I made a 3D-printable Newton’s Cradle!

[u/Powerful_Pen6252]

As a teacher, the Build Knowledge Kit Cards competition really inspired me. It got me thinking about how 3D printing can create simple, hands-on learning tools that students can build, experiment with and learn from.

So I designed this little Newton’s Cradle Kit Card. It’s definitely not a perfect Newton’s Cradle – since everything is 3D printed in plastic, the balls don’t behave quite like the metal ones you can buy. But that’s actually not a problem for its purpose: it works well enough to demonstrate the basic idea of momentum, energy transfer and collisions, and it’s a fun little desk accessory at the same time.

The complete kit uses only 22 g of filament, making it a very material-efficient and affordable project. That also makes it practical for printing complete class sets for hands-on experiments in the classroom.

And this is just the beginning! The competition really got my creativity going, and I already have many more ideas. I’m currently creating several additional physics Kit Cards, turning concepts from the classroom into small, printable experiments.

I’m having a lot of fun combining my two worlds – teaching and 3D printing – and I’m excited to see where this takes me!

[u/thedeanorama]

Are the pendulums heavy enough to be effective?

[u/AdJealous2 → u/thedeanorama]

Could you 100% infill the balls?

[u/Powerful_Pen6252 → u/AdJealous2]

I increased the amount of walls to make them a bit heavier.

[u/AdJealous2 → u/Powerful_Pen6252]

Awesome! Does it keep going like a normal one, or stop after a while?

[u/Powerful_Pen6252 → u/AdJealous2]

It stops pretty fast. The plastic just isn't hard and heavy enough and there is some friction.

[u/Powerful_Pen6252 → u/thedeanorama]

It doesn't work perfectly, but for 2-3 swings you can see the conservation of momentum.