We were tasked to create a container that provided function to our lives and were asked to look around bedroom for inspiration. Coming back from studying abroad, I realized I did not anything to put my makeup. My current situation were throwing them into poaches in a random drawer.
The left shows my sketch of the possible outline of the box with the type of cutouts I would like to include.
To under the visuals and different point of views, I decided to create a 3D diagram. I am able to understand how the different cutouts will look together and modify if needed.
It's important to be conscious of the material we use, and acrylic is not a biodegradable material. Therefore, I wanted to test out the structure more by creating two mini models and another true size one.
The two mini models served to see if I preferred to have all the corners at the same or different heights. These quick models meant to showcase a general outline, which helped me to determine I enjoyed the more fluidness which came with uneven heights.
Changing the illustrator file once more, I created another true-size cardboard model before moving forward to using the marble acrylic material.
An issue arose when making the final product: the caliper I used had some issues measure the thickness of the acrylic. Hence, there were some misalignments of the sides. To fix this issue I lasered off 0.1 inch off each side piece which allowed all the pieces together. With the left over material made from the cut outs, I intend to make them into earrings as to not be wasteful.
On the right shows the box sitting on my shelf holding my makeup.
Testing. Testing. Testing. Make as many models as possible. Overall, I’m really happy with my prototype turned out because it looked just like my sketch.
The second part of the assignment was to 3D print our laser cut box. However, I didn’t want to simply create a box, because with an Ultimaker I could create multiple curve shapes. Inspired by Gustaf Weistman, I wanted no edges only a round, puffy exterior, changing the base to a C-shape to add more fluidness to the work.
This is was my first time working with Fusion 360, so I had to quickly familiarize myself with it. I started off created the base and cut-outs in Illustrator before importing them as SVG files into Fusion. From there, I was able to extrude the base up to a height of 4.5 inches and extrude the organic shapes to make the cut-outs. I chose the lip of the container to print for the 1 inch test, because I wanted to see the rounded edge.
My Cura settings for the Ultimaker S3:
I also scaled down the container to lower the duration. To continue onto the theme of “organic,” I also increased the thickness of the walls from 0.3 to 0.4 inches, and filleted all the edges to be round.
By far the most difficult part of the whole progress was taking out the support from the cutouts, because they were the same tough PLA as the container. On the positive side, the support prevented any uneven layering and all the edges were extremely smooth. I first used pliers to take out the larger pieces, but left some residue. To combat this, I first tried to use a mini drill in attempt to smooth out the residue, but it was extremely hard to control only destroying the edges more.
From here, I realized that the only way to take out the support would be by hand with pliers and precision screwdrivers which had a flat by sharp edge. I painstakingly picked out all the support which was not fun. I also tried using a nail filer to smooth the edges, but it did not succeed. From this, I learned that next time I could either use a water-soluble support or decrease the support infill more so it would be much easier to take out. Overall, I really like how the 3D print turned out for a first time project, but I have much to experiment with when it comes to extracting support.
