Leather Headphone Wrap

I’m still happy I tried out 3-D printing by making a headphone wrap, but the device itself leaves a little to be desired.

A perfect headphone wrap would be:

1. Small   shirt pocket size at the biggest
2. Easy to wrap    or I’ll never use it
3. Easy to unwrap    or I’ll curse at it
4. Secure    it needs to hold the headphones while preventing tangles

My 3-D printed model scores a 3/4. Unwrapping is a pain, so I started looking for alternatives. Instructables user amalkhan has this model, which I like a lot. I also saw a few others that were more like a headphone wallet.

So I’m going to make one out of some scrap leather I have that matches my satchel. It comes down to 6 steps:

1. Make the Pattern

I picked a size that seemed reasonable and cut it out of cardboard to make sure it seemed right. I traced the cardboard on the leather. I want it to be 2 layers like the bag.

2. Cut the Leather

This is where I realized that two layers really complicates things:

• The inner layer has to be shorter
• The stitches have to be radial; not all parallel through the leather
• Once you glue it up, it will never really lay flat for you again.

Still, I want the extra weight of 2 layers.

3. Glue and Trim

Put glue on one end of the leather and keep it secure. It’s best to wait until it’s all set before you continue. I did not do that. Once it’s secure, clamp it around a dowel or something and glue it the rest of the way.

After it’s all glued up, trim off any over-hanging leather corners to even up the edges.

4. Stitch

Another reason I wanted two layers of leather is that I could put cool stitching around the outside of the thing. This is the part that takes the longest; it took me 42 stitches around the whole thing.

5. Add Snaps

To hold it together, I punched in some line 24 snaps.

6. Finish the Edges

I started the edges by sanding with 400-grit sandpaper, then I put some glycerin saddle soap on a rag and rubbed it into the edges. It came out looking like this:

That’s about it. So far it has stayed in my pocket one day without tangling.

3D Printing Results

I designed a thing!

I tried my hand at designing something for 3D printing and it came back:

Impressions

The color is  a bit more fuchsia than my daughter was hoping for. She wanted a pale princess pink, and this is more of a ’80s Raspberry Beret kind of pink.

The material is strong and pretty flexible. I haven’t really stressed it to find out if it breaks, but it bends a bit and always returns to its original shape. The finish isn’t totally smooth; it has kind of a velvety feel, but not at all fuzzy.

It took 14 days from the time I clicked “buy” on Shapeways until I was holding it in my hand (10 business days).

It Works!

For wrapping up headphones, it totally does the trick, and it fits neatly into the pocket of my laptop bag.

Trying Out 3-D Printing

I haven’t figured out what 3-D printing is really good for. Their stock is kind of all over the place, so maybe I’m not the only one who can’t figure out whether I should be excited.

I don’t have a printer, but I do have ViaCad, so I sketched up a quick headphone cable wrap thingie [.stl file] (I drew it from scratch, but it’s inspired by this one by joechung on thingiverse).

Then I created accounts at a bunch of 3-D printing shops. Here are their prices for one of the thing in the cheapest plastic. My daughter requested pink, so I’ll use that if  it’s available.

• Shapeways — $16.06
• Sculpteo — $25.31
• Ponoko — $25.44 (pink isn’t available)
• iMaterialize — €15.81 (about $21.34 at the moment)

I ordered one from Shapeways. I’ll post again when I see how it looks.