Lego Rubik's Cube

A great combination between a puzzle and a building block, the lego Rubik's cube. This lego brick is like a regular Rubik's cube except for its unique ability to combine with other Lego bricks. This project was very fun to do and brought with it its own challenges.The dimensions of the lego Rubik's cube are 6 studs by another 6 studs and can connect to the top and bottom of a regular lego brick.

Supplies

Fusion 360

3-D printer

Step 1: Building the Middle of the Rubik's Cube

This is the easiest component to create. I made a 3 sketches on the 3 different planes and extruded them by how large the cube was minus the tolerance and the space I needed to make the center. I extruded it by 20.6 mm on both sides.

Step 2: Building the Center

For the center, side, and corner I created 1 part of each and copied them in step 6.

To start this component I created a plane .3 mm offset from one of the ends of the middle then created a box 15.7 mm by 15.7 mm with a circle in the middle of 3.3 mm. I extruded it away from the middle including the circle 3.2 mm, then reused the sketch to extrude it toward the middle excluding the circle.

Step 3: Building a Side

The side was my first real challenge for this project, but to start off I created sketch from the face of the top of the center component, then I extruded it downward by 15.85 mm. The next part of the side was to second sketch from the origin and have it cut off a quarter of a circle of the side and then put in its place a slide that is 3 mm in depth.

Step 4: Building a Corner

To start off the most complex of the components I first created a plane 3 mm off the side slide that was created last step, next I created a box that was on the slide and extruded the box 16.3 mm because that was the dimensions of the box,then I created a sketch 3 times in each of the 3 original planes, same strategy as the middle component. I used each sketch to cut off parts of extruded box then I filleted the edges that were made from the cuts. The last step to this step was simply making another sketch like the sketch done at the beginning of the creation of the side The last part of the last step of this step is to extrude the box into that filleted part and the corner is done.

Step 5: Fillets

It is nice to fillet all the edges so that it looks smooth.

Step 6: Move and Copy

using the feature move, with copy on, then you could take the side, center, and corner and copy them into their places. The best way to use this feature with these parts, is to use a rotational move and the axis would be the middle.

Step 7: Create Indents and Studs

the last part to creating the cube is to add the indents and studs. This will include finding out how far away each center of the stud and indent is (8 mm apart) and how big they needs to be (4.7 mm for the studs and 4.9 mm for the indents). It might be best to use a sketch repeatedly. I had to make sure that I was using join instead of create new body when I extruded the studs, but with the indents it is easier to simply have one sketch and use cut on the entire assembly.

The finished file is below here

Step 8: 3-D Print and Download As STL Files

The fun part is watching all the different components be slowly 3-D printed.

The middle will need supports and have 100% infill.

The center won't need supports and can have a 15-25% infill.

The sides and corners will need supports and can have 15-25% infill.

I downloaded each unique body into a STL file. I have attached them here with how many to make of each part.

Rubik's middle 1

Rubik's center stud 1

Rubik's center indent 1

Rubik's center normal 4

Rubik's side stud 4

Rubik's side indent 4

Rubik's side normal 4

Rubik's corner stud 4

Rubik's corner indent 4

Step 9: Building It

Building this type of Rubik's might be harder than others because it might not be the same material so to build this Lego Rubik's cube the bottom must be put together first, then the sides, then put all the top together except for the center part which is the last part that will be put on.

Overall this was a fun project that was challenging and exciting.