Customizable Knitting Needles

thingiverse

This is the first object I wrote from scratch and I didn't see any in Thingiverse, so I decided to upload it. Even before I started gathering parts for my Ecksbot/Prusa reprap, I worked on convincing my wife that it could be used to produce useful everyday items and potentially save us money (I'm not the first to take this angle I'm sure). She's a crafty person and promptly requested that I make her some knitting needles. Well, even before assembling the machine I knew that this would be a hard print for sure. It's been a few months, my machine has been built, tuned and cranked out several items (some useful, some not so much). Her joking inquiries about the whereabouts of her printed knitting needles are starting to get old, so here they are! My wife was surprised and impressed with my results (she might have been humoring me a little) and was even able to knit with them successfully. I encourage any feedback or comments. Instructions If you print, I recommend the following: no more than 0.2mm layer height (0.1mm recommended) raft support, especially if you select a gradual tapered tip HOT heatbed for ABS (110C, long, thin, little contact area, need I say more?) I used ABS purchased from repraper.com. I had issues with the undersides of the tips being crude due to the steep angle and rafting contact, but found that they could be improved by dipping quickly in acetone and gently smoothing with flat object. My endcaps didn't fit so good and I had to use a drill bit to enlarge the holes slightly. Again a careful acetone dip for the end of the needle and the endcaps are on tight (or epoxy will work as well).