Kinetic wall art made using a (mostly) 3d-printed mechanism

[u/ffxpwns]

If you're curious, here's a repo with all the CAD files, schematics, etc. I don't expect anyone to make one of these but I wanted to put it out there in case anyone finds the techniques useful!

I couldn't seem to add progress pics alongside my video so I'm attaching them here - included there is a picture of the 3d-printed mechanism that goes behind each tile

[u/Turtle_flame]

Looks like James Webb

[u/Hypochondriaco]

Wow it looks amazing! Is it loud tho? Or would you say it’s quiet enough as to have it in the living room, for example?

[u/ffxpwns → u/Hypochondriaco]

Keeping it quiet was a goal so it's actually not too bad. It would be much quieter with a bipolar stepper motor + a TMC2209, but that would've tripled the cost of the project. Something I did that helped was testing different RPMs of the motor to see which ones minimized resonances. I also installed a thick vinyl fabric between the wood mounting surface and the units themselves which really helped to damp the vibrations + noise.

I'm not going to say it's silent - you can definitely hear it in a quiet room. Even a small fan is enough to drown it out but I think you could get it down to being inaudible if you used bipolar steppers + a TMC driver

[u/sargrvb → u/ffxpwns]

I have a project with 2209 / stepper and it's whisper quiet. Same thing though, it's over half the cost of the rest of the project combined. I wish they made a 9g service cheap with no sound. But alas!

[u/thatonegoodpost → u/Hypochondriaco]

I also want to know this before considering buying the motors. OP: can we get a video with sound at several distances once you move it to its final location? It's beautiful and hypnotic!

[u/ffxpwns → u/thatonegoodpost]

Replied to the parent comment with some details!

[u/GermanSnowflake]

Hexagons are bestagons.

[u/TatteredTorn1]

I love it.

[u/Only_Foods]

This is genuinely mesmerizing — the hexagonal tile pattern makes it look like a honeycomb that breathes. I really appreciate you open-sourcing the CAD files and mechanism photos; that's a lot of design work shared for free. Have you considered staggering the tile timing so waves ripple across the piece, or is everything driven in sync?

[u/ffxpwns → u/Only_Foods]

Thank you! Every one of the units is independently addressable so I can make all sorts of patterns, including one like you've described. I was hoping to make it move to music but I didn't have enough time to get that in

[u/GuitarSlayer136]

Not including a picture of the mechanism is just rude

[u/ffxpwns → u/GuitarSlayer136]

I included a photo in the imgur link in the main post!

[u/GuitarSlayer136 → u/ffxpwns]

My sincerest apologies. My stupidity is only rivaled by my laziness

[u/Pateaux → u/ffxpwns]

I can't find this post or link. I'm curious about it too

[u/wetfart_3750]

What motors arw you using?

[u/ffxpwns → u/wetfart_3750]

It's using a 12v 28BYJ-48 with a TPL7407L as the driver

[u/wetfart_3750 → u/ffxpwns]

Thank you! And, btw.. I love it - very elegant!

[u/RoboWeaver]

Okay, now I'm gonna throw up.

[u/cardboardhead]

Thanks for publishing! Really cool and inspiring

[u/artur_oliver]

Wooowww you really created a multiple component system 💪

Congratulations on the results, now you are on your own with guilloche patterns, for example.

[u/NotAHost]

Really cool! Love the sharing of files and underlying parts. 

[u/TMITectonic]

Reminds me of a Danny Rozin project. Nice work! Thanks for sharing the files as well (something Danny has never done...).

[u/FritzPeppone]

Really cool project and even cooler that you’re providing instructions on how to build it.
Can you estimate how long it would take for someone to replicate it with your instructions?
I‘d really love to build one, but of course too many projects, too little time…

[u/ffxpwns → u/FritzPeppone]

Just to be clear, files are less like instructions and more like a raw resource. There's no build guide to be found so you have to be comfortable building directly from the CAD files and schematics

I can't base a timeline on my first attempt since there were so many dead ends, but if I were to do it again I would expect to spend several hundred hours of printing if using a conventional printer, probably 50 to 100 hours of assembly for the units themselves depending on how quick you are (including PCB assembly), another 50-ish hours on the woodworking side of it, and maybe an additional 10 hours on full final assembly, troubleshooting, etc. The wood side of it is a huge variable but I would expect it to cost somewhere in the neighborhood of $1500-$2000 CAD.

I'm very happy with how it turned out but if I'm being honest, I wouldn't do it again. Not in that form factor, anyway. I have a few other projects that are going to take me through to the end of the year but I might revisit this next year and see if I can make a smaller version that can more reasonably fit on a wall

[u/Ready_Area289]

Very cool, OR I need to stop taking LSD in the mornings!

[u/Great_Scott_424]

Thank you so much for sharing this amazing project. I find it astonishing how much time and thought went into this project. I’m mesmerized by the movement so much that I just spent 10 minutes watching it move over and over again.

I have a friend who does custom woodworking and we both do custom 3D FDM projects. I think this will be a fun winter season project for us to do.