Week 3: 3d printing and 3d scanning
This week I built a masking tape dispenser for my friend Dennis. Dennis owns a restaurant in Montreal and uses a lot of masking tape to label products. However, even though the entire food industry uses masking tape every day, few masking tape dispensers are available. I will gift my friend the customized dispenser for his birthday next week-end.
The first step of the process was to design the product in Fusioon 360. I built a 2 pieces design that included a base and a wheel for the tape.
I used a circular patttern to make a pretty wheel including hearts and flowers. I also engraved the base with a joke and the name of my friend's restaurant. I am happy to share that i am getting more proficient with Fusion. Making this design took me significantly less time than other weeks. I was also more proficient with parametric ideas. I was able to anchor the design more efficiently, this making scaling a breeze. In comparison, I had to readjust most sketches last week.
I first tried to 3d print the dispenser at SC102 at Harvard. However, I encountered issues with the print. I was unable to get the first layer to stick to the bed. I tried to adjust the settings of the print and asked for help from my TA. However, I was unable to get it to work. After 7 or 8 tries, I was unable to get the first layer to stick to the bed of the printer.
I ended up using the GSD print farm for printing. The GSD requires students to use stick glue to help the first stick. This change proved fruitful and all my subsequent prints did not suffer from this failure. It also uses the printOS web app which lets you monitor prints from your browser. It's thus easy to see if a print is encounbtering issues and to know when it's done.
I encountered more issues with the prints. First, the PLA wire got tangled, this caused the base print to stop. This happenned again with the inside wheel. I also made a design mistake and had to redesign the base to allow the roll to be feeded in the mechanism. Finally, I made a measurement error and had to re-design the inside wheel.
I ended up with a functional tape dispenser. I learned a lot about 3d printing and I am very happy with the result.
Week 3: 3d printing and 3d scanning
For the 3D scanning, I attempted to build a bobblehead figurine of myself. I scanned my face using photogrammetry and will be adding it to the design as soon as I have time.
I will add the scanned head to a DJing figurine. I purchased a model online and modified it in Blender.
