Valentines Heart Box with Surprise

thingiverse

This is a showstopper gift box, perfect for Valentine's Day or any occasion that calls for a romantic touch. The surprise inside is a beautifully hidden and backlit heart shape in the center of the lid. A flashing RGB LED powered by a CR2032 battery provides the backlighting, with a lifespan of several days and easy replacement. No soldering is required - just press everything into place and it will hold snugly. Whether or not you use the light, the box has ample space to hold treats if desired (note: the cool LED won't melt wrapped chocolate). The design looks great whether set up on a pedestal or not. You can find the necessary LEDs and CR2032 batteries at various retailers. On Amazon, search for "rgb flashing led 5mm". Print Settings: Printer: PolyPrinter 229 Rafts: No Supports: No Resolution: 0.20 mm Infill: 20% Notes: Make sure your print platform is clean before printing the bottom surface of the lid, which will be the most visible part of the final object. The maximum dimension of the box is about 109 mm, so it should fit on most 3D printers. If you rescale the model, the battery clip may not work correctly. Post-Printing: Here are all the Heart Box components (the battery clip has already been inserted into the box and battery and LED installed). This closeup shows the battery clip inserted into its mounting bracket in the box (a tight fit, but it will stay snug). A CR2032 battery has been inserted into the clip. Bend the LED leads as shown, ensuring the positive lead contacts the + side of the battery. There are small channels for the LED leads on the interior faces of the battery clip; once you find them, the lead will slide across the sides of the battery. How I Designed This: Creating the Circular Text (Note: this workflow may seem a bit long and complex, but it allows me to use relatively simple techniques with free or easy-to-use tools to quickly achieve the desired design.) I prefer using Microsoft Office tools for working with text, so I used Word Art to create the circular "I Love You" text in an appealing font. I re-oriented the text to place the "I" at the top of the circle and re-balanced it to appear more circular (the choice of font made this challenging). I removed all shading variance within the font to prepare for the next steps. I saved the text only as a .PNG picture. Using Inkscape, I imported the .PNG picture and did a Bitmap Trace to vectorize it. I then saved this in Inkscape's native .SVG format. I imported this .SVG file into Tinkercad where the final mixing was performed (the heart shape and other detailed designs were created in Sketchup). I gave the lettering object the correct height, converted it into a "hole" object type, and grouped it with the heart box lid object.