Stand-Up Cat Toy

While cats sometimes are great at entertaining themselves, sometimes they can be demanding too and are bored pretty fast. And what helps that better than a fun moving toy?

In this Instructable I will show you how to make a toy for your cat that stands up by itself and moves around as you play with it. While the base is 3d-printed, everything else is really easy to get or you already have it lying around.

• 3D-printer
• wooden stick (about 5 mm diameter, 20-30 mm long)
• 4 M3x10 Screws
• some rice or sand
• thin jute rope (or paracord, gift wrapping bands,... - something your cat can play with)

Print out the two attached files.

For better quality I turned down the layer height of the uppermost layers (see the 5th picture), so the sphere would come out more rounded. Also make sure to use supports under the dome-part (4th picture).

If your slicer places supports in the screw holes, you need to add support blockers (3rd picture)! Otherwise it's difficult to get the supoort out and you might not be able to screm the screws in.

Also don't worry I'f you don't get out all the supports from the sphere. We're going to fill it up anyway!

Take your rice or sand and fill up the hemisphere to the point where you can still put the lid on.

Now put on the lid and tighten the screws, so it can't fall off.

Now put the stick into the vertival hole in the lid. To fasten it, screw your last screw into the horizontal hole on the side. Optional you can use glue too but then you can't take it apart anymore.

Now simply take a piece of rope that's about 30-40 cm long and knot it tightly around the stick. No need to use glue here - there is enough friction between the rope and the stick so it won't loosen up. And it's still easy to replace!

I also put little knots in the ends so they don't fray as fast.

My cats have great fun with the new toy :)