in-place screw clam...

Planetary Ptablet Platform

Hey there, wonderful people!

You may remember the Planetary Phone Stand from a while back, the model that started as an experiment I thought nobody would ever want to print!  Well, periodically I get requests for a larger tablet version of that.  

Of course, that model is already a very tight squeeze on regular printers, so in order to support much larger, heavier devices we now have this multi-part assembled version whose main design goals were (a) be stable, and (b) lo...

Counterpoise Bowl

Hey there, wonderful people!

It's so satisfying to pull this one off the build plate and turn it upside down in a clattering of extending parts! The Counterpoise Bowl (or is it a basket?) is formed from a series of concentric rings that print accordioned-up together, unstacking to hang suspended just above the ground from three curved legs.

Now, it's worth noting that the Counterpoise Bowl isn't meant to fold up for convenience or anything like that - the legs are fixed in positio...

Fragment Ball

Magnets ahoy!  There's something super cool about strategically-placed magnets pulling something into shape, as they do in this neat little ball!  I'm not sure what you'd describe this shape as - somewhere between a dodecahedron and a pentagonal antiprism, maybe, but it unfolds into a series of triangular-ish panels with pentagonal-ish cups at the ends.

There are sixteen magnets - one...