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Halloween 3D Printing & Laser Cutting Projects

2022-09-29 | By Kitronik Maker

License: See Original Project 3D Printing

Courtesy of Kitronik

Guide by Kitronik Maker

With Halloween just a few weeks away there is no better time to begin planning ‎your spooky making activities, we thought we would get in nice and early this year ‎and share some of our designs. We've got a handful of Halloween 3D printing and ‎laser cutting projects to help get you in the mood and maybe give you a few ideas ‎too!‎

We've included download links for all of our design files so you can begin making ‎straight away! Although this isn't a tutorial, we've included tips with each of the ‎projects to help you get up and running with as little fuss as possible. ‎

Halloween 3D Printing & Laser Cutting Projects:‎

Near the foot of the article, we've also listed some of the other ideas we had that ‎we didn't have time to produce, hopefully some of these ideas will help to inspire ‎your own designs. The download links for our designs can be found within the ‎relevant sections. ‎

Halloween Flicker Boxes:‎

flicker_1

These highly effective little flicker boxes were designed in 2D and then cut with the ‎laser cutter from shiny black card. You should be able to source suitable card from ‎any stationers or craft shop. They can be put on a windowsill or suspended in air ‎by attaching thin string or fishing line. Tips: We glued squares of thin white paper ‎inside of each of the design windows. This allows the light to get out but hides the ‎LEDs from view. To light the box, we took the quick route and taped our LED to a ‎coin cell battery and popped it into the box. The candle LEDs mimic how fire ‎flickers and look quite effective, especially when the LEDs are hidden from view as ‎they are in these boxes.‎

light_2

We used: ‎

  • ‎1 x Yellow Flickering Candle 5mm Water Clear LED - 30deg - 5800mCd per ‎flicker box
  • ‎1 x CR2032 3V Coin Cell per flicker box

Downloads:

Flicker boxes‎

Halloween Pumpkin with Yellow Flickering Candle ‎LED:‎

pumpkin_3

The above pumpkin design was 3D designed for printing and features the same ‎flickering candle LED that we used in our flicker boxes. Although we only had time ‎to print one, we made three designs, each design used the same pumpkin and lid ‎with the pumpkins being overlaid with different DXF files for the face design, we ‎chose DXF over SVG file as they are easier to handle within our CAD ‎software. Tip: As with the flicker boxes, the LEDs are more effective when they ‎are hidden from view. Our design features a little tombstone within the pumpkin ‎which has a space at the back to hold the coin cell battery. The LED is then pushed ‎over the battery and is kept in place by the tight fit of the battery holder. We used:

  • ‎1 x Yellow Flickering Candle 5mm Water Clear LED - 30deg - 5800mCd per ‎pumpkin
  • ‎1 x CR2032 3V Coin Cell per pumpkin

Downloads:‎

Bat With Flapping Wings:‎

bat_4

This is my favourite design out of the four projects. Not only does it automatically ‎flap its wings, but it also highlights how a design fail can turn into a design win. We ‎initially laser cut our bat from a Perspex sheet with some kerf cuts along the ‎wing/body join so that the wings would flap. In our haste we got our sums wrong ‎and kerf bending became kerf snapping. We re-cut our bat from polypropylene and ‎salvaged the body from our Perspex version to act as a platform for mounting our ‎flapping mechanism.‎

platform_5

Our flapping mechanism is quite simple and consisted of a battery cage, a BBC ‎micro:bit, a servo, some crocodile leads and a length of wire. Oh, and some sticky ‎pads! The flapping was achieved by having the BBC micro:bit rotate a servo back ‎and forth, we threaded a piece of wire through the servo horn and passed either ‎end through a wing and knotted them.‎

mechanism_6

Tip: Details on how to code the BBC micro:bit to control a servo can be found here. ‎We used the same code for this project only tweaking the code slightly to get the ‎desired effect. We used:

Tip: To connect the BBC micro:bit to the servo we created Frankenstein leads out ‎of the jumper wires and crocodile leads. One end of our lead had a Male jumper ‎connector, and the other end had a crocodile clip. Downloads:‎

Waving Skeleton:‎

wave_7

‎Last but not least is our servo assisted waving skeleton, this design would look ‎great hanging in a window. The skeleton was cut in two pieces from a Perspex ‎sheet. As you can see from the above picture, the servo was mounted on the rear ‎with the shaft coming through to the front. The arm bone was connected to the... ‎servo and screwed firmly to it. Tip: Details on how to code the BBC micro:bit to ‎control a servo can be found here. We used the same code for this project only ‎tweaking the code slightly to get the desired waving effect. Although we built ours ‎using the prototyping system, if we were going to put it into a window, we would ‎power it and connect it up in the same way we did for our flapping bat design. We ‎used: ‎

Downloads:‎

‎Further Project Ideas:‎

horns_8

  • Motorised Spider: Laser cut, or 3D print a spider and attach it to a motor ‎using string. Use the BBC micro:bit and a motor driver board to drive the ‎motor one way and then the other, lowering the spider down and then ‎winding it back up. This would work great in a window.‎
  • Wearable horns with lights: 3D print hollow horns that can be held in place ‎with a strap and design an insert for each that holds a coin cell battery and ‎an LED. Design the horns so that they are thin enough for the light to be ‎visible. If you're feeling really adventurous you could add light sensing ‎functionality so that the LEDs only turn on in the dark or add physical ‎on/off switches.‎
  • Sweet collecting cauldron: Design a sweet cauldron with a lid and holes for ‎a string handle. You can place an SVG or DXF image on the bucket in ‎much the same way as we did with the pumpkins above. A flickering light ‎inside would also enhance its look, especially outside when going door to ‎door.‎‎ ‎

Time Lapse Video of a Halloween 3D Print:‎

 

If you wanted to have a go at creating a time-lapse video of your own 3D printing ‎projects, we've got some resources to help you do just that. Although aimed at ‎those who use a Robox 3D printer some of the hacks can be used for any 3D ‎printer. The table below contains links to all of the relevant resources. ‎

table_9

Make A Time-Lapse 3D Print Video With A GoPro

Make A Time-Lapse 3D Print Video With A DSLR

Make A Light Rig For Time-Lapse 3D Prints

©Kitronik Ltd – You may print this page & link to it but must not copy the page or part thereof ‎without Kitronik prior written consent.‎

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