The Dark Tower Book Stand

thingiverse

I read a lot of big books, and it's difficult to find a stand to hold them. With carpal tunnel this leads to a lot of really bad reading neck. So I thought I'd design a stand to hold large books. This year I'm attempting to read all of Stephen Kings books, so I thought I'd make one with that spirit in mind. I also have a fondness for things that have multiple functions. So I pulled an image from The Dark Tower series and turned it into a lithophane to function as it's back. To do this I went to https://3dp.rocks/lithophane/ sized it in model settings, and set it to Positive under image settings. I kept it flat since it will be used as the back of the bookstand. But while it's not in use it can also be used as a cool night light. Originally I was going to close the back off and create a kind of frame with a slider so I could change the image if I wanted, but considering the size of the book I'm using with the stand I thought I should make it all one piece. In retrospect I should have closed the back, leaving the bottom between the legs open to put a light inside. But I was trying to be careful with the amount of PETG I'm using. Originally I was going to print it in PLA, but I didn't have enough white left so I ended up printing it in PETG. I'll let you know how it turns out in a about four days. I'm printing at a temp of 240. At an infill speed of 45. mm outer wall speed of 50.00 inner wall speed of 60.00. 100% infill since it is a lithophane and I'm not using supports because they may damage the image during removal. 10/4/2023 The first print failed early on and we needed to order more white to get it printed. There wasn't a problem with the print, the problem was with the cats wanting to play with the print after we went to sleep. We changed a lot of settings in the meantime and it was pointed out that we could save a lot of plastic if we set it to only print solid walls if they're smaller than the side walls. We replaced our nozzles, added an auto leveler, got a new fan, and a dehydrator (because printing in Korea is a nightmare without one.) And we replaced our extruder wheel, which was scarily ground down. The new wheel is stainless steel and has produced much smoother prints than the one that was worn out. Cura settings: (I'm going to put everything I changed since I'm half asleep and have no idea what I'm doing currently.) Layer height: 0.12 wall thickness: 2.4 Temperature: 200 Build plate temp: 60 Print Speed: 50 Skirt/brim speed 20 number of slower layers: 2 Enabled Retraction: check Retraction distance: 2.0 Combing Mode: Not in Skin Retract before outer wall: Check No supports required Build plate adhesion Type: skirt Skirt Line Count: 3 Skirt Distance: 10.0 It is important to make sure there is 100% infill for anything that is thinner than the side walls. Since some might rescale it that will vary from print to print. Michael Whelan is the artist who created the image that I turned into the lithophane background. I found it on google while looking up computer screen backgrounds and liked it for this project. I later looked up who created it so I could attribute it to them. While I designed the stand and the holder the image itself is theirs and they deserve full credit for their artwork because it's awe inspiring I was concerned with the background damaging the book, however upon it finishing my print was smooth enough that it shouldn't cause any damage while reading. For those of you following me on Goodreads, (which is likely no one here.) I'm to page seven of the 12 page list of stories Stephen King has written. Next up is The Dark Tower Graphic Novels. Unlike the rest of the books which I'm reading in order of release, these I'm going to read all at once before moving on to Duma Key. For those of you not following me on Goodreads I'm attempting to read all of his books before the end of 2023... and there are a lot more then I thought there were. Happy Reading. ^.^