Monday, December 31, 2012

noah's roller hockey puck













Today Noah asked if we could print a hockey puck. There was no way I was going to waste a lot of plastic filament on a regular solid puck, so we decided that we should make a puck for roller hockey. Santa brought him a hockey goal and a some roller hockey gear for Christmas, so he's had hockey on the brain. We have the goal set up downstairs in the play room, so he's been practicing his slapshot the last few days (I predict the paint on the floor will be gone by the time Spring time comes). 

We drew a puck that was fairly simple that had removable runners that we could print out multiples of and replace when the old ones become worn. I modeled it by thinking about a puck that I used to have when I was a kid and made some guesses about the proper measurements. (note: I used to play a lot of street hockey with my brother and my friends when I was younger. We even organized a team and played quite a few open league seasons at a roller rink that was several miles south of our hometown. Eventually we went on to enter a roller hockey tournament outside of Nashville, TN and won our division. Needless to say, I would have freaked out if I could have printed a puck back in the day. There's no telling how many pucks I ground the runners down on or lost before I ever had a chance to replace the runners.) Today's project seemed like the perfect thing to collaborate on with Noah. He provided important design direction to the CAD operator (yours truly) and I sliced the stl and got the printer set-up. We got is started and then he was able to play in the play room while I cleaned the basement shop. When the printer was done we fitted the runners and got to work with a little R&D (aka "shooting practice"). Not too bad for a couple hours of "work". All in all, a fun project for both of us on the last day of the year. We may have to make up a few more of these in different colors with different colored runners.

When we were finished shooting, I figured this was the perfect thing to put on Thingiverse. If you're looking for a puck then go download the files and MAKE ONE!






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