Three vase-mode trees on a beaded tray, with a version lit by fairy lights
Tiny Christmas Tree Kit
A little forest of three bottle-brush trees — 40, 55 and 75 mm tall — on a
beaded tray that holds all three together. Printed as a single spiralling
wall, so each tree comes off the plate as one continuous bead with soft,
drooping branch tips.
Comes in two versions: a plain tray, and a lights version that hides a
fairy light string underneath and brings it up inside every tree.
What's in the pack
Trees/
— 22 mm wide, 40 mm tall
— 30 mm wide, 55 mm tall
— 40 mm wide, 75 mm tall
— all three plated, with the print profile already
set up. Start here if you have Bambu Studio or Orca — it saves you
setting up vase mode by hand.
TreeBase/ — the little disc each tree stands on, with a tapered plug that
locates it
— all three bases on one plate
— the same bases bored through, for
the lights version
— the plate with its print profile
Base/ — the tray all three stand on, 86 × 98 mm
— plain tray
— the same tray with a channel
routed underneath for the lights
— a 1 mm lid that clips the
wire into that channel
The trays are 3mf rather than stl because each one is two separate meshes —
the tray and the beads — so you can give the beads their own colour or
texture in the slicer without the flat of the tray taking it too.
The lights version
Uses a micro-LED ("seed" or "fairy") string on thin copper wire — the kind
sold as battery or USB fairy lights.
The wire lies in a channel routed into the underside of the tray, runs between
the three trees, and comes up through a hole in each base into the hollow
middle of the tree. The lid presses into the channel from below and holds
everything in; the table it stands on is what keeps the lid in place, so
nothing needs gluing.
Check your string fits before you print:
| | size |
|---|---|
| Channel under the tray | 4 mm wide × 2.5 mm deep |
| Depth left for the wire once the lid is in | 1.5 mm |
| Hole up into the small tree | 2.9 mm |
| Hole up into the medium tree | 4.0 mm |
| Hole up into the large tree | 5.3 mm |
The small tree's 2.9 mm hole is the tight one. Seed-LED strings (beads around
2 mm on 0.4 mm wire) pass through all three. Strings with 5 mm bulbs will not
fit the small tree — use them on the medium and large only, or leave the small
tree unlit.
Print the trees in a translucent or natural filament if you want them to
glow the way the photo shows. White or natural PLA both work; solid opaque
colours will light the tips but not the body.
How to print
The trees must be printed in vase mode (spiral mode / "spiralize outer
contour"). They are modelled as a single closed wall, and in any other mode
the slicer will read that wall as a thin solid and the branches will not come
out. The included already has this set.
If you are setting it up yourself:
| | trees | bases and trays |
|---|---|---|
| Spiral / vase mode | on | off |
| Layer height | 0.28 mm | 0.16 mm |
| Line width | 0.54 mm | 0.42 mm |
| Walls | 1 | 2 |
| Infill | 0% | 15% |
| Top layers | 0 | 6 |
| Bottom layers | 4 | 4 |
| Supports | none | none |
| Brim | 5 mm, auto | 5 mm, auto |
Nozzle 0.4 mm, PLA. No supports anywhere in the kit.
The branch tips are laid across open air on purpose — that sag is what makes
them look like branches. A little stringing between them is normal and brushes
off.
Print time and filament
Sliced on a Bambu Lab P2S, 0.4 mm nozzle, PLA, using the profiles above.
| Part | Time | Filament |
|---|---|---|
| Small tree (40 mm) | 30 min | 2.27 g |
| Medium tree (55 mm) | 51 min | 4.33 g |
| Large tree (75 mm) | 1 h 30 min | 8.23 g |
| All three bases, one plate | 26 min | 5.49 g |
| Tray | 1 h 04 min | 21.52 g |
Whole set: 4 h 20 min · 41.8 g
The lights versions of the bases and the tray come out within a minute and a gram of these, so they are not listed separately. Nothing in the kit needs supports, so the times are the whole job.
Assembly
1. Drop each base into its recess in the tray. They are a loose fit by design,
0.2 mm all round.
2. Push each tree down onto its base — the tapered plug guides it in and grips.
3. For the lights version, thread the string through the channel first, bring
a few LEDs up through each base, then press the lid into the channel.
Tags: christmas, christmas-tree, vase-mode, fairy-lights, decoration, winter, tabletop, printable, stl-pack