The 5 Most Useful Things You Can 3D Print

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3D printers are limited only by the creativity of their creators and what can fit on the print tray. And luckily, you don’t need expensive printers, special filaments, or complicated prints that take hours to create useful things. Beginner-friendly 3D printing projects include items that may take only a few hours to print and that you use every day, such as a toothpaste squeezer or a laptop stand. We’ve looked at a number of 3D printer projects that can improve your home or improve your garage. Most of those things are obvious, though, so how about something a bit weird… but useful?

The following 3D printing projects are not the usual device accessories or replacement parts that you will often see at the top of 3D printing model shops, but they all have a very niche purpose. Each one is proof that, with a 3D printer and the desire to do so, you can solve almost any material problem – and in some cases, perhaps create things that you could not buy anywhere else. Try these five projects with your 3D printer.

Cup holders can help tune your car, but they can’t change the laws of physics. That open drink might spill over the edge with a hard enough turn. To solve that problem, we recommend nitroturd7856’s Gimbal Cup Holder. As the name suggests, the owner of the gimbal cup places the cup (the manufacturer displays it in beverage cans) in a gimbaled enclosure so that the force of gravity (theoretically) maintains the level regardless of sharp turns, difficult roads, humps, inclines, declines, you name it. It’s a cool project, even putting aside its importance. Designed for standard 12-ounce cans, with a 16-ounce version for those tall, thick cans. You may also wish to print a 12 ounce sleeve on those small, tall cans.

Note that since the gimbal takes up less space, this uses a holder-size mount. The cup will come out of the cup holder, like those cup holder extensions that allow you to hold larger containers. If your car has a cup holder that is known to be too tight or too big, you should measure it and compare it to the base before printing it.

Another warning: This project may present some problems. The creator notes that you must be very gentle when removing the text, or you may cause permanent damage to the structure. Assembling it can be difficult and may require simple tools. You should also use PETG, especially if you are going to drink any hot drinks or leave them in a hot car. Some commenters also noted that their printer is not long enough to print everything – so your mileage may vary.

On a hot summer day, you can see battery-powered fans everywhere. With climate change pushing the Atlantic Ocean to its peak and causing record heat waves around the world, this will likely become easier and more demanding. Just one annoying problem: the batteries can run out very quickly. There’s nothing worse than grabbing your fan before you go out and only to find out when it starts to stink that it’s dead. YG3D’s Manual Fan is a really clever use of a 3D printer to make a fan that is easy to print, will always work, and won’t cause any battery wastage.

The fan has a pressure lever to change certain gears and rotate its fan blade. So instead of being limited by batteries, your only limitation is your hand gets tired or cramped. And since there is no battery involved, you can bring it by plane. It really is a brilliant design all around.

Don’t be put off by a seemingly complicated design. At the end of the day, it’s just an enclosure, three gears, a spring, and a fan. This is the final version after the creator iterated on previous ones that caused a lot of noise and required adhesives and lubricants to work — this version doesn’t. Make sure you use PETG since using PLA can cause the spring to fail earlier. Besides not needing batteries, fixing this fan should be incredibly easy. The most likely part to break is the spring, so you can just print a new spring-lever combination, and the fan will work like new again.

Your bed-stealing partner and cold feet aside, those problems pale in comparison to a bed sheet that keeps coming loose, no matter how you secure or tuck it. One of the best solutions is a set of Gorilla Grip sheet straps, but in my personal experience, these are incredibly annoying to attach every time you change sheets. Instead, try GripFix by Acki3DPrint.

This is a triangular shaped holder with plastic teeth that you place under the corner of the mattress. Wrap the sheet in the GripFix, and secure it with the adjustable guide tabs. Simple design, ease of use, minimal visual footprint, and no more sheets that refuse to cooperate.

One user pointed out that you can end up with very sharp grip points and can accidentally tear your sheets; this person used PETG and admitted that the problem may not have occurred with PLA, but still, you might want to give those points a little more. Pro tip: Print the guides in a color close to that of your sheets so they won’t stand out. Doing so with, say, a bright orange filament would make it an eyesore, although the design is so minimalist that it won’t hold up much.

Maybe I’m alone in this, but one of the reasons I choose one of the best e-readers over a paper book is the frustration of reading one-handed. Hear me. With a paper book, it feels like hand gymnastics trying to spread the book open and keep your fingers and thumb in the way of the words. My hand is cramping, the paperback spines are bending in such a way that I feel like I’m giving up, and I can’t even turn the pages easily. Meanwhile, I can hold the e-reader all day with one hand and change pages with one hand, too, with a simple tap. I digress, but I probably would have stuck to my paper books if I had this Book Page Manager by fifindr.

The book page holder uses a curved star shape around the thumb hole that should fit snugly between the pages and hold the book open. It makes for easy, one-handed reading, according to several reviewers. Also, the design uses an internal rotating thumb ring so you can maintain a comfortable reading position regardless of your hand position.

The creator has also made two different ring sizes, 22mm and 25mm, in case you have big (or small) hands. Printing should be easy, fast, and require no assembly; The thumb ring is printed inside the enclosure, a great design choice. Your friends and family members can lend you yours, and it won’t be a big deal as you can print another one in less than an hour.

Listening to music on your earbuds is great. It’s not so scary when you take them out and find a piece of earwax, especially if it ends up inside the point near the speaker hole, which risks pushing that gun deep inside when you try to clean it. Most earbuds have nice cleaning tips that are easy to remove, but even so, they are a problem, sometimes a daily problem depending on how many ears you have. Our guy fifindr (who made the book page holder) also made a handy Earbuds Cleaning Tool.

The device looks like something every earbud manufacturer should include with the earbuds they sell. It has a tooth-edged tip (like a brush, in the creator’s words) that’s small enough to fit inside the silicone tip and remove that pesky earwax. On the other hand, the toothless option is useful for scraping grime and gunk from other areas, such as speaker filter grills, under the edge of the silicone tip, or dust trapped in the charging port.

Given the size of this item, you can print it in a few minutes, and it’s too small to bring anywhere. Print a dozen and put one in each bag and in every room of the house. Who knows, maybe you can print yourself an AirPods case with a small pick holder. Just be sure to take alcohol and/or wipes to keep them clean and prevent any ear infections.