Like most people, I’ve printed mostly decorative items and novelties since starting this hobby. I like an articulated dragon or a cool figure as much as the next person, but I honestly haven’t unlocked that much true utility from these machines.
That, of course, is entirely my fault. We’ve all seen the amazing things people can do with 3D printers when they have the talent and time, which I both lack, but there are actually a few 3D prints that I genuinely use every day, because they’re better than the store-bought alternatives.
The Bookshark Bookmark by blecheimer
It’s nothing to be scared of
This might be one of the simplest things I’ve ever printed, but the Bookshark bookmark is also one of the most ingenious because of it. I am a voracious reader, and I have been all my life. I also tend to read half a dozen books at once, and I have plenty of anthologies where I might go a few weeks or months between short stories. In other words, I need a lot of bookmarks to keep track of my reading.
I first printed out some Booksharks because I thought they looked cool. There’s a little stopper under the shark fin part, so when your book is closed, it looks like a shark swimming in the ocean. However, as I started using these, I quickly stopped using all my store-bought bookmarks. Booksharks are just so small, easy, and reliable to use that I never reach for anything else.
They also use very little material, and on a modern printer you can knock one out in a minute or two, or even a whole plate full of them. I like using multicolor filament so that my Booksharks are all different colors, but I guess you could deliberately print them in sets of colors for a color-coded system.
Strong Locking Cable Clip by neoyarus
Those cables aren’t going anywhere
I’ve tried a lot of 3D-printed cable management solutions over the years. Some have worked better than others, but in the end, I’ve actually settled on this brilliant locking cable clip. The print-in-place hinge is already impressive enough, but neoyarus has really thought this one through. There are 16 sizes, supporting one to sixteen cables. There are four different mounting options, and the clip at the end really is easy to open and close.
I have a little trolley with my handheld gaming consoles, VR headset, and other miscellaneous gadgets to charge, and using some double-sided tape to attach one of these clips to the back has been a godsend to stop my charging cables from flopping all over the place when I unplug my PlayStation Vita or Meta Quest 3.
Under Desk Headphone Mount by Chickenface
This one finally has me hooked
I always seem to be drowning in headphones, so I’ve tried every reasonable store-bought headphone mount you can think of. I’ve tried the ones that have a suction cup for your desk, magnetic ones that stick to your desk’s legs, and, of course, the type that slips over your desk’s edge. I always accidentally knock that last type off the desk at some point, so I’m not a fan.
Chickenface has taken a previous design and remixed it into a very elegant under-desk headphone hook. There’s a variant with and without a screw hole. You can use adhesive to attach the former, but I personally don’t trust that. All I needed was a short wood screw and a screwdriver that fit through the bottom guide hole, and I had the hook fitted in less than 30 seconds with a rock-solid attachment.
If you have a desk with existing screws that are in the right place, you can even just remove the screw and replace it with the hook in between. The screw holes are countersunk, so you probably don’t need a longer screw in most cases.
Print in place BAG CLIPS by Shadow_Flash1234
It just tastes better when fresh
I used to use clothing pegs to keep open bags closed, to prevent things from getting stale or bugs from getting in. Then I saw people 3D-printing bag clips, and that seemed like a potentially better solution. The thing is, most of the designs I tried either break too easily, or they do a much worse job of keeping the bag closed than a spring-loaded peg.
Shadow_Flash1234’s BAG CLIP design has none of those issues. It has a built-in clip and is under tension when it’s closed. The little clips do eventually break after repeated openings, but they are fast and cheap to print, and good for long-term use for things you don’t need often, like flour bags.
It’s the simple things that work best
I’ve tried lots of supposedly helpful gadgets that have just too many moving parts, or ask for too much of typical filament. So even though they were pretty interesting and potentially great, the things I end up actually using inevitably seem to be things that do one simple thing well and can be re-printed rapidly and in high quantity.