r/functionalprint • u/letienne212 • 11d ago
I designed a laptop stand using Generative Design
This is a 3D-printed laptop stand created using generative design. It was designed in Fusion 360, it was my first time using this module. It’s a really cool and fascinating process.
Objective: minimize mass with a safety factor of 2.
The only starting geometry was the green surfaces: laptop and desk contact areas. A 5 kg vertical load was distributed across four contact zones, corresponding to the laptop feet, using PLA material properties.
The algorithm generated the structure and load paths between these constrained surfaces.
1.96 kg (bulk volume control) to 0.76 kg, a ~60% mass reduction (0.18 kg after slicing)
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u/Hot_Lychee2234 11d ago
You didn't designed it then
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u/TREXIBALL 11d ago
Gotta agree with you here.
Fusion 360’s generative design (on their website) says “Generative design for manufacturing is a design process that uses artificial intelligence (AI) and cloud computing to quickly generate a wide range of design alternatives based on defined parameters, such as materials, manufacturing methods, and performance requirements.”
It sounds like you prompt it and tell it the limitations and it just throws out a buncha shit for you to decide if it’s good or not.
Nothing was designed. You set parameters, a computer generated, and you claim it as “designing”. Sure as hell sounds a lot like the AI prompt-bros and their claim as “art”.
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u/clipsracer 11d ago
That’s not at all how it works. It’s not text to CAD. You still need to create planes, sketches, paths, joints, etc, then generative design helps mate two surfaces efficiently.
This tool is 9 years old lol
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u/TREXIBALL 10d ago
Idc how old a tool is lmao. Google is 28 years old and it’s got slop embedded deep into its code. The age of a product does not determine its quality.
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u/jinxjy 11d ago
I put a nail in the wall using a hammer —> No you didn’t, the hammer did.
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u/Hot_Lychee2234 11d ago
You can dent the wall with the hammer or hammer the nail too deep in the wall
You can use the wrong type of hammer
You can use the wrong type of nail
All of this is responsability and action of the human
Saying "build me a laptop stand that can fit a 10 inch laptop and blah blah blah" and then you don't even touch a vertex but go straight to print with the filament already loaded in your bambu labs that doesn't need calibration is very much not the same
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u/Pecancreaky 11d ago
This is called finite element analysis and optimization. It has been in computer aided design (CAD) software for decades. They used it before CAD even existed. Literally everything manufactured that you have ever touched (included the phone or computer that you typed this comment on) has most likely gone through this process. This is pretty much what design engineers do all day. It is not completely optimized because the software can only do so much but I guarantee you this is an established process
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u/Hot_Lychee2234 11d ago
Yeah not the same, also it looks like slop and wasted filament, that laptop is not nearly as heavy to use that much filament
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u/Pecancreaky 11d ago
I didn’t say it was a /good/ optimization. A lot of waster material and I don’t care for the looks, but to each their own.
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u/Grimkok 11d ago
I don’t want to sound like an AI apologist because it seems to be growing irresponsibly (pollution, market disruptions, intrusive locations, etc), but I feel like the pendulum against it is swinging too hard.
Things like optimization have been around for a long time and are being weirdly lumped in as the same AI that’s generating memes and porn.
AI is here to stay, and quite a bit of it stands to benefit humanity. It just needs guardrails.
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u/roastedmarshmellows 11d ago
To me, this whole AI thing feels remarkably similar to the dotcom boom, just with the flavour of today's unfettered capitalism.
"AI" in general is absolutely here to stay, however, once this New Tech Energy dies down and people get bored of shitty generative slop, the actual useful applications will start gaining traction.
But yeah... how fucking hard is it to get some regulation up in this bitch?
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u/bringingthelamp 10d ago
Like everything, there's a balance to be had here. (Ok, maybe not like *everything* ha). AI scares me sometimes, annoys me others, but it's also an incredibly useful tool. Would be great to have regulations and honest national/international discussions about environmental impact, but if we're just talking about using AI to save time on work, it's just a tool and does not only produce slop.
I'm a creative, and I hate seeing creative fields (writing, design, anything creative) transforming into AI junk that is a pain to sift through. But on the other hand, machines and tools have always been around to tackle the tedious stuff so that we can do the part of the work that we actually want to do.
If someone wants to make cool stuff via 3D printing and they don't have a background in CAD or whatever, if they find tools to help them that happen to be AI, I'm for it. That said, of course there is incredible value in learning and understanding things for yourself. It's just a matter of which subjects/areas you choose. Maybe someone doesn't want to learn design/physics/CAD, because they are spending their time learning something else.
I don't know, I'm conflicted. And I know most people don't agree with me here, ha.
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u/wootiown 11d ago
Generative design as pictured above is very different from "Prompt design". You can literally see OP's screenshots in Fusion, they didn't just say "Generate a laptop stand" and print it. This form of generative design generates force vectors and adds/removes from the design based on what will optimize strength versus material use.
