3D Printing Useful Things

I’ve owned my 3D printer for eight months now. I spent the first six months printing “decorative” items that ended up sitting on shelves — and while those things are fun to print, it’s tough to justify the money I spent on the printer ($600) when only printing cookie cutters and action figure stands.

Over the past couple of months, things started to change. It all started roughly two months ago, when I realized I needed some bookends for my DVD shelves. Thinking they would only cost a dollar or two, I went to Amazon in search of some cheap plastic L-shaped bookends and was surprised to learn they cost $10/pair! As my cursor hovered over “buy it now,” an idea hit me — why not print some? Within an hour or two (faster than Amazon could deliver them!), I had downloaded a simple 3D model and printed out my own bookends. They’re exactly the shape I wanted, and (excluding the cost of the printer) the pair cost me a nickle’s worth of filament to print. The idea of printing something actually useful for a change piqued my interest.

Last night while decluttering my work area, I discovered just how many pairs of sunglasses I own (five). I don’t have a good place to keep them, and I decided to check Amazon to see if they sold stands for sunglasses. They do, but deju vu quickly kicked in, and I decided to check online for any similar 3D-printable models. I found one in less than a minute, and in less than an hour, I had printed one!

The design is simple but effective. After affixing the rack to a flat surface with a couple of screws, sunglasses can be easily hung by slipping one of the arms through the plastic hoop. After popping the holder off the print bed, I ran a block of fine grit sandpaper over the whole thing just to smooth everything out.

I already had the perfect spot picked out downstairs for the rack. Since my sunglasses always end up on my desk, I decided the side of my desk would make a great mounting spot. I found a couple of shallow screws out in the garage and colored the heads black with a Sharpie to color the heads black (probably not a professionally recommended technique).

Is printing things cheaper than buying them? If you figure in the price of the printer, probably not, but it’s getting close. Again, the cost of the printing filament is almost negligible. I estimate that the sunglasses rack cost around 20 cents to print. According to my records, I’ve printed about 30 things I’ve kept over the past eight months. $600 / 30 = $20 per item, plus the 20 cents worth of plastic. Of course the more things I print the more the price per item will decrease.

Even if it weren’t, I’d still do it. We are still in the early dawn of 3D printing. The future’s so bright… I gotta wear shades.