Autoscout 3D Printed Prototype Transforming Figure in Fusion 360

Being fluent at designing morphing robots in Fusion 360 has been on my list of things to do since Autodesk announced it was ending support for 123D Design in 2017. 123D Design has been my go to 3d modeling program since its web app release in 2012. Its basic interface made designing in 3d feel natural because the limited number of commands are generally intuitive. I've stuck with it since then, hesitant to move on to Fusion, despite it being the standard for hobby level designing. I've spent two weeks getting acquainted with Fusion and I'm kicking myself for not learning this program sooner. I've already designed and printed a working prototype of a G1 Autoscout, which is a Jizai Toys design he made, recently.

While this project had an emphasis on learning how to use Fusion 360 proficiently for the way I'm used to designing, I wanted to explore some new ways at assembling hinges and joints. I've found that the sketches give me the ability to be more consistent with all the features on the figure I'm designing.

Working out the specifics of the transformation prior to printing is the feature that stands out the most. Without the ability to do a motion study in program I would be printing 10 or more prototype iterations, just to see the difference of the small changes I've made. This has the potential to save me weeks on development time, which is a huge limiting factor.

Its been many years that I've been working at my method of design, so, I have a certain way I might go about things, like sizing panels and joinery. Some of my ways have been set from trial and error, so I would be naturally doing less iterations to work out some of the finer details, like clearance issues and how tight hinge parts are.

Being able to easily check how the figure will work out before printing is a feature that cannot be praised enough. I was able to try a new way to make a swing joint and it came out perfect on the first print. I've never used this type of swing joint in my designs, but this particular design called for it where a screw wouldn't work. Not only was this a successful study for Fusion 360, but also for adding a new kind of joint to my repertoire.

Overall, I feel like I have acquired a useful tool in being able to navigate Fusion 360 [Fusion 360 is the paid version, where the free for at-home use version is just called Fusion].

I've had some people ask me about some considerations when designing a transformer for 3d printing and this Autoscout is a great figure study to talk about some of the quirks of resin printing a figure. 

Thanks for your patience, cool cats. We're just getting things ready for our webstore and we'll be talking about that soon. Ciao, for now!