Tiny Mars Explorer

Hello makers!!

This is an experiment more than a real project!

I decided to push to the limit my Ender 3 Pro to print this tiny space explorer! In fact, there are 3 separate parts in this print and the man is only 19 mm tall!

The astronaut is from the original file designed by Max Grueter (https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:230305), I modified it for the tiny scale print.

I designed the Mars soil and the American flag in Autodesk Inventor, trying to match the proportions in one of the famous photographs of the 1969 Moon landing.

The settings I used for the print are:

- Layer height: 0.037 mm (this is actually the highest resolution of my stepper motors)

- 0.4 mm nozzle (0.2 will give you more details and a more clean print, but it is more difficult to print)

- Infill density: 99% (this is only because of the very small dimension)

- Print speed: 20 mm/s

- Travel speed: 100 mm/s

Also, with my filament the temperature that works better is 192°C and a bed temperature of 50°C.

Sometimes you get "hair" around the print, usually because of the travel between printed areas.

You can use a little knife or sand paper to clean it up.

When all your 3 parts are clean, you can use a touch of glue to fix the explorer on the soil.

Then place the flag in the hole and spin it to get the position you want!

It is amazing how some of the astronaut details are visible even in such a small scale!

The tiny explorer is ready to begin his Mars mission!