Kids project: Cool chicken in chair!

Now if you've been wondering 'Will my kids enjoy 3D printing as much as I will?', if they're anything like mine then yes, they'll have a ball. Especially when you introduce them to free software like Tinkercad and let their imaginations run rampant. Case in point, Sophie designed a chicken and then wanted a seat for it too, so next minute..

Tell me more of Tinkercad

From mind to design in minutes. Tinkercad is a free, easy-to-use web app that equips the next generation of designers and engineers with the foundational skills for innovation: 3D design, electronics, and coding!

No seriously, it's awesome. It lays out a design board, offers up a whole heap of pre-designed shapes good to go and then off you go, moving, sizing, shaping, plying, twisting, rotating and everything else possible to create your next idea. While there are lessons ready to rock when you are, both my kids picked up the fundamentals in less than two minutes (apparently Jackson has had a tinker with Tinkercad in school previously) and as a parent, I'm quite happy to have them design away (as opposed to spending most of their day playing Roblox or Minecraft..)

Tinkercad at play

Once you've finished your design it's a simple case of exporting the GCode to your slicer (Cura for me), checking the settings, slicing and sending everything to print.

While the chair was a preset model, Sophie built the chicken herself adding the legs, shades, beak and headphones from the accessory options. We also resized the chair slightly larger in Cura so the cool chicken can sit on it. Because that's what chickens need according to Sophie and who am I to argue? 

Now while the chair legs leave a lot to be desired (there's a bit of a lean and that front one is as rough as guts) I'm highly impressed that the supports did not tear away the chicken's legs like they usually do with something so small like it. Some careful cut aways and the supports fell away cleanly on both pieces. A bit of work with a file to smooth a few things out and now we have a very happy six year old on our hands.