Bottle Cap, Gatorade Bottle, Aquarium Vacuum, Dodecahedron

Bottle Cap, Gatorade Bottle, Aquarium Vacuum, Dodecahedron

Inner Diameter 38 mm, double thread, thread pitch 7.2 mm

Before recycling those sport drink bottles (e.g., Gatorade, Vitamin Water, etc.), why not get some math and art or even something useful out of the bottles? So I took a Gaorade bottle cap, dissected it, and did some measurement—diameters, thread pitch, etc. After a few iterations, I got a functional bottle cap. It is a nice entry-level design project, playing with a few numbers to adjust the fit.

Then, I tinkered with the basic design and made a few interesting caps. With a spout, we can convert a bottle into a working aquarium vacuum using a 0.5-in tube, a siphon that can be used to clean the gravel at the bottom.

Further, I made a dodecahedron and put a few caps around it. The one with 12 caps is hard to print, requiring extensive support. The one with 6 caps can be printed without any support. Well, as mentioned earlier, it is just a way to play with the bottles. Have fun!

####Gatorade and Vitamin Water are trademarks of their respective owner. The cap may work as well on other soft drink bottles. To make it water-tight, please consider using some plumbing tape.

To Print

A resolution of 0.2mm works well for me. A higher resolution should also work.