The Correct Orientation to Print Boxes | Design for Mass Production 3D Printing

BUY THE SUPPORT FIN STL'S: www.angled.xyz/product-page/s...
Explore a creative approach to 3D printing electrical enclosures in this episode of Design for Mass Production 3D Printing.
Traditionally, enclosures are printed either vertically or horizontally, but we introduce a third, more efficient method. Conventional printing orientations come with a number of downsides, like excessive post-processing, weak layer alignment, and material wastage. These inefficiencies can be detrimental to your parts, especially in mass production.
In this video, we show off how we are able to to print ANY enclosure at a 45 degree angle, offering stronger and more reliable prints. The best part? We don't need slicer supports.
Don't forget to subscribe for more updates and share your thoughts in the comments below. Enjoy the video and have a great day!
About Slant 3D
🏭 High-Volume 3D Printing: Scalability Meets Flexibility
Slant 3D's Large-Scale 3D Print Farms utilize 1000's of FDM 3D printers working 24/7 to offer limitless scalability and unparalleled flexibility. Whether it's 100 or 100,000 parts, our system can handle it reliably, while still allowing for real-time design updates, ensuring products evolve with the times. This adaptability is key in today's fast-paced world.
🌿 Sustainable Manufacturing: Eco-Friendly Efficiency
Embrace a system that drastically reduces carbon emissions by eliminating carbon-intensive steps in the supply chain, such as global shipping and warehousing. Our approach minimizes this footprint, offering a more sustainable manufacturing option.
⚙️ Digital Warehouses: Parts On-Demand
Think of print farms as a "Digital Warehouse", meaning we can store your parts digitally on a server rather than physically on a shelf. parts are available on-demand, reducing the need for extensive physical inventory.
LEARN MORE at www.slant3d.com/
Produced by Slant Media

[@slant3d]

Don't want to design your own Support Fins? Get the STL's here: www.angled.xyz/product-page/support-fins-for-tilted-designs-stl

[@chriswesley594]

There;s another huge benefit to this slanted printing tyechnique, which you hinted at with mention of a textured finish. Now that NO SURFACE is printed on the bed, it's possible to be very creative with what you print on the surfaces; logos, ridges, grips, etc. all become possibilities.

[@ethzero]

"3D print on a slant" - Channel name checks out 👍

[@slant3d]

Shift in perspective

[@impetus444]

I think its hilarious that I didn't figure that out til about the 20th video I watched where everything was printed on an angle :D

[@AshFrankArt]

I've always heard that angled printing is great but never considered how to get over the toppling issue. Thank you for explaining so clearly for us!

[@slant3d]

Glad to help

[@davidboop3550]

Man, I second that. Thank you so much! I just split a part into two pieces where I could have just went with your idea. I truly appreciate your help.

[@MinibossMakaque]

I've been doing something similar, but I just use the paint on supports in Prusa or Orca rather than building a support into the design.

[@henninghoefer]

This is where 3D printing really shines: Have any PCB and _always_ get a case with the perfect mount points. And (traditional) case manufacturers seem to have noticed - prices seem to be coming down... Thank you for your videos (I watched the entire playlist over the last few days 🤓)!

[@daveoliver3909]

I love the clear, concise and quick delivery from this channel.

[@slant3d]

Thank you

[@martinlacher7932]

I would love to have a "noise" texture tutorial! What are good settings, maybe for what shape / use case? What do you think?

[@TEACypher]

I second this, i came across a 3d print at work earlier this week, which i thought was molded, but assured it was 3d printed, this noise could well explain it and i would love to replicate at home

[@briansrcadventures1316]

@@TEACypher try "fuzzy skin" setting in the slicer?

[@DrFailov]

Great tutorial! Definitely will consider trying this. As for noize for outer shell: can you please share your parameters of fuzzy skin to try same? Looks really good 👍

[@riba2233]

they already made it

[@richardyoung5349]

Doesn’t that affect all external walls? If so, it would interfere with tolerances on items that are intended to mate

[@HuskerTexan]

Not being from the molding world, I had to listen to 3:22 about 50 times. Finally I think he said "sprue" so I looked it up and shazzam - I have learned an entirely new word.

[@_..-.._..-.._]

Same

[@MarkHarrison-rp2tq]

same, I was like, "screw? screw?"

[@cnesler]

Please don’t do this for anything 110v or higher. The reason you get the boxes off the shelf is its UL Listing. The printed solution is great for project boxes but will be a fire hazard for anything plugged into your wall.

[@slant3d]

Correct. The correct material must be used.

