Initially, the bottle opener took three hours to print using the home-user printers we have in lab. However, because the home-user printers lack the resolution to print a moving hinge, all other prototypes were printed on a stratasys machine with dissolvable support structure. Once the print was done using stratasys machine, the print time was reduced to around two hours. Given the print orientation (opener laying on it’s side), support structure was needed for the undercut where the lip fits into the opener. Support structure was also necessary under the opening mechanism because it is not attached to the platform. While printing the part on it’s side may have increased the print time and support structure needed, the orientation was critical for opener lip strength. Additionally, a high infill percentage was used to reduce the likelihood of hollow,thin cross sections.
Print Orientation
