3d Printed AquaScape | Custom Seashell Design

[ocpondpoacher]

Hi everyone,
I am working on a 7-gallon nano that needs an aquascape. I plan to make a fully custom 3d printed aquascape that mimics some of the most interesting creatures living on the bottom of the earth’s oceans. The goal is to make the design extremely simple yet highly functional and visibly complex.

The inspiration for this design is a Nautilus / Ammonite shell. I create the structure with fusion 360 using their free form modeling and then finished off the Voronoi style structure in Meshmixer.

This is going to be a monster to print. It is likely to take at least a week. I am going to print this in black ABS in 3 separate sections.

Let me know if anyone would like access to the 3d file.

Does anyone have suggestions on what other sea creatures I should create?

 

[itsken37]

Wow! It's amazing how 3d printers can make all those holes in it! I would like to see the 3d design please.

 

[3sgterror]

Hi everyone,
I am working on a 7-gallon nano that needs an aquascape. I plan to make a fully custom 3d printed aquascape that mimics some of the most interesting creatures living on the bottom of the earth’s oceans. The goal is to make the design extremely simple yet highly functional and visibly complex.

The inspiration for this design is a Nautilus / Ammonite shell. I create the structure with fusion 360 using their free form modeling and then finished off the Voronoi style structure in Meshmixer.

This is going to be a monster to print. It is likely to take at least a week. I am going to print this in black ABS in 3 separate sections.

Let me know if anyone would like access to the 3d file.

Does anyone have suggestions on what other sea creatures I should create?

I would love to have the 3d files. That is beautiful and would look great in a tank.

 

[PicassoClown04]

I wonder if you sized it way down if a hermit would be interested in it? That was my first thought when I saw the design. It would be a wicked cool crab!

 

[ocpondpoacher]

Here is my Thingiverse profile. https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4679795
I might have to re-upload the file because it looks like Thingiverse is struggling a bit.

 

[ocpondpoacher]

I wonder if you sized it way down if a hermit would be interested in it? That was my first thought when I saw the design. It would be a wicked cool crab!

I guess that it could work but I would have to make some slight changes to make it more hermit crab friendly. Have you seen some of the 3d printed hermit crab shells? They are hilariously awesome. I have a resin printer that could make some small shells with fine detail but I don't trust them being reef safe.

 

[PicassoClown04]

I guess that it could work but I would have to make some slight changes to make it more hermit crab friendly. Have you seen some of the 3d printed hermit crab shells? They are hilariously awesome. I have a resin printer that could make some small shells with fine detail but I don't trust them being reef safe.

Those are epic!! The fact that theyre see through kinda makes me feel like Im supposed to avert my eyes. If I were to ever attempt a hermit enclosure again, these would make for some epic crabs! If I didnt have a nano tank, I would be tempted to have some made out of ABS but unfortunately I see that making the crabs too large and leading to stuff getting trampled. Very neat and creative idea though!

 

[TriggerFinger]

No input, just following to see your finished product. Cool idea!!!

 

[ocpondpoacher]

I am going to try and print this thing in 2 pieces with no supports. The supports are extremely hard to remove unless you print dual extrusion with dissolvable supports. 1 day 4 hours for the smaller side.

My Geetech A20M has been printer great for several months so I am rather confident that this is going to go well.

 

[ocpondpoacher]

Well the first attempt to print this thing was a total fail. The model detached from the raft and I came back to a blob of plastic.

 

[ocpondpoacher]

Attempt number two is starting a lot better. The print is about 8 hours in right now and not looking to bad.

 

[Vivid Creative Aquatics]

This looks really cool. Can't wait to see the final results.

have you considered moving to either a 0.6 or 0.8mm print nozzle?

You might be able to both cut print time nearly in half while creating a very strong and solid structure. Being solid is important, since you probably don't want it to float.

I would run it a the normal layer heights you might do with a .4mm nozzle (0.2mm or .22mm) for a good surface quality and with 4 to 5 shells and 0% infill, and probably 3 to 4 bottom/top layers.

 

[Biff0rz]

Abs is known to come off the platter unless you keep it warm the whole time. Looks like you have an enclosure which will help. What are you using to model the design in?

