Why do people want to reuse toilet paper rolls? Paper is not a hygienic material, and these are used in a place that's rife with bacteria...
VBprogrammer · 2h ago
If you are worried about this you might want to consider whether you have a healthy degree of concern about hygiene and bacteria. It could be worth speaking with a therapist.
Gigachad · 1h ago
If the bacteria on toilet rolls was an actual problem, toothbrushes would be a much bigger issue than storage tubs.
Nullabillity · 1h ago
Usually you don't use your toothbrush while fondling your genitals...
IlikeKitties · 1h ago
You don't know what you are missing but to each their own i guess.
diggan · 13m ago
> Why do people want to reuse toilet paper rolls?
Because some of us have like 200 cables, and toilet paper rolls is a cheap but effective way of getting some control over these :) And besides, I'm sure that my fingers and feet are more dirty when I touch/move any of the cables, than the toilet paper rolls that spent a couple of days in a bathroom.
bjackman · 2h ago
IIUC this is also true of most 3D-print materials. You should not be using Gridfinity to store food! This is also why you usually shouldn't 3D print a dildo.
This would be true even if the materials were food safe to be honest, I don't see how you can keep something like this clean.
It's for storing stuff like capacitors and screws and electrical tape.
i5heu · 44m ago
context: 3D-print material like PLA is food safe, but due to the many edges and lines between the print layers it is basically impossible to clean to a food safe degree.
lrvick · 2h ago
But, importantly, you can 3D print a dildo mold.
slau · 4h ago
Zach Freedman, the creator of the original Gridfinity, is also an amazing writer and wordsmith. His videos are full of amazing tongue twisters, alliterations and incredible puns.
Why mention multiboard and not honeycomb storage wall (HSW)? It's open source and arguably a better ecosystem.
lrvick · 2h ago
Also the proprietary license on multiboard is absolutely insane. Not only is it closed source, even the printed objects have strings attached. If you ever use anything you print from the multiboard library in a for-profit setting you are obligated to pay a monthly license fee.
HSW 100%
cge · 7m ago
>Also the proprietary license on multiboard is absolutely insane.
Licensing in the 3D printing community tends to be a mess, with licenses that are often absurd, and selectively and sometimes dramatically enforced and unenforced. Multiboard is one of the most absurd I've seen, and is so utterly toxic I feel like touching anything involved with it would be risky: I'd really encourage people to read it [1] (and not the misleading summary they give). I suppose by even writing this I'm making myself ineligible for the license, as the license would not allow me to act in any way contrary to the interests of the company behind Multiboard, or even encourage any third part to act contrary to those interests. If the terms aren't absurd enough, there's a clause for the company to terminate the already limited ability to make and use derivative works if they feel you are taking advantage of the license terms.
Yet at the same time, go to any 3D printing model website, and you'll see numerous obvious copyright and trademark violations of Multiboard, often under completely incompatible licenses. Not only are these not removed (I have reported them before), but the owners of Multiboard will even officially comment on the sites praising the designs.
It's bizarre, but despite things at times going dramatically wrong, like with Benchy's license suddenly being enforced after many years of encouraging violations, people in the community largely seem to ignore the problem.
OK, a hex grid wall is really appealing. Now I just need to find a local printer ..
lrvick · 2h ago
Trust me once you start printing this you are going to want it all over your home and want new panels on demand for any otherwise useless wall space. 3D printers are cheap!
baq · 1h ago
They're also relatively big and ideally the thing they're standing on is attached to the wall or has a 40kg damper (i.e. a concrete pavement block or something similar).
lrvick · 24m ago
Getting one with an enclosure like a Prusa Core One does wonders for noise reduction. Can even throw it under a desk.
I had one in my office for years and no one could hear it on the other side of video calls.
baq · 8m ago
I've got a bambu A1 and noise is not a problem at all, I had to put that concrete block underneath it or it'd destroy the cheap coffee table it was standing on due to vibrations :)
kalev · 4h ago
Took me a while before i understood it was to store physical items. For a second I was thinking some battery solution-like grid storage system. A few photos on the homepage would help a lot and make it much more clear for noobs like me.
stevenpetryk · 6h ago
It’s such a nice project. But boy do I think it would benefit from mass production. People spend a lot of time printing generic bins and baseplates that would be better spent just printing custom bins.
JKCalhoun · 32s ago
I think they're a good intro to 3D printing.
You wouldn't download "Hello world"?
Gigachad · 4h ago
Time has never really been an issue imo. For the average person your printer sits unused 99% of the time if it takes you half a day to print a baseplate and some bins, who cares. It’s still faster and cheaper than shipping.
