6. 3D Scanning and printing¶
- Design and 3D print an object (small, few cm3, limited by printer time) that could not be easily made subtractively
- 3D scan an object, try to prepare it for printing (and optionally print it)
👩🏽🎤 Design and 3D print an object¶
For this week assignment I decided to create a nursery vase for my pine bonsai seeds that I have on my desk at work. They were in a compostable vase and I wanted to upgrade their vase.
👩🏽🍳 Design¶
I started by measuring my actual vase: I wanted to do a vase that would fit the compostable one. I did not want to do something crazy but at least I wanted to test the overhang of 45 degrees. I then moved to Fusion360 to start designing the vase:
I sketched the profile of the vase and then did a revolution around z axis.
I did a fillet and decided not to shell the vase. I did so because I did not want the thickness of the wall to be a costraint for me: I could make it hollow just by not putting the infill and the top layers in the slicer.
I exported the stl file from Fusion and imported it in Simplify3D.
🍕 Slice¶
Once I imported the stl in the slicer, I selected the profile for the machine I have at work, a Delta Wasp 2040 with a 0.4 nozzle.
In the Layer panel, I set the layer height at 0,2 and decided that I did not want top layers because I wanted the vase to be hollow (of course). Since I wanted two perimeters of shell, I also set the bottom layers to be 4: since the nozzle is 0.4 and I do 2 perimeters, the wall will be 0.8 thick and I want that thickness also in the bottom layers, that will depend on the layer height (0.2). Therefore, if I do 4 bottom layers I will have uniformity. I also set the infill to be 0% to have the vase hollow. Here is the vase sliced.
Once sliced, I saved the gcode in my Delta Wasp 2040 SD Card and prepare to print.
🏰 Print¶
I turned on the printer and let her do her things. I already had a black PLA filament that I liked, so I did not change the filament. What I needed to do was to level the plate of the printer. I did this by using a good old paper sheet and the menu of the Delta Wasp.
I did this first of all going in Prepare > Modify height: I positioned the paper sheet on the plate and I rotated the crank until I felt that the paper had enough friction with the extruder.
I leveled also the three points, in this case Prepare > Manual level and I did the same with the three points. I then was ready to print and selected my gcode from the SD menu card:
🔭 3D scan an object, try to prepare it for printing¶
For the scanning part, I started to look at the options I had in terms of softwares and the majority of them were not free, or they were not available for iOS. Therefore I switched to the iPhone possibilities and I downloaded the following apps:
- Capture
- 3d Scanner App
- Qlone
- Polycam
Capture¶
I opened Capture and the app said you had to scan the objects with the Front camera:
What a beautiful sight! Once I tried to use the back camera, I was told that I needed to upgrade to do so, so I quit.
3d Scanner App¶
I opened 3d Scanner App and my device was not Supported. YAY
Qlone¶
First of all, Qlone lets you download a QRcode mat that helps the scanning process. Therefore I printed the mat, selected an object and started 3d scanning.
What I liked about Qlone is the fact that it visually guides you with rectangles on the shots that have been done for the scanning and therefore you make sure you have all the shots you need.
The final scanning was not pleasant, to be honest, so I moved to the next app.
Polycam¶
The last option was Polycam, which I found the best solution. I started scanning my boyfriend (see a picture of the process here made by my friend Andrea Avalli) and I found the outcome to be quite nice.
I then decided to scan a big teddy bear we had in our lab to see how it would come out. I took 150 photos of the bear.
I was shocked! I downloaded the obj and the step file to move the object in Fusion360 in order to print it.
Printing¶
I had to eliminate the bottom background of my bear and I did so by extruding a rectangle and cutting it.
Once the bear was ready, I exported the stl and sliced it. This is the final result!
