Planetary Fidget Spinner

thingiverse

As a mechanical engineering student, I thought it'd be fascinating to attempt creating a fidget spinner that utilizes planetary style gears, and here's my design! This innovative device can be spun conventionally like a typical fidget spinner, held still while spinning the gears, or even used as a back scratcher by rolling it on your back. Check out the print instructions below for more details. 1. Make sure to print each gear separately if your printer is prone to remote stringing issues, and always enable the minimize perimeter crosses setting. This will prevent any unwanted strings from getting in between the gear teeth, causing them not to mesh properly. 2. You'll likely need to drill out the holes in the center of the planetary fork and receiver (use a 1/4 inch drill bit). Be cautious, as the bottom layer may be wider than the rest, potentially interfering with the hole. 3. Double-check that the bottom side of the center gear is positioned on the opposite side of the spinner from the other three gears' bottoms. Tight tolerances are crucial here, so if the wider bottoms attempt to mesh, it could jam the gears. 4. You'll probably need to sand the planetary fork and pins due to stringing issues. The gears should spin smoothly around these areas. Print two planetary pins at once to prevent overheating problems when switching between them. 5. Keep in mind that the exact tolerances required may vary depending on your extrusion settings. If something doesn't fit, or parts don't stay together, try adjusting the scale by 0.01 increments. The tolerances can be as precise as hundredths or thousandths of an inch. 6. Please do not print the full planetary_fidget_spinner STL file. I included it for visualization purposes only. Lastly, I'm working on adding a pin to the middle so that the sun gear/middle gear remains stationary while the rest spin relative to the pin. This feature will be uploaded as an additional pin soon. Update 1: The cap on my spinner started coming loose after some use, so I've uploaded a revised version with a slightly smaller cap. You may or may not find it more suitable depending on your extrusion settings.