 

[ocpondpoacher]

This looks really cool. Can't wait to see the final results.

have you considered moving to either a 0.6 or 0.8mm print nozzle?

You might be able to both cut print time nearly in half while creating a very strong and solid structure. Being solid is important, since you probably don't want it to float.

I would run it a the normal layer heights you might do with a .4mm nozzle (0.2mm or .22mm) for a good surface quality and with 4 to 5 shells and 0% infill, and probably 3 to 4 bottom/top layers.

Yeah, I am going to purchase a .8 nozzle and give that a try. The only reason I have don’t it before is that I don’t often print things this large. I’ll probably set up my creality cr10s so that’s it’s ready for these types of prints.

 

[ocpondpoacher]

Abs is known to come off the platter unless you keep it warm the whole time. Looks like you have an enclosure which will help. What are you using to model the design in?

I have been using fusion 360 free form modeling but I am starting to give blender a try (still have a long way to go).

I am using Meshmixer patterns to make the voronoi texture. I am basically taking the same surface model and doing several different diameter voronoi textures with different mesh reduction and then combining them all. It’s makes the models have a sense of depth with the texture.

My enclosure is very janky. It is just foam insulation jammed into garage shelving. What’s good is that I have 2 printings going at the same time so they are raising the temp enough to make it work. However, the surface of the models don’t have to been great because I am going to finish them and they will also be covered in coral.

 

[ocpondpoacher]

Just finished up the bottom half of the shell and realized that I made a fatal mistake. I had the infill set to 20%. So this print most likely won’t work for an aquascape.

I was already planning on this failing so I have my creality Cr10s already printing a backup. This one is printing with a 100% infill. I’ll make this one into the aquascape and the other can be a sculpture that I keep near the nano.

Got the .8 nozzle. I’ll put this in after the current print finishes. It’s going to take 48 hours.

 

[Biff0rz]

I got this delivered today. Thing is a beast.

 

[ocpondpoacher]

I got this delivered today. Thing is a beast.

Awesome, you can’t go wrong with a Prusa. I have all low budget printers.

Printer list:

Wahoo Duplicator 4 (purchased in 2013) It needs a new controller. Not really worth the rebuild cost so it’s just used for parts.

Creality Cr10s - This thing is a workhorse and has been printing great for years. Micro Swiss all metal hot end and a built plate sensor are the only upgrades.

MP delta mini - Got this printer for my son and even though it always has issues he loves it. The dang thing keeps Z X or Y jumping during prints and I can’t figure out why. I thought it was a g-code issue or bad SD card but I am starting to think the belts are slipping.

Elegoo Mars - This is the only resin printer I have and it kicks butt. I love it for fine detail and once I figured out the setting it prints great every time.

Geeetech A20m - I got this to try dual material prints so I could use dissolvable materials. Nearly every dual print has failed due to jams and the extrudes eating up the filament. I basically gave up on this thing for dual prints.

Shapeoko XXL (CNC) - I was hammering out a ton of cuts/designs with this but sold it 2 months ago to upgrade to a Onefinity CNC. Unfortunately the Onefinity won’t be arriving till the end of January. Coming January I’ll be able to make things 10x faster with the CNC. I have 4 different tank designs in the works.

 

[Biff0rz]

Nice list there! I went from a duplicator i3 (with lots of upgrades) and it's night and day difference with the Prusa. So happy with my choice. The CR10 was on my short list too, that's a great printer.

Did you decide against SLA for this print you're doing?

 

[ocpondpoacher]

Nice list there! I went from a duplicator i3 (with lots of upgrades) and it's night and day difference with the Prusa. So happy with my choice. The CR10 was on my short list too, that's a great printer.

Did you decide against SLA for this print you're doing?

I didn’t do SLA for 3 reasons.
The first is that this thing is really big. It’s about 250 x 250 x 120mm . I would have to chop it up into 4-6 pieces and assemble everything.
The second reason is that ABS is reef safe and many of the SLA resins are not. Or at least I don’t trust them.
The last reasons is that I am going to try some unique/experimental finishing techniques that will only work on ABS or other similar FDM filaments. Hold tight and I’ll share the finished piece when it’s ready.

Here’s is a picture of the complete prints that need to be combined and finished.