Printing keyring fobs

I use tinkercad (I know Earwig and others use I think fusion 360 which is a more “pro” package, but beyond my capabilities). Once you get used to it, you can do a lot with tinkercad, and being a free webbased app means I can easily login anywhere and use it. Amazing for a “website”. I may need to do a course on one of the other packages at some point.

I started with tinkercad but moved on to blender and freecad.

Fact is though that tinkercad does most of what i need and does it so easily, so I’ve pretty much gone back to using that for almost everything.

It’s so simple isn’t it, and when you learn the more “advanced features” (compared to other tools it’s poor) with ruler, and different plains, etc the midpoint/endpoint very useful when laying out holes through things, it’s quite powerful. I’d like to be able to “deform” objects a bit, but I’m a million miles from being any good at that, sooo… Leave it to the experts, lol!

I’m actually using CATIA V5, which is what the company I work for sells. It’ll set you back around £10k + £1k monthly for a basic licence. :scream:

However, I have installed FreeCAD on my home machine, which works in very much the same way (once I’ve got used to the UI quirks), so it’s easier for me than having to learn something completely different like Tinkercad.

I dabbled with Sketchup in the past, is that still a thing?
Edit: Yes, it is - https://www.sketchup.com/plans-and-pricing/sketchup-free

Yeah, much the same here. You take basic shapes and apply logic to them. Adding subtracting, etc… simple to imagine.

Forget smooth transitions from one shape to another or parametric surfaces, or creation from plans or 2D drawings though… At that point I jump to FreeCad or Blender… but then as often as not move the model back to Tinkercad for messing with other simple stuff to finalise the model.

Both Blender and FreeCad are so finnicky in their UIs that it’s just easier to do the simple stuff elsewhere.

Blender’s an absolute nightmare if you’ve got any experience of any other software ever. :laughing:
I have messed with it in the past but coming from technical 3D modelling I really struggled with it. I did use it for video editing for a while, until I found something more intuitive (I think that’s when I moved to HitFilm Express).

Test print 2. Lettering raised slightly and I found a use for the filament that came with the printer, which I’m assuming is PLA.

@PingSpike , what’s the correct font?

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You gunna share the STL once its finished Jez? :grin:

It needs to be multicolour…

Change filaments at different levels to achieve this.

I think I’ll have a go at this…key chain thingy… :thinking:

Looks awesome!

Is it difficult to do a two tone? Grey background with white writing / drone?

Pulled all the keyring discussions in to a new thread to keep @DeanoG60 's other thread on topic :+1:t2:

Easy just schedule in a filament change mid print in the Gcode :+1:t2:

Dave @OzoneVibe said Frutiger Next Black and that “it is used slightly stretched, vertically, but that’s easy to match”.

And the logos used on the GADC merch use a very similar looking Headline NEWS.

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You’re asking on behalf of the father-in-law, right? :smiley:

I have grey and white filaments, so if Jez is kind enough to share the finished STL I’ll definitely give it a go :ok_hand:t2:

Need grey, white and blue for the background… (I have all three, lol)

I haven’t got a dual extruder machine so best I can do is colour change at layer numbers.

I’ll be ordering mine his next week, can’t wait now! :rofl:

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Of course. :slight_smile:

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