Ironically printing custom pelican inserts with this right now
paradox460 · 3h ago
Commercializing doesn't really make sense. So I need to get a small 1x1x3 container to store washers or whatever. With my 3D printer, I'll have that container in under an hour. Even if I bought it with the fastest shipping Amazon has available, assuming it was from a local Warehouse, the earliest I could get it would be half a day away. Having a local store that sells them would be marginally faster, but then I have to go to the store, pick it up and come home. The hour I spend waiting for the printer isn't an hour. I'm I'm completely blocked from doing anything else. It's just an hour in which my printers busy.
KeplerBoy · 4h ago
I guess selling injection molded parts is forbidden under its licensing terms, which seems unfortunate.
Let people make some money while everyone is saving money.
Why would people who did nothing to invent and develop the system would get the money and not the creators ?
kragen · 4h ago
It's not clear what tort would be committed under US law by someone who sold injection-molded parts using the Gridfinity STLs. Patent infringement? No patent has issued. Copyright infringement? Copyright generally only covers expressive elements of works such as the sculpture in question, not functional elements like the "Sega" string that was at issue in Sega vs. Accolade. Trademark? Also doesn't protect functional elements.
Basically, it seems like the inventor purports to be licensing the kinds of exclusive rights to their invention that a patent would grant them, but without actually meeting the legal requirements for receiving a patent.
(I don't know of any other jurisdiction that would give them a cause of action either, but law is diverse enough, and many governments are corrupt enough, that I'm sure there's somewhere in the world they could win a lawsuit.)
Maybe some actual lawyers could chime in on this.
PeterStuer · 42m ago
Had to watch the first 60 seconds of a linked video to know what this even was. It's printable tool storage, tools as in screwdrivers etc.
I guess they assume anyone hitting the site already knows this.
When I read 'grid' and 'storage' on HN, I think of other stuff.
f1ay · 2h ago
This is for generating custom bin / baseplate sizes in multiple "formats", and solves a lot of the issues I see brought up on this thread.
Outside of gridfinity it can be used to generate odd-sized grids via the GRIPS option, make HSW honeycomb walls, and supports multiboard, and a few others.
tetha · 2h ago
Maybe I'm a bit of a downer there, but I looked at the overall effort and time investment of making Gridfinity and rather got myself a cutting board and glue to recycle old cardboard.
Don't get me wrong, Gridfinity looks amazing. But, cutting a few cardboard base plates from old shipping boxes into place and putting together little stands for a metronome, tuner and a few other small things, as well as a bunch of boxes for plecs and other small stuff took like half an hour to an hour.
And I could reuse some trash shipping boxes I had around here.
devrandoom · 44m ago
You'd be surprised how many ways there are to make storage containers. Gridfinity is one of them.
Gigachad · 4h ago
I’ve been trying this out. The biggest problem I’m experiencing is that your draws won’t be a perfect multiple of the grid size. Which means you are always going to be left with gaps on the side which are wasted space which could be up to 40mm.
There is kind of a solution to this where you can use non standard grid sizes to perfectly fit your draws, and there are generators which will create the baseplates and bins for you. But you lose the ability to use other people’s models.
Feel like it would have been better if they had picked a smaller grid size so the average wasted space would be smaller.
MarkCole · 3h ago
There is also the option to do half bins / half grid pattern at the edge. So you have the normal 42x42 grid pattern, then on one edge there are 21x42 sized boxes. There are a number of designs that support the half grid pattern. This would reduce your maximum lost space down to 20mm, and you would still have compatibility with the gridfinity system.
Gigachad · 1h ago
I’ll have to give this a shot. I can always put the generic bins I can generate as half size on the edge and put the downloaded ones in the standard grid.
thebruce87m · 3h ago
What does “draw” mean in this context?
nimos · 2h ago
I assume it is drawers.
rcarmo · 4h ago
What I do is print custom bins to store long things on the side of the grid. Making it smaller or bigger would not have fixed anything.
Gigachad · 4h ago
Making the grid size smaller makes the wasted space less. In the worst case scenario, your draw is 1mm too short for the last row, so the other 40mm becomes wasted. If the grid was half the size for example, the worst case scenario is 20mm wasted.
