Week 3: Flower Lampshades

I created two parametric flower lampshade designs for a small lightbulb with Rhino 7 and Grasshopper, sliced my design in Cura, and 3D printed my first shade on a Prusa i3 printer and my second shade on an UltiMaker S5 printer using PLA. I began by following this tutorial, and through conversations with the teaching staff and examining my own design ideas, I ended up altering my design to become a series of flower-like lamps.

I followed this tutorial step-by-step until I got a drawing similar to the first image above, and I edited the parameters significantly until I achieved a design I liked (the second image, and the code is the third image). However, when I sliced it in Cura and attempted to print it, I discovered that my design was not feasible to be printed. I needed to go back and edit my code and add lofts as well to create a printable surface.

This is a snapshot of a domain box I created with the Python script component in Grasshopper. I used this throughout the lampshade design process to test the size of my dimensions to ensure that they fit within the 220 by 210 by 210 mm size limits.

After consulting with the instructional staff, I edited my code to include lofts. However, my design's edges were not sticking together, which made it extremely difficult to do a successful loft. Furthermore, I was running out of time during office hours to finish my design and send it to the 3D printer, so I ended up removing the top three parts of my design and trimming the remaining part until the diameter was around 25 mm (so that the lightbulb parts would fit). I got the 25 mm dimension by measuring the lightbulb holder with my phone.

I sent the file to the 3D printer, and the height of my lampshade was relatively small, but I thought that it was cute, so I kept it like that. After slicing it in Cura and consulting with the teaching assistant, we discovered that the design would not be feasible to print without the hole at the bottom, so we added it back in and printed it. Once the design was printed, we measured and cut out the hole, and the lightbulb parts fit perfectly into the shade.

Since Lampshade #1 was relatively small, and we had to manually cut a hole in the middle, I was determined to design a slightly larger (only slightly because I loved the flowery look of Lampshade #1) lampshade that could be designed and printed with a hole in the middle. I spent a significant amount of time trying to figure out how to connect the four original parts of my design together, and I eventually realized through trial and error that I had to Bake the Extrude component and then move away the black mesh on top to access my lofted Bake.

I sent the updated Bake as an .STL file sliced in Cura to the UltiMaker and learned that it would only take 32 minutes (as opposed to the hours for Lampshade #1). The design came out pretty well, and it even had an added floor that added more character to the overall design. When I remeasured the diameter of the lightbulb part before printing, it came out to around 20 mm, so I wanted to see if I could improve upon my previous design in Lampshade #1 by reducing the diameter of the hole to 23 mm. However, as a result, the lamp parts could not fit into the narrow lampshade, although the rest of the lamp fit beautifully. In potential future designs, I would increase the overall width of the lampshade so that it prints in a way where I can attach the full lightbulb tightly.

These are the opposite sides (from the cover image) of the final two lampshades I created. The designs of each fit well with the light.

I really enjoyed creating the two lampshades, and I will spend more time understanding the nuances of Rhino, Fusion 360, and Grasshopper for future designs in order to add more customizability to similar designs in the future. I really liked how the 3D printer was able to quickly print my final design, so I am excited to see what I can build from here.