[@cnesler]

@@slant3d but it’s not even entirely about the material. Listed products must go through rigorous lab evaluations. I frankly won’t risk a house fire to save some money on something that important. Very cool idea for hobby boxes though, I’ll definitely try it for my Hyperion project.

[@jeremypeake8169]

This was exactly what I needed for a complex enclosure design, I was just resigning myself to having to print it in three pieces then saw this. Decided to give it a go and man did it work well! Thanks so much for taking the time to share this trick.

[@UltimatePerfection]

I love this series. I don't intend to mass produce anything, but still use this as a design guide for my future projects to avoid failed prints and filament waste (both for ecological and financial reasons).

[@poduck2]

I've just started 3d printing about a month ago. I was thinking that printing diagonally would solve lots of problems, but i hadn't seen a video of anyone doing it. Thanks for explaining this.

[@goury]

It will also introduce a lot of new problems. Another way to solve a lot of problems is to go composite. It can be as simple as just printing different parts each in the most beneficial orientation and then assembling em all together or not so simple as using different methods of manufacturing for different parts. This way does not add many new problems, but does make it much more complicated.

[@thenextension9160]

@@gouryyes I think you are right. These methods are not all or the other. For example the enclosure could be printed slanted but the lid be printed with ideal face facing down for a nice build plate texture.

[@daliasprints9798]

With modern slicers, tree support doesn't cost much material or postproc for the vertical orientation. But diagonal still has lots of benefits. My favorite is that an assembly-relevant dimension of the part isn't dependent on bed offset (which isn't perfectly reproducible) or on layer height quantization.

[@802Garage]

You'll still end up with much better walls using this trick rather than printing them vertically with weak layer lines or horizontally with a 90 degree supported overhang.

[@rbrdly]

Tree support won't be as clean to remove as this method either.

[@ChrisMuncy]

I love this concept. Will have to give it a shot on some test items. Thanks for sharing. Love the fuzzy look of the print as well.

[@SmashingBricksAU]

Great tip using the thin support on the back side. Can you please post the CAD model so we can have a closer look at the dimensions used in the supports?

[@redfox05nl]

Yes this, would like to understand the support in more detail

[@zwurltech9047]

Great again, thank you! Your design tips took my printing to a new level of capabilities!

[@francisbeland8959]

Wow thank you for the great suggestion. I have a box that I was printing up and it was costing a lot only for support. This method allowed me to save 40% of material.

[@carll4992]

Great idea! I like how you keep the video shortened to the point. I don’t like watching videos that are so long that you don’t finish them sometimes. You’re the best!

[@tomsko863]

Very good video! Especially showing the original part and how people can essentially remix an existing product, make it better, and include it in a larger project. Good job man.

[@andresguillen6750]

your videos are gold. thanks for your service!

[@slant3d]

Thanks for watching

[@ericzwirnmann8151]

I just did this for a new print that took 7-8hrs. I was a bit nervous as I always used supports. The end result was amazing. 😃 I didn't have a 45' on the bottom edge of my print, it was a 90' point which proved fatal after the first few minutes. I proceeded to add a .04mm base around the point edge that easily shaved off post processing. Thanks for the tilt orientation tip, will be doing this much more often.

[@willofthemaker]

Great video Gabe! I love how you desigbed the support and used sprues to easily come off. Plus being able to add texture to all sides is great for this. I just did a fuzzy skin tutorial on my channel but you cant get the top layer fuzzy. With this in a lot of cases you can

[@thomasg3412]

Thanks! Tried the support variation immediately and it worked like a charm 😊 ❤

[@vell0cet517]

I love the way your videos expand my thinking of what's possible. Thank you!

[@Schaub3]

You just made several improvements to an item that i have been making for our company Thank You!

[@o0GoldSoundz0o]

Just tried out printing at 45 degrees with the fuzzy pattern and it looks amazing, what a great idea!

[@Cyromantik]

I learned this by accident when printing the bridge of a stringed instrument on my Ender 3. I had to orient it diagonally with some support primitives to make it fit on the bed, and found that is ended up being one of the strongest objects I'd ever printed.

[@ASassyP]

Feels like using the supporting techniques from resin printing in fdm printing. awesome

[@timonix2]

This channel is a gold mine for beginners like me who make their own models to 3D print

[@rubenverster250]

Now I just have to figure out how to design properly ':D

[@domkri9502]

Thanks for sharing your experience. I really enjoy your Content. Cheers

[@Syscrush]

I did exactly this when printing some custom Chicago screw fasteners and now I feel retroactively smart.

