Within a few months of owning my Glowforge laser cutter, I ran across an image on the forum referring to a Dymaxion globe. Everything I had created so far on the laser was very 2 dimensional. Outside of a few maps that had some depth, the Dymaxion globe something different and very much 3 dimensional. I broke down and bought a Dremel 3d45 3D printer to make one of these. I had very little experience with 3D software outside of playing with Google Sketchup, so I was jumping in without any type of plan. To be fair, there are thousands of 3D printer ready designs on Thingiverse to print without having to have any 3D design experience. The 3D Platonic solids that are needed for printing a Dymaxion globe can be found here. The Dymaxion Map (Fuller Projection) to be laser engraved and cut can be found here.
My facination grew, and I knew that I wanted to make more than just one simple globe, which is still proudly displayed on my fireplace mantel! I moved onto another shape in the platonic solids package, the Dodecahedron. So I created a multi-layered Dodecahredon on Walnut using a Zentangle design.
I downloaded Fusion360 from Autodesk, and started teaching myself how to create sketches and 3D shapes from scratch. I won’t go into detail my process here, and will create a future blog post for this. However, creation and prototyping of these shapes became very challenging and enjoyable for me.
I started with an Icosidodecahedron. After only a few bad angles, I was able to successfully print the working connectors to make a Icosidodecahedron. The multi-layered Celtic version of this is still one of my favorite pieces. I was hooked!
I have shared the STL files on this site for free if you want to create your own Icosidodecahedron.
Next on my bucket list was the Rhombicosidodecahedron. I never realized the rabbit hole I was venturing down into. The Rhombicosidodecahedron is a very pleasing shape, and I’ve created a couple of pieces for my personal collection. The first is a Star Wars version using @nopal62’s Aztec calendar design. The second was a multilayered piece featuring different parts of my history with the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
I’m a little fuzzy on the order in which I completed these, so I’m just going to list them willy nilly.
I made a Pentakis Dodecahedron Flower Polyhedral on Maple with Acrylic and Walnut. This probably has the most pieces of anything I’ve created, and probably took the longest. The idea was to create and inlat acrylic flowers into each face of the Pentakis Dodecahdron. Walnut triangles hide the screw holes.
How about I try and make a lamp? Maybe a Pentagonal hexecontahedron Lamp. Using all acrylic, an Alexa enabled smart LED bulb, and a cheap lamp base purchased off Amazon, I created this gorgeous, multi-colored Pentagonal hexecontahedron Lamp.
Moving onto the next shape, this kinda looks like a soccer ball. I created a Sacred Geometric Truncated Icosahedron from proofgrade basswood and cherry.
This is probably my favorite polyhedral in my collection, and has the most time engraving of any project I’ve done. 36 hours to complete multiple levels for this Deltoidal Hexecontahedron. This was cut and engraved on 1/8″ Cedar, and is the largest of my polyhedrals!
Just completed a very complex Disdyakis triacontahedron with honeycomb pattern and LED lights. My most creative project yet!
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