This week’s selection is the text embosser by Reddit contributor snitem.
This design is a kind of “press” that can be used to emboss letters on thick paper or cardboard. As you can see in the image at top, snitem has used this approach to beautifully adorn a message on wedding invitations.
The method is pretty straightforward, but also ingenious. Two 3D printed components are fixed together in hinge fashion, with one offering a “positive” of the desired text, and the other a somewhat larger “negative” space.
To operate the device, thick paper or cardboard is placed in-between and it’s all pressed together. Snitem recommends using a heavy weight or full body effort to push the two halves together. Note that the hinge isn’t there for the forceful effort, but merely to ensure the two halves meet at the appropriate spot.
No STL has been provided for this 3D model, but for those with even the simplest CAD tools it should be an easy task to design your own. After all, you’d want your own message anyway, wouldn’t you?
The trick is to add the solid text to one side, while enlarging and subtracting from the other side. Snitem suggests 1mm for the negative and 0.8mm for the positive, although this obviously depends on what you want to achieve and the type of paper involved.
Embossing paper is something that can easily be done by most print shops, but it can be a costly affair. This approach could save some a great deal of cash, as designing and printing a device of this type would cost only pennies if done on one’s own.
My only concern here would be the amount of time required to emboss a larger quantity of notes. I think the addition of guides to ensure paper is lined up consistently could be beneficial, and help speed up processing, which must be done individually.
If you’re in need of embossed cards, or someone you know, this might be an interesting approach to experiment with.
This is a fascinating example of how 3D print ingenuity can overcome a common issue, and it’s a solution pattern that almost anyone with a printer and a CAD tool can do themselves for almost no cost.
Via Reddit