[@Art_911]

I do this trick with organic prints at times. As I have an FDM and an SLA printer, I have the mindset of Resin printing that uses the "angle" technique a lot. I've actually (with good success) set up resin prints, exported them, and then printed them with my FDM printer. Meaning I've used the supports generated from the Chitubox to print on my FDM printer. I have not delved into designing custom supports, but it definitely, inspired me to do so. This "fin" idea is really great!.

[@AleksanderOlo]

Hey, I discovered your YT channel a while back and I really enjoy the content and all the knowledge- thank you ❤

[@bartz0rt928]

I can see this still be useful for one-offs in some cases (ha!). Great idea!

[@pastudan]

Amazing recommendation on the support structure, and doesn't look too hard design into the part! Thanks for the tip :)

[@skiplgoebel8450]

You just solved a major issue i had with concrete printing. way to go!

[@TechMasterRus]

Going to print a house on its corner?😅

[@_..-.._..-.._]

@@TechMasterRusyou can fit more of them into a neighborhood.

[@retroguardian4802]

I'm going to use this method for printing longer items. I have a printable area of 220mm so for larger items I often print corner to corner to escape that restriction. This will allow me to take that even further. Thanks.

[@slant3d]

Another great application for this

[@un65tube]

Great idea! Thanks for sharing and showing how it's done in CAD! Many greetings from Germany.

[@yayinternets]

Great video! Video idea related to this one: You guys should do one about how to add fuzzy skin on designs in both Fusion360 and Shapr3D

[@VariablePenguin]

Why add fuzzy skin to the model when you can just do it in the slicer?

[@R67K]

This is awesome! I will try it in a smaller scale. Maybe i dont even need fins. If you turn everything 45° nothing needs to be supported. So simple but effective. Thank you!

[@JimMcGrath25]

Thank you for sharing your custom supports techniques. Brilliant

[@slant3d]

Thanks

[@802Garage]

I took your advice on this from past videos and printed a wall mounted headphones hanger I designed by cutting the back corner off off and printing at an angle. The base was about 45x60mm but now I was only printing about 8x60mm on the build plate. Gave me a super smooth surface on the rounded bottom where the headphones sit rather than lots of ledges from the layer lines. The front and back walls that keep the headphones centered printed fine even at 35-50 degree angles. Not the right approach for every part I think, but makes a lot of sense for many. Of course better to remove from the plate for production too.

[@802Garage]

I did not design a support, but it wasn't needed for such a small part. One of my considerations was also strengthening the two screw holes as you mentioned and making the front wall that keeps the headphones in place stronger by not making the layers perfectly vertical. Worked great the part is very strong despite being a couple mm thick at the front.

[@georgestone8099]

Showing the strength difference of a 45 degree print in another video might be cool, with solid numbers and such. I've always thought 45 degree is probably a good general orientation for strength but no ones really done much research on it.

[@daveanything]

i just realized (3/4 of the way through) is the reason this works is the part is only at a 45 degree angle, which means, the part doesn't need "supports" to help it print, only a support to hold it up in place .. nice work.. !!

[@UncleKennysPlace]

Yep, I have a box where this will work perfectly (but that I now print flat on the bed, which also works perfectly, but the slanted version should be stronger.)

[@stacker55]

well i'm immediately glad i stumbled onto this channel. my cad game is about to change

[@kuldar.]

One of the best 3d printing tutorial on YT ❤

[@slant3d]

Wow, thank you!

[@cuzzin9577]

This is very helpful for a project I hope I 1day get to make :) thank you for being so open about your best production practices

[@slant3d]

Glad we can help

[@DigitalDoyle]

Awesome! Very useful. Thank you!

[@jodrafting]

You should learn to use tree supports with the option of baseplate only. Bayer auto-generated easy and clean to remove

[@laytonmiller5865]

This is freaking sweet. This channel gives a lot of great design tips. Good stuff!!

[@slant3d]

Thank you

[@kcalbxof]

i actually built and tested my second printer 5 minutes ago (Tronxy XX11, built from two Tronxy X1's - to make portal instead of arm), you guys are inspiration for me to do so, thank you very much!

[@KensCounselingCouch]

That sounds really cool! Do you have a link or video of your XX11 you built? I'm very curious to see what it looks like and how it prints. Thanks!

