🦖 Cute Gastonia "Gus" – CARTOON EDITION (single color print)

Meet Gus, the friendliest "tank" of the Cretaceous period! This adorable stylized model represents a "chibi" version of the famous dinosaur, Gastonia. With his friendly expression, big curious eyes, and iconic bony armor, Gus is the perfect desk companion, a great gift for dinosaur enthusiasts, or a playful accessory for a child's room.

📜 Gastonia: Myths vs. Reality

Gastonia was named after its discoverer, Robert Gaston, and in the dinosaur world, he was a true heavy-weight. Although our Gus looks cute, his real-life ancestor was an impressive creature:

• Appearance and Size: This armored herbivore was about 5 to 6 meters long and weighed around 1900 kg.
• The Crucial Tail Difference: Unlike his more famous relative, Ankylosaurus, Gastonia did not have a bony club at the end of his tail. Instead, his tail was lined with sharp lateral spikes that acted like shears—when the tail swung, the spikes at the base and sides would lock together to create a deadly weapon.
• Relatives: He belonged to the ankylosaurian dinosaurs (subfamily Polacanthinae) and was closely related to the genus Polacanthus.
• When and Where He Lived: He roamed the earth approximately 125 million years ago in what is now Utah (USA), specifically in the Cedar Mountain geological formation.

🔍 Model Features

• Side Spikes: Gus features his signature long lateral thorns, which provided protection in the wild and look incredibly stylish in this cartoon version.
• Armored Back: The detailed texture of the dorsal plates emphasizes the model's robustness and looks fantastic once printed.
• Stable Stance: Thanks to his four strong legs, Gus stands firmly on any surface and is ready to "guard" your shelf.

🖨 Print Settings & Recommendations (Tested in Practice)

Due to the high complexity of the body and the side spikes, this model is slightly more challenging to print. Therefore, it is necessary to pay extra attention to pre-print preparation (clean build plate, proper calibration).

I have personally tested the model on 5 different printers, and everything went smoothly with these settings:

• Supports: Required – I recommend Organic supports.
• Support Angle:
  • For Bambu Lab printers, an angle of 20° worked best for me.
  • For Anycubic, Elegoo printers, I recommend an angle of 25°.
• Layer Height: 0.20 mm (0.16 mm recommended for finer detail).
• Infill: 8% gyroid.
• Surface Effect: Fuzzy skin (optional – distance 0.3 mm / thickness 0.3 mm) to achieve a "dinosaur skin" effect.

⚠ WARNING: Be extremely careful when removing supports around the limbs and side spikes. Although these parts are designed to be printable, they can snap if handled roughly during post-processing.

📏 Size and Colors (noAMS)

• Scaling: Standard height is approx. 10 cm. Scaling up works perfectly; however, scaling down significantly may make the eye assembly and spikes too fragile.
• Multi-color Printing (noAMS): The model is designed for single-color printers. The eyes are printed separately and then inserted into the head. This allows you to achieve a professional multi-color look without needing units like Bambu AMS or Anycubic ACE Pro.

🧩 Assembly

Each eye consists of three parts that are inserted directly into Gus’s head and secured with a drop of superglue. Assembly is intuitive and quick.

🗂 Print Plates

• Plate 1 – Gus body
• Plates 2-4 – Individual eye colors (Black / White / Iris color of your choice)
• Plate 5 – Complete pair of eyes using sequential printing (for AMS / ACE Pro users)

🗂 Available Files

• 3MF files for BambuLab, Anycubic, and Elegoo (including recommended settings).
• STL files for other printers and slicers.

Do you like Gus? I would be very happy to see your Makes and read your reviews! Every print you share motivates me to design more prehistoric friends.