I have always liked 3D printed hackers, and 3D printed IKEA hackers are the best. Adam Miklosi, a freelance industrial designer and hardware startup owner in Budapest, has spent a lot of time on product development and researching new design thinking methods, and has collaborated with well-known companies such as Canon and IBM. Miklosi won the “Red Dot: Best Design Award” in 2019 and recently created an open-source IKEA hack mini brand called Uppgradera, which means “upgrade, improve, enhance, customize, update and reform in Swedish”.
The brand’s website states: “Uppgradera is not affiliated with IKEA.” “Opening new horizons in product development is a pure fun/supporter program.”
This is his first open-source hack series, inspired by the IKEA household products he usually uses and how to modify them.
Miklosi wrote on the Uppgradera website: “My idea is to use 3D printing to supplement the original design and correct my experience.”
“My goal is to design products that can solve practical problems and have a little “uppgradera”, so that the user experience is more pleasant and efficient.”
The series went live earlier this week and consists of six ingenious 3D printable accessories that should make its attached IKEA products easier to use.
The first of these accessories is NÄ01, which was made to enhance the NÄVLINGE reading light… As a fanatical reader, this undoubtedly aroused my interest. IKEA lights have high-power LED lights, but there are no shadows, so the light hits your eyes directly. The 3D printed NÄ01hack is a simple shade that can be clipped to a lamp, making it a more attractive light source for work or reading a good book.
IKEA’s KLIPSK bed tray is perfect for people who want to have brunch or snacks in bed. Unfortunately, it is made of a very smooth material, so any glass placed on the tray can easily slip off and cause confusion. That’s why the KL01 of the Uppgradera hacker is really useful.
“KL01 is a glass bracket that can be installed on the bed tray and placed next to the groove on the back as needed,” the site pointed out. “If you want, you can use multiple at once.”
If this indicates that there are multiple drinks on the same tray, then I must be…Who doesn’t want to have a cup of orange juice and a cup of hot coffee on the same breakfast tray?
IKEA’s STAJLIG hangers are very good because it does not cost a lot of money to make a full pack of passports, but when you hang your shirts on the thin brushed steel, they will end up being crumpled and worn in the shoulder area, and none of them that.
Uppgradera ST01 is just a pair of shoulder pads, which can be easily attached to the STAJLIG handle. It is designed to prevent wrinkles and frayed fabrics for longer use, and it also reduces the weight of the shirt itself.
The next product in the Uppgradera series is EK01, which is a drying net for EKOLN toothbrush holders.
The website explains: “On the bottom of the EKORN toothbrush holder, water dripping from the toothbrush will accumulate.” “Residual toothpaste is a breeding ground for bacteria. It also helps deposits on the bottom of the toothbrush.”
Enter the 3D printed EK01, which can be placed in the EKOLN toothbrush holder to keep the toothbrush above the bottom. This will evaporate the collected water and provide continuous ventilation, so sediment and bacteria will not accumulate quickly.
Another popular product from IKEA is the ENUDDEN soap dish. It’s on the lower end of the scale because it’s basically just a molded plastic tray with no holes at the bottom, so any soap in it will constantly dip into the water. Uppgradera EN01 is another 3D printed bathroom accessory grid that helps solve ventilation problems.
According to the website, “EN01 is a grid that can be placed on a soapbox so that it stores soap at a sufficient height while providing ventilation. In this way, it not only increases the soap’s “lifetime”, but also by drying them Save to maintain its quality.”
The last 3D printed product of the Uppgradera hack series is CH01, which is intended to be used with IKEA’s popular CHOSIGT cheese grater. The product has a smart storage solution to collect grated cheese. Unfortunately, it cannot capture all the cheese, and wasted cheese is a terrible problem, at least in my opinion. CH01 is a basic ring that can slide directly onto the grater to prevent the cheese from falling.
At present, all products in the Uppgradera series have been Beta tested, so the store section of the website has not yet been opened. The website states that these six accessories will include 3D printed files so that you can conduct your own IKEA hacking, but I can’t see them on the website, so I think this will eventually become popular in stores.