[@slant3d]

We appreciate that. Best of luck to you

[@kcalbxof]

@@KensCounselingCouch havent changed anything yet about firmware or even settings, so print quality is really bad. Basically mirrored all of it, so build volume is the same, but it is now more rigid and stable. Noise is the same, though, which is sad. That may be due to usage of cxy-v1 board with bad stepper drivers. That thing is ancient, but for its price (it was 1/3 of a price of anycubic kobra neo which i own), i wont complain. I would be changing plastic stock bed with glass one, then adding heated bed - need to figure out how to make it temperature resistant, acrylic bed base wont be good for 90 C bedtemp i need for PETG, for example. Lots of work to do, but it is quite fun project for me. Here are the photos of it and test print that came on sd card, both of it look lame, tbh. ( ibb.co/30DHG2n ibb.co/kHhTK0N )

[@RandomImpluses]

I really appericate the concise video and concepts! Thank you!

[@raf_the_riffer]

This is great advice! I’ve learned so much about FDM 3D Print CAD design from this channel

[@slant3d]

Thanks

[@Nazreen]

Just wow. Glad that i discovered this channel earlier. ❤

[@Brocknoviatch]

Super impressed! I would have thought you’d need more support. Definitely going to try this. The noise looks good and would also hide some imperfections like seams etc. thanks for sharing.

[@slant3d]

Underated surface texture

[@JeremyDWilliamsOfficial]

@Slant3d Awesome video! Really valuable. Thanks for sharing :)

[@CyrusDemar]

Having printed for multiple years, and exposed to the internet for too long. I was really sceptical of this "miraculous" claim. But gave it a look. And it actually makes a lot of sense, most printers print happily at a 45 degree angle and even greater. I'm not a fan of the knurled look, but hey, if it just needs to hold electrical components, looks doesn't really matter. I for one will keep this in mind going forward.

[@mikenotsue]

Thank you! Very well explained and digestable. I have some components to print that I've been dreading due to the overwhelming amount of support material. This solves that dilemma.

[@divineikegod920]

Thanks for the tip...its really great😊

[@occamraiser]

Excellent. I particularly appreciate the designed-in supports concept. I will definitely design some things to print at an angle next time I am concerned about horizontal/vertical layer delamination.

[@rklauco]

I have to test it - need some enclosure for my ADS-B tracker, so here we go! :)

[@skiplgoebel8450]

Today's show- Over the top GOOD! congrats

[@slant3d]

Thanks for watching

[@jimgnandt5190]

I tried this and it worked really well, perfect actually.

[@jamesmcintoshjr]

This is also a great technique to avoid print warping.

[@slant3d]

Very true

[@obst-box]

interesting technology. I just tested it on a small case. it was printed well. printing at an angle helped to minimize shrinkage of ABS plastic. thanks!

[@Kaiser_257]

As always awesome content, awesome ideas, awesome advices, awesome explanation, awesome everything

[@slant3d]

Thanks!

[@TRABWorkshop-ri4ql]

We learn something new each day, today I learned this - thanks :-)

[@thelegaloccupier]

Well done ⭐️your videos are excellent. So informative 👌

[@endotherm]

I just love that "fuzzy" texture on the outer surface. So simple, but it disguises so much and gets rid of a lot of tell-tale 3D printed features. Printing on a diagonal allows you to "fuzzy" each face. If you print it "flat", you cannot apply it to the top and bottom surfaces. Diagonally, the top and bottom are literally a single line. Tilt it in all axes and the top and bottom become a single point.

[@Brigadoom3x3]

That's an elegant solution!

[@anventia]

I have got to try that method for designing supports in CAD! I definitely do notice the wobble when using auto-generated supports, this looks like a great solution! P.S. Fits your channel name perfectly lol

[@bhartissimo]

Thanks for sharing this great tip.

[@SeanLumly]

I really like this. Primarlily as it eliminates the possibility of bed adhesion problems. But the perks of fewer supports (for grid aligned geometries), and better use of build volume is crazy.

[@_..-.._..-.._]

You have far less area to adhere though, this method is more likely to come loose printing at high speed on a Cartesian (core Z) printer. It does help if you have over-adhesion, but not if you have too little.

[@SeanLumly]

@@_..-.._..-.._ That depends on the support structure built. I've since used the method to good effect, but not at speed. However, it produced a very nice part.

[@reru_personal]

When you guys do tangled testing, will you guys do strength tests with the pieces printed diagonally in addition to the standard flat and vertical?

[@GlennBrockett]

The bit about built in supports was great. I have not yet tried it on my designs, but I can see the uses. Also, printing at an angle like this would likely be less prone to warping off of the table like a long part would.

[@eric_r_colby]

Awesome as always. I need a master class in cad software by you in my life haha.

[@Boradumir]

That's pretty nice. I like the idea. 👍👌I don't know if you mentioned it, but you also prevent it from warping, because you don't print big surfaces. I will try this and hope it will work on my bed slinger.

[@noahkatz9616]

Very helpful and great timing, I'm working on an enclosure design right now.

