Tetrahedron chainmail fabric

Hello everyone, thanks for stopping by!

The aim of this project was to create a dual color chainmail and I really like tetrahedron (three sided pyramid) so I decided to go with it. The chainmail consists of lower hexagon link piece and tetrahedron piece. It is very flexible and you can effectively fold it in half. Of course no supports neeeded, everything bridges nicely, I decided to make two layers of bridges and then lay the plane on top of that to improve printability, the bridges are 0.4mm thick so I recommend to print at 0.2 mm layer height. Flawless bed adhesion and calibration is crucial for this print! 

The color change is done with simple M600 filament change command. If you ask me how I did the yellow center, I snipped out 6 of the original tetrahedron pieces and printed out additional 6 connector pieces. For the connector pieces, use a dab of superglue on center and the three spokes and press the top connector piece on top of the bottom piece. Thanks to this color change the bottom color pokes through nicely when the chainmail is bent which looks awesome! Also the tetrahedrons reflect the light in a cool pattern I bet if you print this out in silk filament it will look amazing!

These connector pieces make it possible to link the chainmail indefinitely and you can make them in different colors, into different shapes, make mosaics with them, use M600 filament change command to create triangle or even triangles on tetrahedrons… Sky is the limit! I'm very much looking forward with what you can come up with so don't hesitate to post that make!  

See it in action here.

Printed in Filament PM (Plasty Mladeč) Silver PLA and Fillamentum Mellon Yellow PLA. Printable on at least 22x22 cm bed, for smaller sizes you can adjust the .step file I provided or use the .3mf format and delete objects in slicer.

If you like this, don't forget to hit that like or donate button, follow me here or on Instagram @lukes3d and @lukes3d_memes. Also I will be happy if you check out my other projects like this Flexi Hexagonal Coaster that evolved from this:

As always, .3mf, .stl and .step files are available!

Cheers!

Luke