SOLAR_FIELDS · 4h ago
An old colleague of mine went through the process of doing gridfinity. One of his main struggles was getting boxes that fit his power tools perfectly. He was looking for a way to easily get a shape of the tool into CAD. What’s the most straightforward and effective way to get a CAD representation of a solid these days? Of course there are expensive solutions but is there anything reasonably achievable in the DIY space?
cluckindan · 21m ago
You could get a table mat with a measuring grid and take photographs of the object from different sides; three or more depending on how much asymmetric features the object has. Go as far away from the object as possible and use maximum zoom to get as close to isometric perspective as possible. If it’s not a very thick object, this method is millimeter accurate. With larger objects, the perspective will lead to slightly larger measurements at the object extremities: edges closest to the camera will be enlarged.
Then, in your CAD program, set up the photos as backgrounds for different perspective views.
Or, obviously, get a 3D scanner and live with the point cloud mesh approximations, it’s probably less of a hassle.
Or… just get a good set of calipers and a radius measuring tool.
upstandingdude · 3h ago
Imho thats overoptimizing. To me the next larger square box is the best most flexible solution. I get the allure of perfect fit places for everything but to me its not worth the continuous effort. (I got several gridfinity drawers)
pavelrub · 4h ago
The common approach is to take a photo of an object from above together with a ruler or something of a known size for scale, then import that directly into the CAD software, scale according to the scaling object, and create a cutout along the object's outline. No need for calipers, 3d scans, or other complex measurement procedures. There are a lot of videos and guides on how to do that.
alphalima · 3h ago
This is how to do it.I also round the edges of the cutout.
Also, there is an extension for freecad to make non rectangular (e.g. "p") shaped bins.
Most satisfying, least productive things I've done this year!
cgjohn · 3h ago
I'm sure your colleague has done this already, but for anyone considering creating their own models, I would highly recommend checking whether somebody else already went through that process for you. A lot of things have been fitted into gridfinity. And even if not for gridfinity specifically, you can fairly easily adapt other existing models to a gridfinity based box.
There are 3d model search engines where I recommend just entering [item name] + gridfinity to find pre existing models. There is: yeggi.com and thangs.com (be aware that the latter recently changed to only display models from its own domain by default).
lrvick · 1h ago
I just pull out calipers, take some quick measurements, then put them into OpenSCAD, export, and hit print.
Between Honeycomb Storage Wall and Gridfinity almost every tool I own has a home.
junon · 4h ago
Photogrammetry is one. Generally results in messy geometry though and tolerances get finicky.
The CAD plugin in Blender is my favorite though. Need a caliper to get measurements and then I can build out my hooks/clamps/whatever. FreeCAD for when I just need sketches as I find the solid part workflow utterly confusing, whereas I'm very well versed in Blender.
diggan · 10m ago
> Photogrammetry is one. Generally results in messy geometry though and tolerances get finicky.
The trick is a hybrid approach, use photogrammetry to get a draft model into whatever environment you use (like Blender or whatever), then use that for creating the high-quality cutout manually, which will be very easy with a in-place 3D draft model right in the scene.
1. Draw the outline of the tool in question on A4 paper
2. Scan it
3. Trace it on Blender, extrude, boolean
4. Print
Of course, only works for small enough tools. Maybe use more A4 sheets?
wizardforhire · 3h ago
Well if you want to get dirty and not deal with design, build a vacuum former. Shop vac, perf board, 2x4 or 1x2 frame and whatever rigid for a backer. Build the frames out of screen door frame pieces, and binder clips to close them. Polystyrene sheets are cheap af $.05 or less at any plastic supplier. Never been to a plastic supplier? I guarantee theres one relatively near by in whatever is your closest major city.
Use your oven to heat the plastic. Turn on the vac, pull out the plastic when it droops, slam down quick… perfect part. Lots of videos on youtube. Adam savage does a few on the process. Lots of nuance to the process to get really good pieces but for cheap, quick and good its hard to beat. Oh yeah the whole stormtrooper cosplay scene has done a lot of work on the setup, most definitely lots of improvements that I’m glossing over but like all rabbit holes its pretty deep.
Because some of us have like 200 cables, and toilet paper rolls is a cheap but effective way of getting some control over these :) And besides, I'm sure that my fingers and feet are more dirty when I touch/move any of the cables, than the toilet paper rolls that spent a couple of days in a bathroom.
This would be true even if the materials were food safe to be honest, I don't see how you can keep something like this clean.
It's for storing stuff like capacitors and screws and electrical tape.
I wish he’d write books.
Highly recommended: https://m.youtube.com/@ZackFreedman
https://www.reddit.com/r/honeycombwall/
Although they aren't open-source as Gridfinity or HSW:
Cargo modular storage system by Play Conveyor: https://thangs.com/designer/Play%20Conveyor/3d-model/Cargo%2...
