3D Printer Hexagonal Planter

Intention

When I first began this project and started brainstorming ideas for what to make, I initially ruled out making planters since I wanted to make something somewhat more useful. However, after searching through Thingiverse and Pinterest, I realized that the common trends for 3D Printed objects that held smething could be categorized as eiher cups/vases or iPhone holders. I then revisited the idea of making a planter since I would be able to customize it as I choose and coulld use it to hold my succulent plant. 

Context

After I had decided to create a planter, I started playing around with different ideas that I could design in Fusion360. I really liked the vase we had designed, but unfortunately I would need a solid body in order to hold in the soil and the plant. I decided to create the hexagonal planter as I was playing around with the different sketch tool, drawing isnpiration from the planters I saw on Thingiverse.

Process

I liked the idea of a geometric design and was able to use the loft tool to easily create the slanted walls of the planter, with the polygon tool for the hexagonal bases. One of the things I was confused about was the size of the planter. I initially made it have a hexagonal edge dimension of 3 inches, but had to go back and resize my design to a 1 inch edge size since that still led to a large hexagon. I used a circular patten to try and make the design more elaborate, but this led to the design not being completely closed. As such, I decided to first print the simpler design and try the complex one if the first one was successful. I've attached a picture of my first print of the hexagonal planter. Unfortunately, there appeared to be holes in the body which led to the printer printing spaghetti instead of a closed planter. 

Moving on from there, I got help from Louise and one of her friends who came in on the last day of class to fix the body and make sure it was now closed. I used the Mesh Mixer program to double check the mesh and ensure that there were no holes. 

Product

I'm still waiting on the final planter to be printed since the NVBots machines are down for maintenance.

Reflection

I found it really interesting to be working in 3 dimensions instead of 2 with a fixed material width as is the case with laser cutting. I liked being able to use Fusion360's tools to easily construct 3D bodies, but next time, I might try looking into a different way to construct it to avoid the holes that were present in my initial design.