On shelves December 15th
download the files on: https://learn.adafruit.com/3d-printed-daft-punk-helmet
OK, here are some questions:
1. Pedro, is it just you who designed + built the helmet? If not, who worked on it with you and what did each of you do?
The design of the helmet took me about three days to design. Many of the elements required a lot of tweaking the order of operation booleans that need to be tracked, while still having a history of base shapes.
Size and comfort was also a factor when designing the shell. Because of the production schedule, the components had to be quickly visualized before the actual model was printed. The code for the LED animations was programmed by Phil B, our in-house engineer. Two separate sketches were used that loops through a series of animations.
2. What is your full name, what do you do professionally and where do you live?
My name is Pedro Ruiz, creative technologist at Adafruit. I host a weekly live 3D Printing Show with my brother Noe Ruiz and Matt Griffin.
Every week we design and release a 3d printed project along with a video, cad files and complete step by step guide on how to build the project on the Adafruit Learning System. Many of the tutorial sites only give you a sentence or two with little step by step instructions, low quality photos using components that aren’t readily available. We pride ourselves in developing repeatable, high quality designs that anyone can build. All components and tools are available on the Adafruit shop. Many of the circuits that make our projects possible are developed by our founder Limor Fried.
I work remote and reside in sunny south florida with my lovely wife and son.
3. What made you decide to embark on this project? Why did you do it and how long did it take you?
Every week we pitch and toss around ideas. During one of our meetings, Limor asked if we wanted to make a Daft Punk Helmet. Who wouldn’t say yes?!
4. Have you worn the helmet out in the world? If so, when/where? And how long can you keep it on?
The model shown in the video is defiantly for wearing in-doors. You could print out the frames and use a transparent material for the front shell to give it more visibility. You could wear it for a few hours at a party as long as you have a friendly spotter to watch your step!
5. When you wear it for a long time, what do notice — does it get heavy, is there a lot of condensation on the inside like in a Halloween mask?
The NeoPixel strips are covered in weather proof silicone. The wires also use a super flexible silicone covering that protects against humidity. There’s enough room and padding in the helmet for breathing room and air flow.
6. How heavy is the helmet? How thick is it?
The helmet is 5mm thick and weighs 2 pounds with all of the components and batteries installed.
7. I know that it takes 1.2 pounds of filament; do you know how many feet of filament that is?
290045.4mm of 1.75mm filament or about $29.47 in material
8. Does the filament print out in concentric “circles” — ie in one direction — or does it loop back and forth, changing direction as it prints? (Or something else entirely?)
We modified our wade extruder to use 1.75mm diameter, so the extrusion width had to compensate for the updated esteps. Extrusion width was set higher with three shells so that the nozzle had a chance to fill up with enough material to extrude without skipping as in travels across the large build area. Because of this, the walls are pretty close to each other and didn’t require the 6% infill that was used for a rectilinear fill pattern.
9. You warn that visibility is limited. It doesn’t seem like you can see anything in there. What are you really able to see through the filament?
You might be able to make out a figure in bright direct sun light!
10. Can you tell me a bit about how you programmed the light pattern? What were you going for in the effect? Could you program it to, say, respond to the music you’re playing?
The programing is by our super star coder Phillip Burgess who writes all of the animations for a lot of our projects. Yes, you could absolutely add a microphone that would trigger the lights. We have many examples of sound responsive projects of the Adafruit Learning System. One of the most popular is the wearable VU meter necktie!
11. Anything funny, interesting or instructive you’d like to add about the build itself or mistakes and discoveries you made along the way? A little anecdote for color?
The helmet is great for scaring your small chid when they act up! Definitely make sure to have enough filament before you start printing, running out half way is no fun when it takes almost three days to full print!
Every Thursday is #3dthursday here at Adafruit! The DIY 3D printing community has passion and dedication for making solid objects from digital models. Recently, we have noticed electronics projects integrated with 3D printed enclosures, brackets, and sculptures, so each Thursday we celebrate and highlight these bold pioneers!
Have you considered building a 3D project around an Arduino or other microcontroller? How about printing a bracket to mount your Raspberry Pi to the back of your HD monitor? And don’t forget the countless LED projects that are possible when you are modeling your projects in 3D!