www.3ders.org

Feb 12, 2016 | By Andre

Nostalgia can come in many forms. Whether its the smell and feel of the sand on the beach or listening to an old favourite on the radio, there are just certain things that can instantly pull you back a few years.

Blogger Richrap is someone that had developed a persistent affinity towards his favourite chocolate bar the Trio in recent years. And if you consider the savoury combination of toffee, thick milk chocolate and biscuit that the treat consisted of, who can blame him.

Unfortunately for Richrap, the Trio was discontinued in 2003. Fortunately for him however, he's a pioneer when it comes to contributing to the RepRap open-source field of 3D printing. He knows that if something doesn’t exist, his background with 3D printers, a little bit of design skill, some well devised food safety measures and sweets are all that's needed to bring the Trio back.

So that’s exactly what he set out to do. He started out by designing the shape of the chocolate bar in 3D modelling software Sketchup and laid them out to form a positive mould for 3D printing. Once the design was printed, he coated his 3D printed “chocolate” (and caramel capsules) with a food & skin safe silicone so as to produce a negative mould.

The reason for this extra step is mostly a precautionary one as filament that runs through your typical desktop 3D printer is never technically food safe. Both potential extruder related contaminates or mould (the bad kind) developing in the the pores of your 3D print remain a minor concern.

This being said, Richrap still did do a few tests using the popular flexible Filaflex 3D printing material for curiosity’s sake, even though he said he never used it for his chocolate.

Once his mould was complete, it was all about remembering what was in his favourite chocolate bar before melting and pouring and placing that delightful combination of milk chocolate, caramel, and biscuits into his 3D print assisted Trio mould.

So, how did it taste? As you can see in the below video, he was thoroughly impressed. And if all this talk of chocolate is making you crave a Trio for yourself you might be in luck. RichRep has released the 3D print files of his Trio mould for free on his Youmagine file sharing page.

An exciting conclusion to RichRap’s adventure in nostalgia quenching comes with the news that the Trio isn’t completely dead after all. It seems that after 13 years and a Facebook campaign to resurrect the chocolate bar the Trio will once again hit UK grocery stores in March of this year. But who are we kidding, the 3D printed variety is so much cooler!

 

 

Posted in 3D Printing Application

 

 

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