***UPDATE December 28th 2014~!

I now have this sword for sale on Sculpteo. If you would like to purchase one please go to my Sculpteo store.

Price starting at $14.39 Sword of Triex (Now has a officialish name!)

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After having the Razor Sword printed I thought to myself, “I need to go bigger.” And well I did! At just over 18CM I give you… My next print… I have yet to name it, but right now referring it to Superion’s Sword / Sword of Iacon.

I was not able to print this with Shapeways as they have a 10CM rule about printing any sort of weapons. Instead I went with with Sculpteo. The material I chose to print in was Alumide Material. (Aluminum dust added to plastic…) Shapeways also has a similar material…

The sword is rather strong, and I am assuming would be similar strength in the regular white plastic strong (if not stronger.)

Anyways less talking more pictures!

I started off using Tinkercad.com to build the 3D model.

The model was printed with Sculpteo in Alumide material.  I picked this material specifically as a test to see how strong/weak and what the material was like with qualities/strengths/weaknesses.

Receiving the model it came in somewhat grainy straight lines. (I figured this would come this way.) You can see in one of the first pictures above. The printed results I was pretty happy with, even with the Autobot emblem was slightly smudged on one side. This might have been from the way it was printed and clearly the size of the spacing in the emblem. Either way one side came out pretty clear (I might try to use some black acrylic accents on the emblem to make it stand out a bit more.)

To fill in some of the grainy lines I used a primer spray paint. (The second picture above is after the first coat.) After 2-3 coats it started to fill in and give it a much more smooth finish. Some of the swords edges also required some sanding due to this material being more on the grainy / rugged side.

Painting it with a acrylic paint gave it a flat matte look with no shine. I did about another 2-3 coats especially on the yellow handle as I accidentally painted into yellow areas with the gray. (The gray tends to be VERY dark and thick!) I used some very small brush tips to refine the edges and give a very clear crisp lines.

After finishing painting I used a clear finish matte sealer. Which I did several coats of (which gave it a bit of the shine seen in the final pictures.) This dried very quickly and gave it a bit more strength.

To REALLY give it a final shine on the blade I used Pledge FloorCare multi-surface. This dries clear and gives it a little more protection.

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Final notes going forward I am going to make all my pegs for hands to hold a blade slightly smaller than the 5mm. The problem is most items after painting, sealing, and so forth… Causes it to “scrape.” After reading some on the net this is also explained and they suggest going as much as .25 mm shy of the 5mm. To as little as .10 of the 5mm.

Finally when painting I highly suggest you understand the paint. The yellow I choose was SO thin when it went on that any mistakes I made with the darker colors (the gray) made me have to do SEVERAL layers of yellow to cover it up. When I did the red I learned this so I simply covered the whole blade in gray then came back with the red. (This gave it a bit darker red which fits nicely with Superion’s red!)

 

Products Used:

DecoArt DASK264 Americana Primary Sample Pack

SC Johnson Pledge Floor Care Multi-Surface Finish 27 OZ

Sprueing is a method of joining a multi-part model into one. The benefit of this is that most 3D Printers charge an additional flat rate per “part” even if it is in the same model. Separated parts usually can add as little as $1.50 to even a $6 charge per part.

Sprueing does have its own challenges as different materials require different thicknesses. Most white strong materials require at minimum 1mm thickness. 1mm sprues are rather springy and “give” when pushed or dropped. Resin (Sculpteo) requires a 2mm thickness. Each material has its own requirements for sizes so it is always best to keep this in mind when printing. When I first did this I was concerned that it was adding costs and “waste” to my model, however with Shapeways recent price changes it actually reduced the cost over all. (Shapeways.com before October 7th 2014 it would have raised the price!)

At home printing is slightly different as instead of printing the whole thing you might print on a flattened plain or each individual piece separately. Sprues and Cages are really only for commercial grade printers that use the powder layering process.

 

Pictured above is version 1.0 hands of one my models I am working on. It consists of 2 joints on each of the 4 main fingers, 2 thumbs, 2 5mm pegs to fill the wrists if needed and 2 palms. Totaling 20 parts. Without sprueing this model would cost over $30. By placing sprues in the model this costs less than $10 depending on the material selected.

The above is printed in white strong polished. It has a rather nice “spring” to it when pushed on but bounces back rather well.

Spruing is a rather easy process basically I personally use Tinkercad. Adding in columns and sizing their thickness to 1mm then placing them so they connect and create a strong structure. Most smaller pieces only need one connection point. (Fingers, and joints…) And on the larger parts I have 2-3 connections.

If your model is not going to be polished then you may not need as many sprues. However… If you plan for it to be put through several processes its best to add more.

While sprues do add a little more labor involved after receiving the model in the end it does provide the printer you use a LOT less work involved. (Somewhat wish they would speed up the ordering process on models like these!)

These sprues if done small enough to spec they really do not even leave a mark once cut. I use the following tools to remove and scrap excess away.

Wire cutters or Scissors. (To cut each part from the rest of the model initially.)

Elmers/X-Acto X3037 Axent Knife with Cap, Blue. (To clean the parts of any excess.)

Use your wire cutters to cut away at the sprues freeing up each piece. It is ok to leave some room on the parts. As the final process you will use your X-Acto Knife to scrap layer by layer to smooth the spots where the sprues joined your parts.

In following this process and using the above tools I was able to remove any excess material from the sprues. I was afraid that it might leave marks or bumps on the model but it actually did not.  You do have to be slow and careful and take small layers at a time off till you get a smooth surface. Smaller parts are easy to mess up on so be careful and go slow. White Strong Plastic can be pretty forgiving depending on the model you print.

 

I have started back into what started me in Computers in the last few months… 3D!
Years back I worked in a program called Adobe Atmosphere (R.I.P. 2001) – Wikipedia link. Long story short Adobe finished it out and hit version 1 and discontinued it. The product was WAY ahead of its time and basically allowed people to create 3D Worlds that you could chat/play/and explore.

Anyways without further going into that history here is some pictures of my first works. Back in 3D.

(Using Tinkercad!)

The sword comes in two parts. Which gives the ability to print in two different materials. For this I chose to print in Transparent and Strong White Plastic. It came out pretty nice. I had to also split it up like this in order to comply with Shapeways terms and conditions. (No weapons larger than 10CM…)

Because of this I had to split it up… Which I have another project that I finished that I had to print with another company that does not have this rule.

I am at the moment finishing the handle in a yellow paint. (Unfortunately not exactly the orange yellow seen with the AOE Bumblebee above…) It should however give it a nice clean look.

To see it in my Shapeways store: Shaunware Design