Eggs, they’re what’s for breakfast…… and lunch and sometimes even dinner. Heck, I even eat them as a post-workout protein supplement. Eggs are my coffee in the morning, and my protein shake before bed. However, when it comes to cooking with eggs, I prefer to eat just the whites, while either tossing the yolk down the drain or saving them for my wife to cook with. Unfortunately though, I, like many others, am not very good at separating an egg. I either get tiny pieces of shell mixed in with the whites or I break the yolk and need to start from scratch.
If you are a consistent reader of 3DPrint.com, then you have probably seen the technology of 3D printing go to use in creating many incredibly interesting, useful, and even ridiculously-designed objects. However, none may be as brilliant, yet so simple as that of what a man named Lloyd Roberts came up with.
That creation was a 3D printed egg separator, a design which originally came about due to Roberts’ desire to experiment with NinjaFlex’s flexible filament.
“Before this product I had no previous experience with the material, but knew that it was used a lot for flexible items,” Roberts explained to 3DPrint.com. “I however, wanted to create something with a function that could only be done specifically with this material.”
Roberts, who currently works for MyMiniFactory and iMakr, is also the owner of a MakerBot Replicator 2 3D printer.
The egg separator that he designed features a top that is 3D printed in NinjaFlex, as well as a smaller component which is printed in standard PLA. It’s printed using a 0.2mm layer hight and 100% infill, in order to reduce the odds of food residue getting caught within the device. Once off the print bed, the device works as a vacuum which is able to pull the yolk from the egg white like nothing you have seen before.
“It works really well, though it could always be improved,” explained Roberts. “Squeezing and releasing the flexible filament over the egg yellow causes a vacuum that pulls the egg up into it. The object can then be tilted to stop the egg from falling back out. With time I will also try to develop the design so that the egg can be held within the separator without the need to tilt it back. It may also be possible to then use it for multiple eggs without the need to squeeze the [yolk] back out each time.”
The design is free to download and 3D print from MyMiniFactory.com. Roberts plans to eventually modify his design to feature something “more comical or aesthetic” than the plain white design, but for now, I know I will have a much easier time making my egg white omelets in the morning.