[@Lulzigi]

So this is interesting. I have a conveyor belt 3D printer (CR-30) that inherently prints at a 45⁰ angle. I always thought of that as a negative. I think I'll try to design some stuff with that extra strength in mind.

[@christopherpepin6059]

As an alternative to designed supports you could always design the support triangle as a separate part and simply merge the two models in the slicer. For any given angle the triangle part is going to be the same for every print, you just need a couple variations for different heights.

[@peterlanoie]

Hi there Slant 3D. I've only recently started watching your videos, but am finding them informative. Particularly this one. I employed this support and printing technique to print a thin walled air duct that was essentially a 90 degree elbow. I was able to print it without any supports apart from the 45 degree custom support "spine". I did want to comment on your microphone. You appear to be using a Blue Yeti. The microphone pickup elements in this (there are 4) are oriented with their planes parallel to the microphone body axis. The way you have it positioned in the videos is with your voice hitting along the axis (such as is typically seen with normally hand held mics). You should be talking at it laterally, from the side to maximize pickup. Use the pattern knob and try out some positions. You might discover it sounds way better. Cheers!

[@baxrok2.]

Great ideas! Thanks.

[@rwz]

This was amazing. Thanks!

[@I_enjoy_some_things]

The “Fuzzy Skin” setting in Prusa Slicer is one of my favorite cheat codes lol. Definitely hides small imperfections and, to an extent, even layer lines.

[@scottdrobina5278]

Great content, thank you! It was very difficult to see the details of the box in your hand because it was black and the video backdrop is dark. I suggest using white filament for the items you present in your hand. It is just a suggestion. Your videos and content are awesome!

[@MeToob]

New to 3d printing myself, so thanks for the videos, they have helped me out along the way. You've mentioned electrical enclosures a couple times in your videos, I'm curious about how you go about getting approval for them. Thanks again.

[@stvcolwill]

Excellent video - Well done!!

[@theX24968Z]

for that nice kind of matte texture, i've noticed bambu's PLA-CF material does a good job at producing that kind of texture without needing to add noise to the 3d print.

[@chuysaucedo7119]

Very cool. I gotta try this

[@sirrodneyffing1]

Awesome tip. VERY useful. Thanks a million for that.

[@slant3d]

Glad it was helpful

[@dtaggartofRTD]

That's different. I'll need to keep that in mind.

[@mandalorianknight7002]

Tbh, traditional manufacturing would likely create this via injection mold if mass production is end goal. While vastly more expensive upfront, additive can’t compete with that output but it’s incredible with short runs

[@slant3d]

Very incorrect. We do mass production 3D Printing printing every day

[@mandalorianknight7002]

Sorry@@slant3d, FDM cant compete with sub minute production cycles that can run 24/7. There's vastly more molded parts than printed, but, there's vastly more prototypes that are printed.

[@stuz32]

Interesting idea, I'll have to give it a try :-)

[@Pridanc-oj4ot]

Fantastic stuff. TYVM.

[@moccaloto]

The texture is awesome

[@LykleSchepers]

Nice thing about having a belt printer is that it by default prints at 45 deg angle. So all these benefits, without support material. And you can print batches automatically.

[@lodewyk21]

I really like this. Great vid. 😁

[@slant3d]

Thank you

[@KeithGroover]

Good stuff! Can you do a tutorial about fuzzy skin? Specifically how you would make just certain surfaces fuzzy while leaving the rest clean. Thanks!

[@jmangus83]

I know in my slicer. It asks how far out you want the protrusions and how far apart you want them to be away from each other. Then it asks if you want all surfaces, just outer, or just inner

[@KeithGroover]

@@jmangus83Yeah, I'm using prusaslicer, and how it defines "inner" and "outer" surfaces seems really finicky. I've resorted to using a hack I found, where you use the "text" feature and write a bunch of "||||||||" and then stretch it over the surfaces you want to be fuzzy. It's a pretty crappy system, so I'm wondering how it should be done.

[@petemenuez]

Which slicer are you using? @@jmangus83

[@AmirKhan-qx2lr]

@@jmangus83 which slicer?

[@ADBBuild]

@@AmirKhan-qx2lr In Prusa slicer, its called "Fuzzy Skin".

[@feynthefallen]

I'll have to give that a try some time.

[@Vector3DP]

Great tip. It's worth considering though that this will also increase the mass and print time. You notice on the slicer that you get additional walls when you print on the diagonal to ensure vertical shell thickness during printing, all those purple walls. You could maybe add another 2 walls to the flat print for a faster print with similar weight and strength.