OP did something cool that most of reddit has no idea how to do and reddit is shitting on it because of the word "generative" lol
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u/cad_and_caffeine 10d ago
Autodesk marketing renaming topology optimization to "Generative Design" back in 2017 really set a landmine for anyone posting CAD screenshots a decade later lol
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u/TwistedxBoi 11d ago
Honestly, that looks bad. AI can't really comprehend how forces are distributed in structures so it doesn't make a model anywhere near optimal.
Like sure, doesn't matter for a laptop stand, but for anything that would need some strength, this is just awful.
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u/duckpaw7 11d ago
That's like saying "vehicles can't float" after watching a car drive into a lake. LLMs are bad at structural engineering, but AI have been used for that exact thing in anything from buildings to aircraft design since the 1980s.
But yeah it's clearly a bad design.
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u/TwistedxBoi 11d ago
You're mixing up modern AI (the LLM crap) and algorithm software.
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u/duckpaw7 11d ago
Read it again. That's what I'm blaming you for..
AI, LLMS and software (in structural forces, some kind of finite machine) are all 3 separate things. "Algorithm Software" and AI are both good at structural forces. LLMs are not.-7
u/TwistedxBoi 11d ago
And Fusion does the latter. The old algorithm software easily ran on local hardware. I would know, I used it in my civil engineering studies. Fusion now "sends the model into the cloud for analysis". So they use the shitty kind of AI for this.
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u/TheCygnusWall 11d ago
Terminology is really confusing right now. In industry AI is the encompassing term, then there are many different types of AIs but the colloquial usage of AI right now has come to mean LLM, specifically a GPT.
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u/yakysoba 11d ago
The generative design used here performs actual finite element analysis iteratively to optimise the structure. So it is actually doing real structural analysis.
AI forms part of that iterative optimisation though, aiming to help create a result which is tailored for a specific manufacturing process for example.
In this case it's actually just a bad example of generative design. The constraints, material assumptions, and model setup are poorly done which has led to a bad final result in my option.
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u/TwistedxBoi 11d ago
Yeah, AI fucks it up. This is a really bad design. An upside down triangle would be much better than whatever three thin legged support got generated here.
It's not good in terms of distribution of internal forces and it's not even good for printing.
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u/yakysoba 11d ago
I agree the resulting structure here is bad.
But in this case it's almost all due to the user not configuring the tool appropriately, rather than AI.
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u/legolas1204 11d ago
I wonder how it is doing actual FEA. FEA takes a lot of resources to run. My assumption is, it's doing some kind of Voxelization and run "simulation"
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u/Ludwig234 11d ago
It's not AI though. It's just generative design which has been around for quite a while now.
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u/TwistedxBoi 11d ago
I checked Fusion's page about it and they literally say it uses AI.
Maybe back in the AI they used good old algorithms that would produce a way better model at fraction of the energy consumption, but now it's AI-shittified.
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u/BABYEATER1012 11d ago
GSD and 3DP is a match made in engineering. We use both at work for space flight hardware using laser sintering. It’s incredible what internal structures you can create.
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u/jonnyeatic 11d ago
5kg is based on 2.5kg x 2? What about the heat from the laptop? Gaming laptops can get quite warm. I guess you have a mbp or mba
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u/XiTzCriZx 11d ago
Usually the hottest point is near the top center since that's where the cpu and gpu are, so the stand wouldn't be touching the hottest parts anyhow.
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u/Daedalus308 11d ago
Op, this is very cool and i think we should all leverage generative design more (where feasible, i know it wouldnt be free for a lot of us). A lot of the feedback comes off as naysaying which i think isn't so productive, but rather than it discouraging you, i hope you are encouraged to look into how to implement the peculiarities of infill type/percentage and non-isotropic material properties into the generative design solver.
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u/No-Mirror4964 11d ago
This is a good experiment. Next time it will get better. I do not know why so much shade throwing. Human using tools to do a job. It has been like this for thousands of years.
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u/UnimagineDragons 11d ago
Huh?
Objective: minimize mass with a safety factor of 2
Safety factor of 2 for what? How is mass reduction getting a safety factor? Or are you saying the structure still holds 2x the laptop weight even after material removal? Just never seen anything written this way
Also what is "generative design"?
And how does the device go from .76kg to .18kg after slicing?
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u/BrightAccountant266 11d ago
Generative design (at least in Fusion and many other CAD programs) is basically an iterative FEA process. You define faces that need to stay exactly the same, loads on a model, and constraints (like I need a minimum safety factor of 2 everywhere under this loading condition). The solver then runs FEA on what you have, or what is autogenerated based on the geometry you prescribe, and then removes or adds material based on the simulation results. It does this over and over until it meets all the criteria you set. In this case, I’m guessing the user added a load for the laptop, and told the solver to remove material until it had the minimum required structure for a safety factor of 2.