Multiboard, by Multiboard: https://www.multiboard.io/
HSW 100%
Licensing in the 3D printing community tends to be a mess, with licenses that are often absurd, and selectively and sometimes dramatically enforced and unenforced. Multiboard is one of the most absurd I've seen, and is so utterly toxic I feel like touching anything involved with it would be risky: I'd really encourage people to read it [1] (and not the misleading summary they give). I suppose by even writing this I'm making myself ineligible for the license, as the license would not allow me to act in any way contrary to the interests of the company behind Multiboard, or even encourage any third part to act contrary to those interests. If the terms aren't absurd enough, there's a clause for the company to terminate the already limited ability to make and use derivative works if they feel you are taking advantage of the license terms.
Yet at the same time, go to any 3D printing model website, and you'll see numerous obvious copyright and trademark violations of Multiboard, often under completely incompatible licenses. Not only are these not removed (I have reported them before), but the owners of Multiboard will even officially comment on the sites praising the designs.
It's bizarre, but despite things at times going dramatically wrong, like with Benchy's license suddenly being enforced after many years of encouraging violations, people in the community largely seem to ignore the problem.
[1]: https://docs.google.com/document/u/0/d/1C0-Iyxydqk_d2I3o_5ua...
I had one in my office for years and no one could hear it on the other side of video calls.
You wouldn't download "Hello world"?
https://gridfinity.perplexinglabs.com/
Ironically printing custom pelican inserts with this right now
Let people make some money while everyone is saving money.
https://x.com/zackfreedman/status/1650629770156326912#m
or for those allergic to X:
https://lightbrd.com/zackfreedman/status/1650629770156326912...
> Let people make some money
Why would people who did nothing to invent and develop the system would get the money and not the creators ?
Basically, it seems like the inventor purports to be licensing the kinds of exclusive rights to their invention that a patent would grant them, but without actually meeting the legal requirements for receiving a patent.
(I don't know of any other jurisdiction that would give them a cause of action either, but law is diverse enough, and many governments are corrupt enough, that I'm sure there's somewhere in the world they could win a lawsuit.)
Maybe some actual lawyers could chime in on this.
I guess they assume anyone hitting the site already knows this.
When I read 'grid' and 'storage' on HN, I think of other stuff.
https://gridfinity.perplexinglabs.com/
Outside of gridfinity it can be used to generate odd-sized grids via the GRIPS option, make HSW honeycomb walls, and supports multiboard, and a few others.
Don't get me wrong, Gridfinity looks amazing. But, cutting a few cardboard base plates from old shipping boxes into place and putting together little stands for a metronome, tuner and a few other small things, as well as a bunch of boxes for plecs and other small stuff took like half an hour to an hour.
And I could reuse some trash shipping boxes I had around here.
There is kind of a solution to this where you can use non standard grid sizes to perfectly fit your draws, and there are generators which will create the baseplates and bins for you. But you lose the ability to use other people’s models.
Feel like it would have been better if they had picked a smaller grid size so the average wasted space would be smaller.
Then, in your CAD program, set up the photos as backgrounds for different perspective views.
Or, obviously, get a 3D scanner and live with the point cloud mesh approximations, it’s probably less of a hassle.
Or… just get a good set of calipers and a radius measuring tool.
Also, there is an extension for freecad to make non rectangular (e.g. "p") shaped bins.
Most satisfying, least productive things I've done this year!
There are 3d model search engines where I recommend just entering [item name] + gridfinity to find pre existing models. There is: yeggi.com and thangs.com (be aware that the latter recently changed to only display models from its own domain by default).
Between Honeycomb Storage Wall and Gridfinity almost every tool I own has a home.
The CAD plugin in Blender is my favorite though. Need a caliper to get measurements and then I can build out my hooks/clamps/whatever. FreeCAD for when I just need sketches as I find the solid part workflow utterly confusing, whereas I'm very well versed in Blender.
The trick is a hybrid approach, use photogrammetry to get a draft model into whatever environment you use (like Blender or whatever), then use that for creating the high-quality cutout manually, which will be very easy with a in-place 3D draft model right in the scene.
1. Draw the outline of the tool in question on A4 paper
2. Scan it
3. Trace it on Blender, extrude, boolean
4. Print
Of course, only works for small enough tools. Maybe use more A4 sheets?
Adam Savage’s guide to vacuum forming https://youtube.com/watch?v=lTy8tsZzT_Q&pp=ygUaYWRhbSBzYXZhZ...
First page I could find for the diy stormtrooper costume process https://www.studiocreations.com/howto/stormtrooper/index.htm...
Though the plus side to this is that it can be done somewhat inrementally
Great in its own right though
Kudos to all gridfinity makers out there.