Folding Chair

Description

It's a small footchair that I designed for fitting in a small space behind a radiator. It folds together and is held in place with magnets. It fits perfectly on my 22x22 print bed, and each of the three parts takes about three hours to print. Now that I have built it with magnets, I think it would still be a good project without them. 

The model is 18 mm thick when in its flat configuration. The chair is 16 cm high and has a top area measuring 18 by 16 cm. The legs extend to a width of 22 cm.

Magnets

I used four magnets. Each one had a diameter of 6 mm and a thickness of 2 mm.

Print settings

I printed the parts in PLA with four walls, four top and bottom layers, a layer height of 0.2 mm, 10% infill and no supports, with the seams set to random.
It should work with other materials, and I think it may work with a layer height of 0.3 mm, but you would then need to check for pauses for the magnets. There may also be some unforeseen problems with tolerances or the hinges.

Print instructions

Leg No. 1

The print is made up of three sections. The first section (bein_1) includes the arm that connects the two legs when standing. Please refer to the pictures for guidance on how to orient the print.

If you print with a layer height of 0.2, you can pause the print on layer 56 and insert two magnets in the two places marked in the photo. Please ensure that you insert the two magnets so that they attract each other.

There is a second pause on layer 87 where you need to insert a third magnet for this part.

Leg No. 2

The other leg (bein_2) has a notch that the leg-to-arm hook fits into.

For this part, pause on layer 61 to insert one last magnet. Please ensure that the magnet is in the correct orientation so that the arm of leg 1 is attracted to it.

Top

The top of the chair should be printed in this orientation.

Assembly

Once you have all three parts ready, you can assemble them. It is quite a tight fit, but it will work. Press the pieces together, ensuring the correct orientation of the parts.

In my case, I store the small chair behind a heating pipe, but I'm sure you'll find plenty of places to store it yourself.

If you're feeling lucky and want to modify the project, I've provided both the Fusion and 3MF files. I also added a parameter to Fusion for the thickness. It is called 'dicke'. I tested it for 16–20 mm, but there may be some issues.