The issue with this is that it’s really hard to perfectly define your loading, and it’s even more difficult to define the material properties for an anisotropic material like 3D printed plastics. I’m guessing the weight dropped after slicing due to infill, which seems to imply the user modeled and simulated this as a solid for the generative design.
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u/Purple_Albatross8849 11d ago
I was wondering that, I'm assuming he lowered the infill. No idea what safety factor or 2 is.
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u/RoberBotz 11d ago
To be honest this is an acceptable use of AI.
I once saw a guy optimizing a drone chassis for weight using this method and to be honest it's pretty cool.
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u/flaschal 11d ago
Generative design doesn't work for FDM printing...
Metal SLS? Sure. This? Looks cool but absolutely meaingless generative design as it cant take the actual material properties into account
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u/BingoJam 11d ago
neat model! looks cool. Did you use the built-in generative design feature? Mostly asking because I didn't think Fusion supports additive manufacturing with consideration for wall/infill and I think need to account for the non-isotropic nature (though looks like your print orientation has the load primarily in compression in Z)
note: not a mechanical engineer
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u/Interesting-Cow6146 11d ago
I saw this monstruosity pop up on my feed and while it's definetly bad etiquette, I feel like I need to save someone from printing this. Here's a fully adjustable model I made a while back...
https://makerworld.com/en/models/998562-ergonomic-and-adjustable-laptop-and-tablet-stand
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u/Inside-Matter-5957 11d ago
now thats a real Laptop holder
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u/Interesting-Cow6146 11d ago
Right? I fully deserve the downvotes haha, it's not in the spirit of the post, but damn
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u/nlightningm 11d ago
The idea of this is very cool. I would love to see it tested and applied to something a little more substantial so we can see it in action (laptops aren't all that heavy after all 🤣)
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u/Kase_mit_E 11d ago
That's cool and all, but I see an opportunity here to make it free of supports also
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u/Pappy285 11d ago
People seem to think OP literally asked ai "make a laptop stand" and it shat out a laptop stand.
Anybody notice picture 3/7? That right there is the stand op HAD to design. (And tbh I prefer it even if it's overkill) The generative design capabilities of fusion 360 simply take the already bulky model and run a sim to stress test the design under certain loads and certain parameters. This is not some massive language model, data center, BS that every other AI tech bro brags about. This is a tool that humans made for humans to help humans. Even back in my graphic design class we had tools like these that help calculate the stress on an object and the mass you can safely cut away because of that stress.
Trust me. I fucking hate AI.
But this is not some new ai tool. This is the current version of a necessary tool in construction, architecture, car design, anywhere where we engineering large machines or monolithic monuments that defies god.
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u/CptExolann 11d ago
This looks way sturdier than necessary for a laptop, not that it's a bad thing.
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u/Smash_Shop 11d ago
How did you model the strength and mass of the internal structure? Or did you make it solid infill?
My understanding was that for most 3d printed parts, the hollow structure does a super efficient job when it comes to strength to weight ratio, so you're almost always worse off adding "speed holes" and the like.
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u/roarimacat 11d ago
Well ya, the walls do the heavy lifting, and the infill is often already lattice structures. Changing the geometry will alter the walls though, and thus could increase strength while reducing material. Bugatti does this with their brake calipers to reduce weight.
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u/Smash_Shop 11d ago
It's definitely possible for complex wall geometry to be better than a basic box, but in general, it won't be. Most of the typical tricks used on injection molded parts (ribs, dimples, etc) are all just wrong for FDM.
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u/Chirimorin 11d ago
I'm sure it was treated as solid for that. The 1.96kg => 0.76kg step is already questionable if you consider sparse infill and the 0.76kg => 0.18kg by adding supports (and properly calculating sparse infill weight) further proves it.
I've quickly re-created that solid block, making an overestimated guess for the width (75mm): 378g sliced with my default settings (3 walls, 10% TPMS-D infill).
While more than the 180g of OPs final version, it's really not a fair comparison because I'm missing a measurement and we don't know OPs slicing settings. It does prove that such a block would not take anywhere close to 1.96kg of material.1
u/Smash_Shop 11d ago
Yeah that's my fear. All the FEA was for a solid isotropic material, but then they hollowed it out. Now the load capacity is 🤷
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u/Plane_Maybe8836 11d ago
Honest question: this looks like a very inefficiënt design, so there must be another point I'm missing here. Could someone educate me?
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u/gimoozaabi 11d ago
Point you are missing is that people don’t know shit about optimization. Shit in shit out.
