Ocean Automaton - Mini Ocean Aquarium

Mini Ocean Aquarium Automaton!

A mini aquarium in your hand! This ocean simulation toy/automaton can serve as an educational tool for kids, sparking interest in ocean geology and biology, or simply as a fun decorative piece for adults. Everything is designed and sculpted from ground up.

Printing Tips

I refined this design through multiple iterations, using rolls of filament for prototyping to ensure easier printing. However, every printer is different, some of the following tips may help:

• Support: Supports are minimum. For structures with holes in middle, I use slim tree support with “on build plate only”, so trees are easy to remove.
  • Most other stuff just default 0.2mm and normal support. 
• PETG or PLA for gears: I use black/white PETG for most stuff because I don't have black PLA. But I think PLA should work too since not much force needed.
• Tiny Sea Creatures: These small parts may fail during printing. I manually added tree supports, but feel free to add more if needed. Fortunately, failures don’t waste much filament or time since they are very small, and you can print each separately.
• Penguin & Killer Whale: Designed for AMS printing, but if you don’t have AMS, you can easily paint them with a black marker.
• Cylinder Glass Options: Requires transparent PETG. I spent a lot of time study how to print transparent glass. The end result is not ideal but I think it is not bad for emulating the ocean looks. Choose one glass option based on your preference:
  • Option 1 - plate 6 (Left Image): Spiral Vase mode for a single-body cylinder. Prints faster, with a crystal like ocean look, but causes distortion and reflection, like a convex mirror.
  • Option 2 - plate 7 (Right Image): Two flat pieces assembled. Print slowly with no fan, higher temperature, as recommended by Bambu Lab (guide here). Use Bambu smooth PEI plate. Results in a frosted glass effect, allowing visibility from all angles.
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🔹 For a quick & easy print: Choose Option 1 (recommended for testing and try).
🔹 For better visibility of fish shapes: Choose Option 2.

Handling Flat Glass Prints:
If printing the flat glass option, be cautious when removing it from the plate. It’s very thin and can crack if handled roughly. Use a large plastic card or another printing plate to carefully lift it. Once removed, it becomes strong and durable.

Assembly Instructions

Assembly is simple, requiring only a small amount of glue for attaching the sea creatures to the mounting stick.

1. Install gears and rotation wheels onto the base.

2. Attach the main gears to the central pillar (ensure the correct direction for the middle piece).

3. Install the top square pillar and mount the killer whale. Snap the connector stick into the socket holes—insert one side first, then firmly snap in the other.

4. Glue each sea creature onto its mounting stick, then insert the stick into the rotation gears.

5. Install the glass and top piece:
   • For the two-piece flat glass option, align the pillars at the edges of glass sheets, to the slots on the top and bottom bases.