Sputnik on a Stand

thingiverse

The historic Sputnik satellite, first human-made satellite in orbit, rendered here as a 3D-printer-friendly version. The focus here was to capture some of the finer details, and get a scale that allows that detail to be shown without ending up with a huge model. There are other Sputniks available on Thingiverse - give those a try too. This one was created from scratch purely from inspecting photos of the real thing. The antenna mounts are particularly true-to-form, and the size is small enough that it won't take over your whole desk. A big challenge with many spacecraft models is doing something practical with the antenna bits. What works nicely for me has been using straightened paper-clips, which are ubiquitous, and avoids the need to scale the body of the model up to a crazy size to allow 3D printing of very thin plastic pieces. For such a simple structure, getting the balance of size vs detail right is a bit of a challenge, but I hope you'll agree the trade-offs make for a nice model. There are TWO VERSIONS of the top section with the antenna mounts. One has manually added support bits you can break off and toss. The other has none, and leaves that for you to support as you please. - A single peg holds the two body halves together. - The stand assembles nicely for me - but use a bit of hot glue to secure any bits you wish. Still in progress - will try to tweak a little more as time allows. **Check Out Some of my Other Space Probes** * [Cassini probe to Saturn](https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2520236) * [OSIRIS-REx probe to the asteroid Bennu](https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2758233) * [TESS - the exoplanet survey craft](https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3000952)