Introduction: RGB Desk Illusion

Hello and welcome to my fun step-by-step guide for how to build an RGB illusion for your desk. It was a lot of fun building this and I hope you will enjoy it.

Supplies


  • A computer (for you to work on)
  • A 3D printer (I used the Creality Ender 3 v2 Neo)
  • PLA plastic in any colour.
  • An RGB LED strip. (There is a picture of one above) →→→→↑
  • Two small neodymium magnets (for the illusion)

Step 1: What We Will Build

Here are the parts for the project and what they do:

1.The baseplate, which the excess RGB string will be wrapped around and then go to the powerplug

2.The top magnet

3.The RGB LED string

4.The Bottom magnet attached to a string so that the magnet cannot go too close and stick to the top magnet. The string will act like a leash for a dog so that the dog cannot run to the other dog (the top magnet)

5.The two forces of the magnets will be strong enough so that the bottom magnet will not fall to the ground and the string will not let the two magnets touch each other so that the magnet will float.

Step 2: Main Parts

The top part is 3D printed with my Creality Ender 3 v2 Neo and you can get the 3D model here. You can also customize it to look epic. The lower part is a spool for the RGB string to rap around and it is usually used for pakaging for the RGB string.

Step 3: 3D Print It

After you get the CAD file from the previous step (Main parts) customize the file to your own delight and download the file to your computer when you are done. When you are ready, open Cura Slicer, but if you do not have it already installed you can get it here. Click on ''file'' in the top left corner and click on ''open files''.Grab the correct file and click ''open''. Your customized 3D model will appear on the screen. Click ''slice'' in the bottom right corner and then plug your 3D printer's SD card into your computer. Click ''save to removable drive'' and then plug the SD card back into the 3D printer and then print the file.(Do not unplug the SD card from the printer while the printer is on, because you may corrupt the SD card and lose all the files on the SD card.)

Step 4: String It

Carefully remove the model from the baseplate of the 3D printer when the model is done. After that, find the point of the RGB strip (you can easily buy one at a Cina shop for 14 Dollar) and wrap it tightly from the top to the bottom as shown in the picture above. You can use some clear glue if the end point of the RGB strip gets loose.

Step 5: Stick It

Stick the 3D printed part to the middle of the the spool as shown above and wrap the excess string around the spool, but don't wrap all of the RGB string around it because there must still be enough string left to go to the power plug.

Step 6: Magnet It

Now we have to use the magnets to make an illusion. Take one of the small magnets and stick it with glue against the top bar as shown in the pictures above.Take the second magnet and stick it to a piece of string (preferably thin string like thread, because it is not very visible). Stick the string to the base, but you have to do it precisely because if the string is too short, the force that keeps the two magnets together will be too weak and the magnet will fall like a meteor hitting the earth, but if the string is too long the magnet will stick to the top bar.

Step 7: Extra

I hope you enjoyed this project, because I certainly did, but at the end some people may feel like something is missing. So if this is you, I have a challenge for you. Build something extra to spice up the project. What I did was I connected my phone to the RGB lights, so I can play music and the lights will flash with the music. You can also schedule it to go on and off at precise times and much more!

Step 8: Goodbye :(

I hope you enjoyed this project even if you did not build it. Please share some pictures on the '' I made it'' page if you built this.

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