For my 3 year old son’s birthday last year he received a “Stomp Rocket Ultra” kit. The kit was awesome, and we had a great time. Eventually we wore the rockets out, so I decided to design a model we could use to 3D print more. It was a big hit, and we have since printed countless rockets.
The rocket was designed in Fusion 360. It is a fairly simple design. It consists of the following:
- a cylinder 20 mm in diameter and 245 mm long
- a triangle fin extruded 1mm and repeated around the center 6 times using a circular pattern
- a hemisphere at the top of the rocket for a rounded top
One part of the design that is not apparent just by looking at the finished product is that the fins are purposely cut into the cylindrical body by 0.5 mm. This is done to make the slicer I used (Simplify3D for this model) slice the rocket in a way that makes the fins a part of the body, instead of an add on to the body. Fins that are added after the cylinder is printed (instead of while the cylinder is printed) are significantly weaker and fall off easily.
The image below shows the final rocket model as sliced by Simplify3D. Note how the fins are printed as part of the outside body loop.
For slicing I recommend the following settings:
- Layer Height : 0.3 mm
- Top Solid Layers: 5
- Bottom Solid Layers: 0
- Outline / Perimeter Shells: 2
- Support: None
You can get the STL file over at the model’s Thingiverse page. If you have any issues or questions let me know.