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As you might know: I have a new 3D printer.
And since I got it I have printed more as with my previous printers. I now own
a Creality CR20 pro and it is a no hassle workhorse. Power it up and start
printing. No calibration (except occasional bed levelling) and excellent print
quality.
Then I saw an Anchor shaped clothes-hook on the internet.
I thought it would be a nice surprise for a friend of mine who is a boat
owner. However the pricetag just for downloading the STL file is a downer for
me.
I just can not see why people make a very simple design and not
offer it for free. The 3D printing world and Reprap world was once an
open-source community and that is why I restarted my old hobby. Now loads of
guys buy a cheap 3D printer and try making money with it. The hobby spirit is
gone.
Well I am a tinkerer so I decided to make it myself.
First
thing to do was to have a good look at the shape and start a search on the
internet.
A quick search with Google immediately gave me a good image
which was free downloadable from
Pngimg.com
So I went to the website and there it was: http://pngimg.com/download/37294
I opened Gimp (a free open-source Photoshop clone) and editted
the picture so it was pure black and white. You can do that by the "select by
color" option. Select the black part, invert the selection and fill the rest
with white.
Next I turned the picture at what I thought was the right
angle.
Then I removed the right part of the picture and part of the
crossection on the left side.
Last step was to add the bar which is going to be used to put it
against the wall
Then I exported the picture as a JPG to my harddrive.
I
was going to make the STL file in Tinkercad. Tinkercad however does not
support JPG files so I had to convert the JPG to an SVG file that Tinkercad
understands. You can do that with a public domain vector editing program like
Inkscape. But I took the easy rad and used an web-oriented converter called:
Convertio. You can find it on the web with this link:
https://convertio.co/nl/
Converting just took a few seconds and then I could download the
SVG file.
Next step: import the SVG into Tinkercad and scale it. I
scaled it to a height of 15cm and a width of 10 cm 
And the last step was to extrude the height to 2cm so you could
put a screw in the bar.
And now I could export the STL file to my computer.
I sliced in the
Creality slicer.
And here is a 50% reduced result. This printed in about 25
minutes. I amde several small ones and 2 large ones.
Actually this is technically not 3D but 2.5D. But whatever you
want to call it, it worked out fine. Fun to do and my friend appreciated it.
And that is the most important part.
Luc Volders
