Over the past year, I have began exploring the world of 3D design, as well as 3D printing. In order to educate myself further in this area, I completed a Solidworks course in my own time, purchased a 3D printer and got to work.
Once I had some knowledge under my belt, I decided to develop a product from scratch so that I could further educate myself on limitations, density and tolerances of my printer. I chose to design a full size print of the ‘Buster Sword’ from the popular 90s Playstation game – Final Fantasy VII.
Print time took a total of 150 hours. Internally, the sword is printed in a honeycomb pattern of 20% fill. Each piece of the sword incorporated a hole for a 3mm x 30mm steel bar and 2 aluminium locator rods to pass through from handle to blade. This helped to align everything and maintain rigidity. Close to 2kg of PLA Plastic was used to print the sword. Once everything was glued and connected, I began sanding and filling the sword, followed by painting and rendering.