3D Printed "Lived Laughed Loved" Halloween Gravestone Home Decor

Before Halloween this year, I saw cute gravestone-shaped cookies that had the phrase "lived laughed loved" frosted on them which gave me inspiration to make a 3D printed version of it.

I thought it would also be cute if it was a set of 3 gravestones -- with each having one word of the phrase -- so I modeled them as well.

This is what I used -- you can follow along with what you have.

• Software
• Autodesk Fusion 360
• PrusaSlicer
• 3D printer: Prusa i3 MK3S+ & MMU2S with 0.6mm nozzle
• Filament -- I used 2 colors: gray and white.
• NOTE: You can also print this design using one color -- see the files in the "single-material" folder.

NOTE: If you don't want to create your own 3D models, the designs I mention in this Instructable are available to download here: https://www.printables.com/model/305757-funny-lived-laughed-loved-halloween-gravestones-va

This is made up of 3 components:

• The double-layered base (with a nub to connect to the gravestone)
• A "core" to be printed in a contrasting color to show as the engraving
• The gravestone itself with the engraved letters (and a hole to attach to the nub on the base)

NOTE: The core is cut out from the gravestone as a convenience so it doesn't matter which order you have the STLs added to the slicer.

• Dragged and dropped the STLs into PrusaSlicer and positioned it so it would print with the text facing down so the front of the gravestone would have the smoothest texture.
• Sliced it with these print settings:
• 15% infill (lightning)
• Perimeters: 1 (since the letters are close to each other)
• Exported the G-code and sent it through OctoPrint to print it on the Prusa 3D printer with my filament color choices loaded into the MMU.

• Join the two pieces together by sticking the gravestone top onto the nub on the base.
• Add to your Halloween home decor and enjoy!

I just wanted to note that I had to iterate on the design a few times before getting it to what I shared in the steps above. See the steps below for the 4 design iterations.

v1: My first design was a single printed piece (no assembly required) in a single color with one word per gravestone. I wanted to keep it simple and avoid designing it for multi-material because it would have required a lot of filament changes since it was being printed standing up. Because I wanted a fairly deep engraved look, there were some overhang issues that I didn't particularly like, mainly the top part of the border not being consistent with the rest of the border.

v2: I decided to change the design to a two-piece so I could print the gravestone facing up to avoid the overhang issues, and since it was going to be printed laying down, there wouldn't be as many filament changes if I did multi-material, so I designed for the engraving to be in a separate color. To do this, I modified my design by extruding the letters by 0.6mm into a new component for a separate STL. I also separated the base from the rest of the gravestone and added a nub to the top of the base and a corresponding hole in the bottom of the gravestone, with a 0.2mm tolerance on each side -- this turned out to be too loose. The letters also looked awful since I had the perimeters set to 2 and required the letters to be filled in based on the shape of the letters.

v3: To fix the letters, I modified the design so that the printer only needed to print a large solid shape of white to cover all the engraved areas for each layer (instead of having to print the letters in white and trace around the letters in gray). This helped so much! But I had this white "core" to be much thicker than I needed it to be, which caused unnecessary filament changes for many layers. Thinking the looseness of the nub fitting was caused by the perimeter generator set to "Arachne" and perimeters set to 2, I didn't make any modifications to this area -- it was still too loose. I also flipped it to print the gravestone facing down so it would be smoother on the decorative side.

v4: I reduced the tolerance from 0.2mm to 0.1mm per side which was a better fit. I reduced the height of the core to avoid the unnecessary filament changes. This is the version I shared in this Instructable.

Download them here: https://www.printables.com/model/305757-funny-lived-laughed-loved-halloween-gravestones-va

(Bonus: There's also a blank one if you want to make it your own!)

I hope you enjoy it!