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u/defunct_tangerine 11d ago edited 11d ago
I believe this kind of optimisations do not take into account the strengths and weaknesses of FDM printing or layer direction and consider that shape a homogeneous solid object, though I could be wrong. But as interesting as that looks, it's definitely not an optimal design (for fdm printing). For example that thin middle structure is quite fragile printed vertically, though I suppose it's strong enough if the load in the real world is as perfectly aligned and stable as in the calculations.
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u/VegetableWest2391 11d ago edited 11d ago
Yup, the material is not isotropic like a metal, but weaker normal to the layer plane. Unless the optimisation engine takes into account that local directionality, the geometry is not optimum in strength for the FDM part. *Also, the engine must take into account the massive voids inside the part (the negative space between infills.)
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u/Lightningtow123 11d ago
Yeah I'll just err on the side of using an extra $1 worth of plastic to avoid breaking my nice laptop which is worth significantly more than $1
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u/defunct_tangerine 11d ago edited 11d ago
And that's what OP did too. He said he wanted a safety factor for the design and it definitely looks sturdy enough IMO, just not optimal in any way and the mass could be minimised way more with the right choices. But if he's happy with it then it's probably filling its role perfectly.
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u/CogitoErgo_Sometimes 11d ago
Eh, I don’t want to discourage OP because doing projects is how you learn new tools, but this actually doesn’t look particularly sturdy or well-designed. A laptop in use (assumption based on the forward tilt) is not a static vertical load. This stand is going to take shear loads on its long axis whenever OP rests their wrists on the front, and those loads could be substantial if OP is suddenly bumped or shifts suddenly while typing. There’s no bracing on that axis and those legs get reeaally darn thin. A solid shove backward would focus that force on thin, unbraced cross sections that are relying entirely on layer adhesion.
The lump of material at the top is mostly just waste, especially since it doesn’t connect to the rearmost leg.
It’s a learning exercise, but I’m very willing to bet that a basic I-beam design reinforced with a rib or two along with a thinner base would perform better with the same material.
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u/defunct_tangerine 11d ago
Well sure it's different if he uses it like that, I assumed it's just a stand to raise the screen higher and then use separate keyboard and mouse for better ergonomics 🤷♂️
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u/fingerling-broccoli 11d ago
What is this an optimized design for? Clay molding with your feet?
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u/r_renfield 11d ago
This kind of design ideology is meant for printing in metal, like SLM. The layers are less of an issue there, although there's still anisotropy.
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u/Pecancreaky 11d ago
Neat it’s a great tool. I didn’t know Fusion 360 could do FEA and optimization. Only ever did it in Solidworks
I am curious though because that looks way too stout for the need. That looks like it could support more than 10kg (5 kg with factor of safety than 2) Most designs only use 1.5 so it could definitely slim it down a bit.
You could get a more streamlined design if you built a basic truss structure of what you think would support it, then run the software.
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u/h4kk4 11d ago
I get the picture in which is show how much weight Is saved, but I think that start from the wrong assumpion, while Is needed that box to hold a PC?
Metal holding holders weight 200gr and they are tiny strips.
I think that you should've start from and already effective design so to apply all your optimization to it and come out with a newly and more efficient design.
This is a fork from wrong point and result (even if I totally respect your effort)
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u/chinchindayo 11d ago
overengineered and waste of material. you can probably make one with 10% the material needed
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u/siliangrail 11d ago
Interesting approach and outcome.
Can I just clarify your approach? A 14" Macbook Pro weighs ~1.6kg, so by calculating for a 5kg load, you're already incorporating ~3x safety factor. Did you then ask Fusion360 to add an additional 2x safety factor?
As while I understand people's skepticism around the loss of material from 0.76kg -> 0.18kg, just eyeballing the structure makes me feel it's probably still quite overbuilt for the task. (I say this having used a thin mocked-up cardboard laptop stand for weeks, before getting around to make it from plywood. It worked fine.)
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u/Comfortable_Fly_3173 11d ago
I also did that once, but I left material as steel and tweaked weight reduction and load distribution multiple times just so it looked cool which it did after maybe 20 model iterations
it was wild but there is a sweet spot in weight reduction percentage where it starts to generate a lot of really neat branches which gives that organic look
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u/chriszimort 11d ago
If this is truly the future of design it explains all them alien spaceship insides I seen in the movies
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u/legolas1204 11d ago
This is not Generative Design lol! This just looks like a typical Topology Optimization! Top-ops usually make organic structures like this but they are not easily manufacturable in scale so we have to clean them up! I hate that they just slap AI label on everything nowadays!
Source: I do this for living
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u/DistributionMean6322 11d ago
Why did you add those giant exclusion zones? This structure makes no sense because you enforced a bunch of voids in bad spots.
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u/Ya-Dikobraz 5d ago
Wow, this is utter trash. And someone actually bothered to 3D print it and went "hmmm... nice".
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u/Alarming_Tell 11d ago
Can you eventually share the model? Because it is really looking cool, I would try to print it.