Fast-Printing Infill Boxes (Stackable)

Update (Sept. 26, 2024): Added community-requested standard and stackable 120x180 and 180x180 bases. Added 180x60, 180x90, and 180x120 X-Walls for the new 180x180 bases size.

Update (Sept. 16, 2024): Added an community-requested standard and stackable base size. (90x180)
Update: (Sept. 9, 2024): Added community-requested 60x180 and 240x60 standard and stackable bases.
Update (Sept. 7, 2024): Tightened tolerances on all stackable bases to make them stack better per community request.

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Infill Boxes: Customizable, Fast to Print, Easy to Assemble, and Strong!

Infill boxes are a solution to creating storage containers that solves a number of problems makers will encounter when printing traditional "single-print boxes." You can achieve aesthetically-pleasing results in about half of the time, while also using minimal plastic and while making a strong box! (And, they're stackable!)

Choose from a variety of base sizes and wall heights, and customize your box with your own choice of pattern during slicing.

It is recommended to print these designs in PETG, but others have reported success with PLA. (They'll just need some more force to assemble. Please review the documentation PDF file for filament brand notes for PETG and PLA filaments.)

• Print the box bases with 5 perimeters.
• To further reduce print time, you can print the walls with 4 perimeters.
• Do not print any top or bottom layers and do not generate any support material.
• Parts have 0.2mm of clearance. Test Parts are included so you can verify your calibrations before printing the big pieces of your box.

What is wrong with traditional box designs?

The exponential relationship between print time and print volume for a traditional box model makes the experience undesirable. This is mainly due to solid infill and perimeters taking a long time to complete.

Additionally: retractions and travels for intricate designs also take a long time. More negative issues come from slicer miscalibrations and filament issues, such as stringing, poor overhangs, and poor bridges.

Traditional box designs can also suffer from strength issues if they have interesting hole-based patterns on the walls of the box; you have less total contact area between layers. The load force a heavy item exerts on a box falls entirely on the weakest area of interlayer adhesion.

How do Infill Boxes Solve These Problems?

Print Time - Infill boxes are printed in parts and are made of infill! With no solid infill layers to speak of, we gain a lot of time back when printing the parts of an infill box. We also get to keep appealing aesthetic designs and know that they'll be printed in the most efficient way possible.

Filament Miscalibrations - Infill boxes are much easier to print. Any bridge areas are designed to be manageable and have no impact on the part's aesthetics because they're so small. All you need to worry about is filament temperature, moisture, bed adhesion, and print speed.

Strength - Loads are evenly distributed throughout the box along layer lines so you aren't relying on how well layers are stuck together for strength; you're dealing with the full tensile strength of your print material. Where parts connect, layer lines are perpendicular to one another for even more strength!

What Infill Do I Use?

You can use any “solid” pattern that has a lot of connection points throughout the infill. Good examples are Grid, Triangles, and Honeycomb. Some patterns you want to avoid are things like Rectilinear and spirals.

Check out my other model here on Printables: My Infill Visualization Tool.

With that tool you can make real-world references to see what different densities of infill look like. It even comes with pre-sliced files for the Prusa MK3 and MK4 so you can print all of the infill densities out at once for the same infill pattern.

The tool was intended to be used for determining what density of internal infill to use for different size nozzles and for seeing how the support structure of the infill looked, but it also works great for “infill” designs like this box, or my infill coaster model.

How To Assemble:

Please review the additional assembly and print instructions for detailed pictures and statistical information.