TobySpartanus

I am so incredibly impressed right now. I love that you were able to make such a successful (and good looking btw... black and orange is where it’s at) machine on a budget. As a high school student it’s motivating to see guys like you make awesome stuff.

Oh my! That sounds absolutely glorious. Thank you for the tip! I will definitely try that. My little brother is caramel's #1 Fan.

This is fantastic! I am a highschool student (definitely not retired), but I may try to make a similar machine. I wish I had the templates for all your parts, but going off the pictures, I hope I can get similar results.Great job with this!!!

This is awesome! Thanks for sharing :)

This is fantastic!

This looks fantastic!!!!

Got it! Thanks!

Cool Project! I didn't know you could do this with the Moon. I particularly love your Octopi Timelapse...very impressive.I do have a question about grabbing data from Google Maps. I can zoom out to see the globe of earth, but I can't move to find other planets...

OOOH! Interesting problem! I replicated your issue by selecting the smallest possible area I could in Terrrain2STL...got your same problem. I ended up with a low-poly topo map - not very exciting! However, I did select the area around my town (which is a very small town) and the topography showed up fine. Hmmm... I would try again. I think a box size of 120 is too small. I would not go smaller than 360, using the "Box Size" slider in Terrain2STL. Worst case scenario, you end up with an awesome model of your county instead of just the town.I gave a quick look at a few other tools (OpenTopo and USGS Data...helpful i'ble here:https://www.instructables.com/Make-3d-Printed-Topo-Maps-of-Anywhere/) They may give better results. The author of that i'ble says that some data sets even cap…

OOOH! Interesting problem! I replicated your issue by selecting the smallest possible area I could in Terrrain2STL...got your same problem. I ended up with a low-poly topo map - not very exciting! However, I did select the area around my town (which is a very small town) and the topography showed up fine. Hmmm... I would try again. I think a box size of 120 is too small. I would not go smaller than 360, using the "Box Size" slider in Terrain2STL. Worst case scenario, you end up with an awesome model of your county instead of just the town.I gave a quick look at a few other tools (OpenTopo and USGS Data...helpful i'ble here:https://www.instructables.com/Make-3d-Printed-Topo-Maps-of-Anywhere/) They may give better results. The author of that i'ble says that some data sets even capture cars and trees!!! Be sure to give it a look. Let me know if the results are better! (if you try it)Using those tools is a very involved process though. A more straightforward tool is cadmapper.com. It has contours ever 4 meters, which is pretty dog gone good. But if the selected area is greater than 1km^2...it'll charge you. I hope this is helpful! I am sorry that your first attempt didn't work well. I guess makers get used to that pretty fast tho :)

Hey! Just wanted to let you know that I entered this exact same project before you.

1) YES! The process is a bit different (I chose to talk about Terrain2STL bc its simpler). Here is the national map view by USGS: https://viewer.nationalmap.gov/basic/?basemap=b1&category=histtopo,ustopo&title=Map%20View. And Shapespeare has already written an i'ble about how to use this tool. Be sure to check it out! https://www.instructables.com/Make-3d-Printed-Topo-Maps-of-Anywhere/ (This link is also at the beginning of my instructions. 2) Most definitely! You can select a large area, and cut it up into smaller sections that can then be printed on a small 3D printer. 3) I know next to nothing about full-color 3D printing. However, if you only want to use a few colors (like grey for mountains, green for grass, blue for water, white for snow caps.) You could buy a Prusa 3D print…

1) YES! The process is a bit different (I chose to talk about Terrain2STL bc its simpler). Here is the national map view by USGS: https://viewer.nationalmap.gov/basic/?basemap=b1&category=histtopo,ustopo&title=Map%20View. And Shapespeare has already written an i'ble about how to use this tool. Be sure to check it out! https://www.instructables.com/Make-3d-Printed-Topo-Maps-of-Anywhere/ (This link is also at the beginning of my instructions. 2) Most definitely! You can select a large area, and cut it up into smaller sections that can then be printed on a small 3D printer. 3) I know next to nothing about full-color 3D printing. However, if you only want to use a few colors (like grey for mountains, green for grass, blue for water, white for snow caps.) You could buy a Prusa 3D printer with its multi-material upgrade. Prusa has instructions on how to make multi-colored prints. I have also thought about switching from grey or black to white on my single-color printer to make it look like the mountain tops have snow. Paint is always another option...just a bit more involved.I hope these answers are helpful! If you like this project...please vote for me! :)

Sure thing! In 3D printing, overhangs can be difficult. That's why supports are often necessary. However, if the overhang angle is < or = 45-degrees, supports are unneeded. I wrote an article (https://all3dp.com/2/cura-support-settings-optimize-your-supports/#do-you-need-support) for All3DP about support settings. Check out the "Do You Need Support" section for some more in-depth explanation.Thanks for asking! I'll try to make sure that is more clear in my i'ble. (Please vote for me if you like this project!)

This is incredible! I can see this being a perfect father's day gift.

Very nice design! I have been thinking about designing one for myself...but now I don't have to!

This is so cool!

Nice project! Thanks for all the steps. What kind of printer is that? I don't think I've seen one like it before.

Very nice project! Your results are very nice.

Nice project! I really want to try this now. Would it be possible to make this work with concrete coasters as well? Would the tops of the coasters just have to be super smooth?

Great minds think alike! (We are both teen makers :)I don't think you should participate in the contest if you just want to do a multicolor version of this...I think that is too similar. But, I think making an instructable about how to make a 3D printed moon would be an amazing idea, and a perfect entry in the contest. Good Luck! (You're gonna give me a run for my money :) )