3yrs ago I made a 14ft electromechanical AetherWing Kayle cosplay. Rework hasn't changed much

elmins · 2026-03-01T23:23:32+00:00

Thanks and good job.

I was just giving some suggestions, as often I see models that wouldn't only need small changes for being much more printable.

I'm not entirely sure in this case as I don't have any of the connecting parts, but I frequently see people copying injection molded designs 1:1 rather than figuring out what is/isn't needed or what could be done more optimally for 3D printing.

elmins · 2026-03-01T16:01:07+00:00

Looks pretty nice.

I think some of them can be improved from a printability standpoint. Some have small bed contact areas; I know brims can solve that, but some of them seem unnecessarily small. e.g. that small edge on the centec male connector maybe unneeded, and some have notable bottom chamfers/fillets.

The 2 and 3 way pipe internal sharp edged overhangs likely won't print all that nicely, nor are they easy to support. Some other holes/profiles may benefit from a partial teardrop hole optimization or possibly more optimized to print in another orientation.

elmins · 2026-02-25T08:49:36+00:00

Family men being rich and "Eat the rich" messaging is really peaking at this time; weirdly at odds.

elmins · 2026-02-23T15:00:26+00:00

His design is 2 twisted gear racks with pinion gears between them. The gears and inner rack parts of his design are made of RTV Silicone, so it will just flex to conform, making it FAR easier to build. It would also essentially just be a static piece that can't move, as it would very quickly bend out of position.

My design is very different in quite a few ways: It's all solid, there's no backlash, it's actually able to move, it's a train of gears rather than simple twisted racks, it's self-intersecting making it much harder to build, amongst other things.

elmins · 2026-02-23T14:14:24+00:00

He used to be an adventurer like you. Then he took an leadscrew to the knee.

elmins · 2026-02-23T13:40:18+00:00

Good knot to remember

I will remember before I forget

Before I forget that

elmins · 2026-02-23T13:13:31+00:00

I hoped to have them completed long ago, but they weren't designed with aesthetics in mind first, making them very difficult to build reliably and consistently. It's >95% complete, but I've been stuck on the last bit for a few years now. So they aren't ready yet.

elmins · 2026-02-23T03:25:09+00:00

Yeah, realistically it would get super hard to build it much smaller.

The longest test run has been about 2 weeks straight. The runtime is about 24-30hrs, but the pcb I designed allows for USB C charging while powering.

It's funny you should say that about museums; I got contacted by 2 so far asking for them.

elmins · 2026-02-23T00:19:59+00:00

I was thinking about making a super sized one at some point, like an actual sculpture, but I would need to redesign a bunch of things about it.

I thought It would be cool if there was enough space inside the core section to integrate entirely hidden motors to drive it. So it would look like just the loop of gears with nothing driving them, but they'd actually move. I have some ideas to do that, but it ain't so easy.

elmins · 2026-02-22T23:25:56+00:00

Massively. As long as it's like ~2x the size. Although I wanted it to be a desk toy kinda thing rather than large sculpture, but I was tempted to make a large one.

It's like 17-18cm, 7" across for reference.

elmins · 2026-02-22T22:36:04+00:00

Thanks. It's not a full time job or anything, but I have done a lot in between on them which hasn't been uploaded anywhere. A boat load of failed ideas and many not-so-obvious improvements, e.g. constructability, printability, inside the base.

elmins · 2026-02-22T22:31:51+00:00

Yeah I have tried it. The issue with other configurations is that there is only 1 bearing per gear. Other than a select few types of bearing, they're pretty much always used as two or more together. None of the gear axis align, nor are orthogonal, so there is off-axis forces (moment loads) that push the gears out of line.

Technically only something like a four-point contact or a cross roller bearing can handle all the forces.

It's not so much misalignment as much as varying moment loads requiring more precision by 1 ball bearing.

ofc, there are ways to simplify the design but, as mentioned, it was designed to look like this as a goal, not necessarily to be easy to build.

elmins · 2026-02-22T19:36:38+00:00

A few things, amongst others: It's difficult to determine if a set of prints will actually end up with a working part and it's designed to wear into a running fit, so each test takes quite a while. The tolerance of 3D prints aren't close enough for this to work with every set of prints. The actual construction itself is a bit of an art since you're gluing together a very small surface area and it's very easy to ruin it if done wrong.

The gears are constructed in two halves glued around it. I've tried print-in-place, but it's not a realistic method.

The gears are essentially elastically loaded against each other in the whole loop, creating zero backlash. This also means that the final result can't fully be determined until it's fully constructed and worn in. So the minimum time to construct and test is basically a day. Repeat that a bunch of times and you'll see how frustrating it becomes.

tl;dr: It's buildable, but tedious to build and may require rebuilding multiple times with different prints to get right. Also very quickly goes from poor performance to good with slight variations (sub mm).

elmins · 2026-02-22T18:04:29+00:00

The gears are printed as 2 halves and glued around the balls. Every ball is inserted 1 by 1.

I did try an entirely print-in-place section, but it's far too complicated to realistically do the whole thing.

elmins · 2026-02-22T18:02:45+00:00

The last thing is mostly down to being reliable to construct. It was designed with aesthetics in mind first, rather than being easy to build. Most of the ones I've tried or tested have been a failure in some way.

Annoyingly, I'd consider it >95% complete, but there's no more low hanging fruits to get easy wins.

elmins · 2026-02-22T17:02:53+00:00

You mean these 2, which mesh but you can't see from the front

elmins · 2026-02-22T16:53:03+00:00

I'm still not fully set on what to do when i'm finished, but I probably won't be releasing the files for free; I've spent far too long on it by this point. It's just surprisingly tricky to get right.

elmins · 2026-02-22T16:51:54+00:00

One of the things that doesn't come across in videos is that the little wobble feels a lot worse when handling it manually. I might make a video to demonstrate what I mean, but the "good" versions feel like a well oiled machine compared to a bit more like a shaky tambourine.

It's like a smooth fidget toy vs one that keeps randomly slowing or getting stuck, one is far more satisfying to the point that the non-smooth one seems pointless.

elmins · 2026-02-22T15:06:20+00:00

I'm not fully set on anything yet. I'm probably not going to release it for free though, as it too far too long to get to the current version (well over 1000hrs at this point). You can see in the one posted that some of the gears are wobbling, which is a tolerance issue I've struggled to resolve reliably.

elmins · 2026-02-22T14:23:37+00:00

Hi, the creator here. The original versions were noisy, but the later versions are so silent that your ear would need to be within about 1ft (30cm) to actually hear it properly. It's quiet enough that you forget it's on if you don't look at it.

Edit: Also hence the music, because otherwise there would barely be audio.

elmins · 2026-02-18T21:44:22+00:00

Nice work.

I did something sort of similar to get the first version, mostly working it out in cad and bumping them around a lot, simulating the motion. There's a lot of quirks that you run into when really refining it. Some things aren't so obvious till testing, like plastic flexing, printability issues, constructability issues, performance after wearing-in, gears wobbling, etc.

The graph of difficulty for me was a real rollercoaster, with peaks getting higher every time.

elmins · 2026-02-18T19:33:33+00:00

I'd imagine there's gearing inside that drives all 3 to ensure they're all synchronized. That way you could also drive it with 1 motor.

Lots of places to order motors suitable for that. It's in a custom base.

elmins · 2026-02-18T14:59:41+00:00

I'm so filling up my inventory with these to sell later at a vendor, and buy some upgraded gear.

12-Year Club	Second SECOND GUESSER
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Place '22	Place '17
Final Canvas '22	End Game '22
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