Geodesic Dome Cat House - Totally Screwed Remix

This geodesic dome was designed to be assembled as a cat/pet house. The dome accommodates a pet bed up to 400 mm (~15.75 inches) in diameter. It was remixed to be assembled using M3 screws & nyloc nuts. While you don't have to print or use them, I have also designed finishing caps for the inside of each panel. They will make the inside surface of the dome more aesthetically pleasing as well as minimize the collection of dust & fur on the inside of the dome. The caps have access slots on each edge to allow for easy removal & maintenance.

To assemble the geodesic dome as I have, you will need to print:

Print Settings

All parts should be properly oriented & are designed to be printed without supports. For best results, print using a 0.2 mm layer height. I used 30% infill with a triangle infill pattern, but you can experiment with other infill densities & patterns if you’d like. For the top & bottom layer pattern I used concentric.

Bill of Materials — to assemble the geodesic dome you will need:

366 M3x10 socket button head screws
366 M3 nyloc hex nuts

If you don’t already have an assortment of fasteners, I recommend Bolt Depot. If sourcing fasteners from Bolt Depot, order product #7220 & #4792.

I would also recommend a good 2 mm L-key for hex socket screws and a 5.5 mm wrench—both proved invaluable.

Assembly

Here are some tips & tricks that I found useful when building my geodesic dome: 

While printing panels, I also printed the corresponding panel caps. I printed multiple panels/caps at the same time. 6x Panel 1 Remix.stl and 6x Panel 1 Cap.stl or 5x Panel 2 Remix.stl and 5x Panel 2 Cap.stl, for example. When a set of panels finished printing, I snapped the finishing caps onto each of them and stacked like panels with caps together. Each panel & panel cap has a series of small dots on the inside wall of each panel & the underside of each panel cap. This makes orienting caps easy by simply matching the number of dots along one panel wall with the dots on the underside of the finishing cap. It will also be useful during assembly as two mating panel walls will always have the same number of dots.

I found it easiest to assemble sets of panels into their hexagonal or pentagonal shape & then assemble those together. For example, starting at the top of the dome, assemble 5x Panel 2 Remix.stl and 6x Panel 1 Remix.stl and then connect those two subassemblies together.

Even though each finishing cap has dots to mate and orient them with their corresponding panel, I found it best to leave caps on panels during assembly, only removing caps when needed to facilitate assembly.

I started by assembling the Panel 2 pentagon subassembly at the top of the dome and worked my way down, attaching the 5 Panel 1 subassemblies to it, and so on.

When I got to the row of Stellar Black panels that run along the base of the dome, I assembled them all together into a ring and then attached that to my dome all at once.

To print my “maker’s mark” panel (Panel 2 Remix Hackjaz.stl), I combined two gcode files. I wanted the surface pattern of the panel to be concentric, but the exposed bridging needed to be of a line pattern in order to bridge properly. I sliced the Panel 2 Remix Hackjaz.stl file twice. Once with concentric top/bottom layers & once with line top/bottom layers. Using a text editor, I copied the two layers where the bridging began out of the gcode file that was sliced using the line setting. I then replaced the same two layers of gcode in the file that was sliced using the concentric setting with the gcode I had copied. I saved this new merged gcode file & sent it to the printer. I was very pleased with the result!

Update: There may be more than one way to accomplish this natively in your slicer without having to splice two gcode files together. I was able to accomplish this in Cura (5.2.1); Under the Top/Bottom tab, I made visible & set Top Surface Skin Pattern to Concentric, Top/Bottom Pattern to Lines, & Bottom Pattern Initial Layer to Concentric. This results in a sliced model with the first layer (the one touching the build plate) to be a concentric pattern, the last layer printed (in this case, the inside surface of the panel) to be a concentric pattern, & any other layers (that aren’t infill) in between to be a line pattern—including any bridging! MichaelP was also able to accomplish this in Cura (5.2.0); Under the Experimental tab, he made visible and turned on Enable Bridge Settings. Through some experimentation, we were both able to replicate the same behavior, but this seems to be depend on your Wall Thickness setting to work and doesn’t work for higher Wall Thickness values. See our conversation on the Makes & Comments tab for more information.

Assembly Diagrams

TOP

FRONT

BACK

RIGHT

Value4Value

This remix is being released under the Value4Value model. If you received any value from my work, please determine what it was worth to you & return that value to me in the form of a donation. Thank you for supporting my work!

Print Info

Printer: VORON 2.4 350
Rafts: No
Supports: No
Resolution: 0.2 mm
Infill: 30%
Infill Pattern: Triangle
Top/Bottom Layer Pattern: Concentric
Filament Brand: Keene Village Plastics PLA
Filament Color: Natural, Evergreen Pearl, Stellar Black

How I Designed This

I started with the the Fusion 360 files published by Abby575 in Geodesic Dome Cat House, remixed them, & modeled the rest in Fusion 360.

Changelog

Changes made from the original design:

• The fillet radius of all panel vertices was changed from 6 mm to 3 mm to reduce the amount of visible light at panel intersections. The corresponding internal fillet radius was adjusted accordingly.
• A chamfer was added to the top inside edge of all panel walls to accept a snap-in finishing cap.
• All square zip tie openings were changed to 3.25 mm holes to accept M3 screws.
• Identification letters on panel walls were replaced by a more discreet series of dots on the inside surface of panel walls. The dots also appear on the underside of all finishing caps to aid in cap orientation.
• Finishing caps were modeled to fit all panels in order to cleanup the inside surface of the dome as well as to minimize the collection of dust & fur on the inside of the dome.
• The paw print cutout was moved from panel 2 to panel 1 in order facilitate my desired assembly pattern.
• Finishing caps for paw print panels were designed to mimic a through-hole paw print to further reduce the collection of dust & fur on the inside of those panels.
• A “maker's mark” panel (Panel 2 Remix Hackjaz.stl) was designed as a way to leave my mark & to make the design mine.

“If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” — Isaac Newton

This remix would not have been possible without the Fusion 360 files published by Abby575 for their Geodesic Dome Cat House & was inspired by the assembly pattern of DeanR96's remix Geodesic Dome Cat House - Pine Tree Cutouts (also Geodesic Dome Cat House - Pine Tree Cutouts here on Printables).

This remix would not have been possible without the Fusion 360 files published by Abby575 for their Geodesic Dome Cat House & was inspired by the assembly pattern of DeanR96's remix Geodesic Dome Cat House - Pine Tree Cutouts (also Geodesic Dome Cat House - Pine Tree Cutouts here on Printables).