One of my favorite 3D printed organizations. Custom silverware drawer
I made this about a year ago and it's one of my favorite creations. Even though I made a mistake in measuring the bottom and had to cut out some slots. One day I'll print it again, but it used a ton of filament and took forever last time.
It might be the first thing that I have seen that makes me really want to have a 3D printer around.
Do you still need to minor in 3D printing to make them practical?
I know that might be an exaggeration, but I've heard they are a bit of a handful. One of my gaming buddies was really into them a few years back. Even as an IT guy, the way he talked about it made it sound like I would need to do a fair bit of research to make anything worthwhile.
I'd say 3D printing is as accessible as it's ever been. There's tons of options nowadays and there are quite a few "plug and play" printers. The hot new one on the block would be the Bambu printers. They have a range of prices and from what I've heard, are pretty easy to use. I haven't tried them because they are proprietary and I like Prusa for it's open source nature. I'm a tinkerer so I have no problem tearing apart and fixing things, as well as I enjoy adding custom mods to fit my needs.
Also, if you don't mind a bit of tinkering, you can get a decent printer for under $200 nowadays if you just want to dip your feet in at a low price. If you have a Microcenter near you, they often sell one of the Creality printers for $100 on sale.
Thanks! I had to split this in 6 prints and connect them after. Each one took around 12 hours to print and used around 1.5kg of filament, IIRC. But this was one of my early projects and I would change a lot knowing what I do now to use less filament and less printing time. Filament is not too expensive. Around $15-20 a 1kg roll. You can spend a lot more or a lot less depending on brand/quality and sales though. Still a lot cheaper than buying a nice organizer bin and this one is customized to fit my silverware and drawer. It's my favorite hobby ever!
Next time, print forms and create a mold. You'll spend a whole hell of a lot less money and you can make it food safe by applying wood putty and sanding the forms.