"Stationsplein robot" development and 3D printing

3D Modelling – 3D Printing – 3D Print processing

This was a project I was tasked with developing and 3D printing a statue that stands in front of Enschede’s train station made by Jelle de Graaf. The company Planetart which hosts the yearly festivals “GOGBOT” and “TEC ART” was hosting an awards ceremony and requested me to make several 3D figurines of the iconic statue to use as awards for artists that’ve done significant contributions to Enschede’s culture

Original Task Parameters

  • The statue has gone through several iterations in its appearance, so I took 4 pictures of it in its most recent edition – one picture of each side 

  • The 3D figurine would be used as an award and would need to be handled, so after giving it some thought I’ve decided to go with PLA as a material for the 3D print
  • I decided to model the lower LED block that the statue was also standing on, so the entire statue would look more like an award and be more stable

3D Modelling

    • The model was made in Maya using the referance pictures I took from all 4 directions of the statue

    • The model was going to be printed in plastic and not resin, so it had to be hard modelled without any sculpting, as all the intricate details would have been lost in the print

  • The model had to be modelled watertight to be printed, and a lot of areas that were exposed or see-through in the statue had to be filled in, so it could support its own weight after being printed

Printing

  • The 3D model was sliced using Cura, and printed using the Ultimaker 2 3D printer
  • The model was printed in PLA using a 0,2mm nozzle with the layer height being set to 0.12mm.
  • To protect the more fragile areas, a large amount of supports were added

Print Processing

  • Supports had to be removed extremely carefully to ensure that the weaker areas like the the arms did not break off
  • The robot would then be spray painted with a primer, and then sanded using a dremel. This process was repeated several times to remove the layer lines, strenghten the fragile areas and to achieve a smooth finish.
  • Finally, the statue is painted using a metallic spray paint, applying it several times in very thin layers, to avoid a build up of paint.

Final Result

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