Heart tracer

thingiverse

My printable shape things can be made quickly with little plastic. I created these designs to be simple and easy to understand so that anyone can resize them as needed. Print Settings Printer: CraftBot Rafts: No Supports: No Resolution: optimum Infill: 30% square Notes: I optimized this thing to print in ABS with maximum settings. I recommend a skirt with an offset of 0mm (otherwise known as a brim) with 2-5 loops for ABS. As seen from the photo, increased infill may be helpful too. How I Designed This For this project, I used a free program from Autodesk called TinkerCAD. I'm a long-time user of AutoCAD, which is a desktop drafting program from the same company. I used TinkerCAD to make it easier for educators and learners to replicate what I did easily. TinkerCAD is awesome because it's not only free but also easy to use. It runs in your browser and has built-in instructional lessons. www.tinkercad.com For this project, I started with the geometric shape titled 'heart' on TinkerCAD. I adjusted the height to 2mm to get a strong yet minimal thing. Next, I adjusted it using Shift+click until the long side was approximately 120mm so that the thing would be large enough and fit on various printers including MakerBots. Next, I used alt+click to make another heart. Then I resized it using shift+click to 110mm and moved it to the center of the original heart. Using the hide and group features, I had a final product. Project: Heart Tracer Objective The purpose of this project is to help kids learn about shapes by being hands-on. Using my tracers, kids will be able to interact with shapes by tracing, cutting, and coloring them. Audience The intended audience is kids 3+ with adult supervision, although these would be good for all ages to keep in their craft materials for when they need a perfect geometric shape. Preparation Teachers wishing to modify the size of their own triangles will need access to a computer with internet access and be logged on to a free TinkerCAD account. Tinkercad is easier to use with a mouse than with a tablet or trackpad, so computer mice are recommended. No previous 3D design experience is required for students, although familiarity with Tinkercad would be helpful. Kids should have access to crayons/color pencils and safety scissors and be supervised at all times. Step 1: Adjust Size Depending on your project and needs, you may need to adjust the size of the object. Simply download the thing from here and upload it to www.tinkercad.com. Next, press shift+click on one of the corners to adjust the size. Remember that you can adjust the snap in the bottom right corner which will allow you to be more or less accurate. Step 2: Print! Check out the beginning of this project for recommended settings. It would be good to let kids in on this process, but remember that there are lots of hot pieces on a 3D printer. Step 3: Trace Either have your kid(s) hold down the shapes and trace in or outside them, or alternatively tape the shapes down. Step 4: Cut Assist your kid(s) in cutting out the shapes. Using safety scissors is advised, and using non-straight scissors (like the ones that cut in wavy lines) could add more fun. Step 5: Color If you had the kid(s) trace inside of the thing, they could have just colored it all the way in already. Nonetheless, you can use this part of the project to also teach them about colors. Results The kids can use this to learn about shapes, colors, and scissor safety. This will give kids a good head start for their academic careers!