Spinning top with wooden pencil

cults3d

Fun top for making cool patterns using a standard hexagonal wooden pencil. Before printing out the top body, print out the sizing template first. This should fit onto the pencil with just the right amount of friction. Due to differences in printers and pencils, this may or may not fit your pencil perfectly, so save time by starting with the sizing template. If it's too tight, scale up the part in your slicer and try again. If it's too loose but still usable, you can use some tape or a similar material to hold it in place. If you get the sizing template just right, it'll slide on and stay put, which is ideal. Once you've got the sizing template at the correct scale, load up the top body you want (two legs or three legs - just a matter of what looks cooler) and print away. You can use 100% infill for faster spin times, but I printed the one in the photos with 25% infill and four shells and it spins well enough to draw some cool stuff. It doesn't get the best spin time, but experiment with different start spins (spinning it on an angle works great from my tests) and also try slightly inclining the surface holding the paper. This top is really more about creating cool patterns than achieving a really long spin time. I'd bet the shape of the pencil tip might also affect the results, but I haven't tried that yet. Background: This isn't a remix in the most literal sense of the word, but SirRob's "Air Head spinning top" directly inspired this design. I came across it back in February, and had a failed print at first, but I thought the idea was cool so I managed to try again and got a good print. I played with it for a while, but that started me on the path of designing and testing my own spinning tops. I've got a bunch of designs and will try to post the good ones, but this is one of the most recent, and one of the more entertaining. Fusion 360 file included if you want to modify it to your liking. If you do, please share your remix!