Small Simple Letter Scale (Range: 0~10g) - Fully printable!

thingiverse

This simple letter scale can weight between 0 and about 10g. I wanted to design a scale that can quickly be printed and uses few resources. It required about 2 m of filament at the original scale. The scale was designed in Catia. Hope you guys like it. Good luck assembling and have fun! Instructions Download all the parts, or the zip containing all parts. The number of times each part has to be printed is indicated in the filename. The scale is designed that it can be assembled completely from the 3d printed parts and some 1.75mm filament. So no parts are needed that aren't already in the house To connect the pieces sandwich the base and the counterweights between the L shaped measuring arm and the hanger. Then push some filament trough the joints and melt the ends with a soldering iron. To make the scale ready for use attach some counterweight on the plate at the bottom of the base with some tape. Then the scale needs to be calibrated. To calibrate the scale use some coins and attach them to the plates attached at each end of the lever. Since the weight of the coins is known, one can calculate a simple formula to relate the angle at which the lever balances to the weight that is attached. I am using a 5ct euro coint as counterweight. It weighs 3.9g. Using some math and experimentation I found, that the weight to be measured can be described by the following formula: tan(x) * 8.05 = measured weight in g with x being the angle of the lever. This should be a good starting point for calibration. Attach several different weights and note their angle. Then you can solve the equation above for the factor on the left side (8.05). If you do this for a range of different known weights (for example different coins) you can then average those factors to get an accurate relation. The scale reaches an accuracy of about +- 0.1g. I want to design a printable scale in the near future, however most likely the exact factor will change from print to print, therefore the scales will vary and be inaccurate. Therefore use scales from other people with caution. Take a look at the pictures for reference, and feel free to ask any questions below.