I have just bought a new tv unit online and after assembly realised my dvd player would not fit in the gaps intended for it. I decided this would be a perfect excuse to put my new toy, an Anet A8 3d printer to the test as well as my design skills

Step 1: Measuring and Designing

The first stage was to measure the feet and the contact areas, I did this by placing a sheet of paper under one of the feet and drawing around it marking where the rise of foot started. this gave me a measurement of 20mm and on the bottom of the foot was a 15mm round pad. i decided on a top piece of 25mm to allow for a ridge to hold the tv in place

next i measured the distance between media unit and the bottom of tv, comparing this measurement to the height of dvd player gave me a height of 30mm for my feet.

i now needed to decide what i wanted my riser to look like, originally my first idea was for a single rectangular block to go under the feet on each side of the telly but when i first measured the feet i realised this wouldnt easily fit on my printer bed. At this point I came to the conclusion that if all i wanted was a straight block i could go to the shed and cut 2 lengths of pine and use those.if i was going to 3d print them it had to be a design that was simple, elegant and look like it was part of the tv. Then inspiration struck whilst putting my son to bed and he turned his sand timer over.

Using tinkercad i then started the design basing it on bottom half of a sand timer. the first part was a paraboloidto give the dome effect, followed by a cylinder both centred together. on top of the cylinder i used a torus to create a retaining ringi then used a box hole to cut the torus in half craeting a front retainer only.

you can find my design on tinkercad at: https://www.tinkercad.com/things/5DgermFkFZT

Step 2: Printing

After designing the riser the next step was to get it ready for printing and to start the fabrication. To do this i downloaded the .stl file from tinkercad which i then opened in ultimaker cura 3.5.1. using cura i converted the design to gcode format and saved it onto my memory card to transfer to the printer.

after loading the card int the printer, i loaded the printer with black 1.75mm pla filament and started the printing process. I would need 4 risers for my tv as there is 4 points of contact so would need to do 4 prints.

When converting/slicing the file cura gives you details for build including time and material quantity.

each riser would take 1hr57min, using 4.4m/13g filament.

on completion of each riser they were detached from print bed th supprt rafts removed and sanded around bottom edge to remove sharp edges

Step 3: Finished Product

finally time to put them to the test, using a helper ( the wife) i lifted the tv one end at a time while she placed the risers under the feet.

The risers are a perfect fit for the feet, giving the tv a gentle wobble test the stability of the tv doesnt seem to be affected at all. looks wise the risers blend in perfectly in my opinion, confirmed when my son thought we got a "different tv as the dvd player didnt fit under old one"