Making a 3D Pen Blank

Thank you @Box and @McGordon for all your help this far. I have my object now ready to scale down Pen Section1.skp (127.4 KB)

I see on my drawing that I need to change the size of the height ( Is this refered to as the Z axis?) as when I scale this down its going to only be 2mm high.

I am wanting it to be 20 x 20 x 20 mm square

I cant see any way to do this other than to re draw it, is that correct.

Just pull the edges and the x up to the height you want.

You also might want to make the walls a bit thicker too. When I scale it so that the base is 20x20, the walls are only ~0.2mm thick which is probably too thin to print.

Your slicer will probably fix this, but the base is below the origin.

Thank you @McGordon I have done this, I doubled the wall thickness and am going to try to scale it down now

Pen Section1.skp (107.2 KB)

Scaled to 20mm x 20mm again, some walls are 0.98 and one is 1.37, but the floor is still only 0.2mm. It would be tidier if you made them all the same.

It would be easier to just work in metres so your box is 20m x 20m x 20m then scale it down when you’re ready to print or just scale it in Cura, it will probably do it automatically when you open it. The numbers are easier to work with, you won’t have to work out in your head what thickness the wall will be. If it’s 0.2m you’ll know that’s going to be 0.2mm.

As far as knowing if 0.98mm walls are ok, that depends on your printer. Don’t ask me, I’ve never 3D printed anything!

I have I think tiedied it up i cant get the tape measure tool to measure the wall thickness, it wont stay on the lines. Pen Section1.skp (116.1 KB)

You’re still working at an awkward scale 1.02m : 20mm or 1:51?
I don’t know why your tape measure isn’t working, but you could dimension it as you have with the total size. You have 0.09m walls, a 0.07m and a 0.05m floor.

wall_thick

floor_thick

Also the X is not in the middle of the box in both directions and also higher than the box…

It’s not that a complicated model, so it can be easier and quicker to just redraw it. Otherwise you can go round in circles tweaking small errors here and there. If you’re more careful while you draw it, you won’t have to go around fixing small errors later.

I drew a 20x20 rectangle, pulled it up 2 and drew the outline on the top face, then pulled up the walls and the x. The Xs are 4 thick and 1 away from inside of the walls at closest point. Adjust these thicknesses and gaps to suit your printer. All sizes were in m but to be scaled down to mm (1:1000).

Pen Section gm.skp (40.5 KB)

I drew it at 20m x 20m x 20m and Cura imports it without even saying it scaled it at 20mm x 20mm x 20mm.

@McGordon

Thank you, I am going to start a fresh as suggested, I exported your design and opened it in Cura. It printed ok until it got to the top where it printed over the whole top.

Oh well, it’s a start!
I’ve no idea why it would cover the top unless it was printed upside down. Can you cut or sand that layer away to see what’s inside?

Which printer do you have?

It’s a great start I will sand it, I have a Anet, A* PLUS 3D printer

@McGordon I started again and have done a cylinder, I have followed everything in this topic that you have told me. I think this time it is tidyer and it is ready to be scaled and printed

PB21.skp (139.3 KB) PB2.skp (139.2 KB)

It looks ok, it is solid. The floor is quite thin at 0.5mm. It might be only one layer when printed, maybe 2 depending on resolution. It’s 20.5 high now instead of 20 if that matters to you.

Do you know that you can see a preview of every layer to be printed in Cura? So you can see what’s going to happen before you print, like how many layers on the floor.

I have previewed it in Cura and the box is not a solid and the cylinder is not a solid. its a box within a box and a cylinder within a cylinder. The boves print separetly and so do the cylinderes, and despite the drawing showing no top after slicing it the printer prints a lid on the box

The walls are only 0.8mm thick, so if your nozzle size is 0.4 you’ve only got room for two layers in the thickness of the wall. Is that what you mean? Even if you set infill at 100%, the square walls still only have two layers, but the cylinder kind of gets 3.

I don’t know why it’s printing a lid.

Any chance you printed it upside down.

I have lots to learn before i even attempt to try and do a 3D print

Are you using STL format to export to Cura?

If you’re using DAE that might explain the printing of a lid on the box.
Have a look at this thread: