3D printed magnetis building board fixtures?

[Turbojoe]

OK. So my daughter bought an Ender3 Prusa clone 3D printer. Although I'd never seen or touched a 3D printer before I'm now its builder, caretaker and operator and have finally gotten fairly proficient at printing downloaded files from Thingiverse. As far as any designing goes my daughter will be learning CAD soon but not soon enough. I can't design diddly. For now I'm just a printing fool. Lot's of hobby related (and for her) goodies printed already.

I have an old Eldon J. Lind magnetic building package and accessories. I hate the crappy magnets that it comes with. I have several laser cut fixtures that I bought a while back that use neodymiums. MUCH better! I searched Thingiverse for some magnetic building board fixtures. I came up with a few but none that will help me. The few that use neodymium use sizes I don't have and would never have any other use for and the others use the crappy magnet/plate setup I hate. I'm sure there are more neodymium based 3D printed fixtures out there. I'm just not certain where to look yet. Thingiverse is the only 3D printing site I know so far. Anyone seen more 3D printed magnetic fixtures? Lots of options out there for neodymium magnets. If I see 3D printed fixtures that I like I'm willing to make a special order for magnets to fit. Magnets are pretty darn cheap now.

Joe

 

[jhitesma]

Do you have some rough measurements and/or photos/drawings of the type of fixtures you'd like? Shouldn't be too hard to draw some up for printing sized to use the magnets you want to use.

 

[kdobson83]

I'm kinda lost by what you are looking for. What do you mean 3d printed magnetic fixtures? What kind of fixtures? And if you found some that would work but the magnet hole is wrong, this is pretty easy to fix. Link what your looking at and the size of your magnet (in mm's) and I'll see if I can modify it for you.

 

[Turbojoe]

Thanks for the offers guys. It took me a while to find the ones I was thinking about (LINK) on Thingiverse but when I found it I also stumbled on "Customizer". Holy cow ! It looks like I may be able to reconfigure those files to fit my pile of 6mmx3mm disc magnets myself. I'll try to play around in it later. I'm finding new 3D printing stuff every day. Way cool.

I still can't design anything myself but I'm sure everyone has had the orange rib upright tool that comes in the House of Balsa kits. I'd LOVE to have one of them double thickness (to stiffen it) and with feet to hold magnets and ensure 90 degrees. There are so many other ways to accomplish the same task but the modified upright would be a cool new tool.

Joe

 

[kdobson83]

Tinkercad.com. Super easy to design your own stuff. Watch a couple YouTube how too videos on it. I learned how to use tinkercad in about and hour. Well, the basics anyway. Very easy to figure it out as you go.

 

[CarolineTyler]

Tinkercad.com. Super easy to design your own stuff. Watch a couple YouTube how too videos on it. I learned how to use tinkercad in about and hour. Well, the basics anyway. Very easy to figure it out as you go.

Big thumbs up for tinkercad!!
Yes, tinkercad is super easy to get going with.... Especially while I'm in that steep initial learning curve of Fusion 360!!!

 

[Turbojoe]

First off. THANK YOU EVERYONE! I took a look at TinkerCad last night and had "some" success creating the modified H.O.B. upright. Only added the first 1/16" slot though. Then I lost it all when trying to save the file. I think I know how to save now after seeing another YT video. It's gonna take a while for this dusty old noggin to finger it all out but I'm inspired now. I'll work at it little by little. I'm seeing SO many things I could design and print to make everything so much easier. This printer is my daughters. I now see that I'll have to buy my own when she finally takes it.

Joe

 

[BobW55]

I use Simplify3D..... I am still learning.
If there was a local school offering a class Id sign up, even at my age.

 

[abhiash]

While using the simple form that will be going to provide the most of the part which will be having the most of the formation that needs to manage it so https://epsonsupports.net/blog/epson-printer-not-printing/ have the fill information to 3d printed magnetics building board fixes the part.

 

[kdobson83]

To save your work in tinkercad hit the tinkercad home button at the top left corner. It automatically saves then returns you to home. Here's a pic of the button.

Another quick tip to help, use control + z to undo something you just messed up. Lol Maybe your computer glitched or you hit the wrong button and it messed something up, if you hit control and z at the same time it'll undo the last action. You are able to hit it multiple times too. I use this "undo" function A LOT! Lol Another quick tip, learn how to use the align tool. It makes lining up parts simple and easy! And one last tip, learn how to import files. You can import other parts that have been made by other people that you want to modify, or, you can use other websites to convert 2D images like a name plate or jpg into a 3D image and then import it into tinkercad. While this does require a bit more knowledge it's great for adding detail that would otherwise take hours to do to your work. Here is a rough draft of a picture I pulled off Google images and turned into a 3D image.

If you need a tad more help just let me know. I feel like I'm pretty good at tinkercad so far.

But, keep in mind, tinkercad is a tad limiting for the more inteicate designs. But it works great for simpler designs.

 

[Turbojoe]

Thanks again you guys for the tips. I haven't gotten any email notices of these new thread posts since last week. Hmmm.

The little I played with Tinkercad last week was promising since I spent less than an hour actually working with it but I haven't been able to get back to it since. kdobson83: I make nothing but mistakes so I learned early about ctrl-Z! So glad it works in Tinkercad too. Your other tips also touched on exactly the things I'm having trouble with such as aligning and getting the depth of the open "slot" accurate. When I go back in again I'll make sure the first thing I do is make sure I SAVE my work properly! I found one good YouTube video that I could learn a lot from but the guys voice and the echos make it so hard to listen for long. If anyone knows some good videos that don't go off into the boring technical aspects that turn a noob off I'd love to see them.

Joe