Customizable sieve / filter / strainer

3D printable parametric sieve / filter / strainer (formerly thing:2578935)

License

Creative Commons - Attribution

Attribution

Based on Sieve (or ‘Seive’) by pcstru (Thingiverse thing:341357).

Gallery

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Description and Instructions

This is an enhanced and customizable version of the sieve by pcstru. It allows to make sieves, filters, strainers, or whatever you like to call them, in various shapes and dimensions.

Open the .scad file in OpenSCAD and use the OpenSCAD Customizer to create a model with your own desired specifications.

Compared to pcstru's original, this updated version has these extra features:

• choose between round, square, or heart shapes;
• option to make any regular polygon shape by reducing the number of circle segments. The polygon will fit inside a circle of the specified outer diameter (this means making a 4-sided polygon is not the same as selecting the ‘square’ shape);
• ability to make a rectangular or elliptical shape with the stretch value to extend the shape in one direction (not applicable to heart shape);
• optionally add a taper to create funnel-like filters (not applicable to heart shape);
• there is a bit of extra overlap between the walls and grid, such that the grid should be well-attached to the rim even when using few or thin strands;
• the grid is perfectly centered at all times, courtesy of my unstoppable urge for detail. (But, the origin can be adjusted if desired.)

You can opt to print the grid as one set of layers, i.e. a plane with holes in it, or to print two sets of strands on top of each other (‘offset’ option). The latter is easier and probably faster to print, and may yield a more accurate filter if hole size is important. The disadvantage is that dirt tends to stick to the filter more easily.

You can also opt to lift the grid. This allows to print accurate filters with strands merely as wide as your nozzle diameter (see photos). Set the lift distance to your first layer height to ensure the filter only starts being printed at the second layer. This avoids that the strands get squished against the bed, or printed with a wider first layer extrusion, both of which would make the hole size inaccurate. You could also use a raft to the same effect, but it might be difficult to remove the filter form the raft without damaging it.

The segments parameter also affects the heart shape, but you should use a multiple of 4 in this case to ensure a smooth and usable shape.

Print settings

The examples in the photos were printed at 0.2 mm layers, but any layer height should work. Infill should usually be set to 100% unless you are printing a design with very wide walls or so.

Both prints shown in the photos use 0.4 mm strands (with offset), and were lifted 0.25 mm (first layer height) off the bed.

For filters with narrow strands, you should ensure the extrusion width matches the strand width.

If you are trying to print a filter with a fine mesh that is only 1 extrusion wide, and the mesh disappears entirely when slicing, ensure that slicer options similar to “detect thin walls” are enabled.

Updates

2017/10/10: v2.0

First published to Thingiverse.

2020/02/26: v2.1

Added limits and steps to parameters, to make this more usable in the OpenSCAD customizer. Also allowed to make the outer ring shorter than the grid, or omit it entirely (use a height of 0).

2020/05/15: migrated to GitHub.

2022/03/23: v2.2

Added ‘stretch’ parameter to allow creating elongated shapes (rectangles, ellipses). Refactored the code to be more straightforward.

2022/05/19: v2.3

Added ‘taper’ parameter (thanks to beettlle) to generate funnel-like shapes.

2023/05/21: v2.4

Added grid rotation and heart shape (thanks to rixvet).

2023/08/11: v2.5

Allow shifting the position of the grid; reduce rendering time of final mesh by generating less structures that will be trimmed anyhow.

Tags

customizable, filter, grid, mesh, openscad, sieve, strainer