Rectangle Grid Planter

The task at hand was to design and print a small plant holder for a classroom window sill. With the size confinements and accessibility in mind I designed this grid-like planter with drainage holes in each compartment, and a catch pan underneath to act as a base. The initial design was that the planter would be a single piece with the drainage area underneath the plant compartments. See image below as reference

However I realized it would be difficult to drain the excess water without having two separate pieces. I then designed the catch to be removable, and have the planter simply sitting in or on top of it. I moved on to figuring out size confinements, and made a basic sketch of what just the planter would look like. I also sketched out a top view of what each compartment would look like, including rough estimates of the thickness. 

Now to start designing the planter on Solidworks I first made a rectangle with the proper dimensions. I then extruded the base and perimeter, and mirrored it. I also patterned the two rectangles to make the lines of 5 compartments that would make up the planter. Then I patterned the drainage hole and added fillets to some of the edges. 

After I had a rough design of the planter I checked all the dimensions and rounded a few edges to make it look more sleek. Finally, I engraved into the front face of the planter “Networks”. There were no real issues in this part of the design besides choosing a font, which I consulted the teacher to help decide. We settled on a font called “Oddly Calming” which I felt was perfect for the environment of the classroom. 

The final last minute addition I made to the planter was that I added pegs on the bottom to act as feet to hold it up inside the catch. Thinking the catch would be bigger than the base of the planter itself. This design choice would be changed later once I designed the catch in full. Here's a picture of the sketch that included the initial and final design of the catch-pan. 

Now that the planter was complete it was time to make the catch. I took measurements of the bottom of the planter to ensure that the edges of the catch wouldn't interfere with the drainage holes. And similarly to the first compartment on the planter I made a rectangle with the proper dimensions, and extruded the base and perimeter. At first I designed the catch to be smaller than the base of the planter and to have square surfaces extruded up in each corner to hold up the planter. However I ended up increasing the size of the catch and bringing the extruded pieces in a bit more. This was to ensure that the planter fit securely in the catch but still allowed for air to get under. 

To replicate what the planter would look like, I made a cardboard model that was to scale. Including each compartment with drainage holes. At the time of making the model my plan was that the planter would have pegs that held it up, and the catch would go underneath and fit with the pegs on the outside. This is reflected by my model but not any sketches as I didn’t really draw it up before cutting out cardboard pieces to make the model. The reason that this was not the final design is because the pegs were too small to hold up the weight of the planter when it was full of dirt. Additionally it would be difficult to get the catch out without picking up the planter. Accessibility and functionality were issues with this design. 

Here are pictures of what the model looks like: 

After some deliberation on the design for the planter we decided to have it sit on top of the catch, with small pillars coming out of each corner. At first I made the pillars too tall, and we shortened them. After that we moved them inward from the corners and brought the overall height of the catch down. Going for a more subtle look, there's a slight overlap between the bottom of the planter and the sides of the catch, that make it look like one single piece. 

When it came time to slice the model and print, we ran into some issues. We knew the planter was going to be a large piece, however the size it was at would require more than a full spool of filament, plus around 18 hours of printing. It would be too difficult to swap out spools while it was printing so we decided to make the model smaller by a few centimeters. In total we shortened the height by about 1.5 cm which saved a lot of time and filament. 

This is the final product, 

I decided to print in white so there was room for customization, maybe for students to paint it. Overall the quality of the print was really high, there were no structural issues or imperfections. The planter fit well on the window sill and the teachers were very appreciative with the project. Overall it was a simple project that had a few issues to be resolved, but regardless was a smooth design process from design to print.