Stock Maker Farm Spool Holder Bearing Mod (comes with the newer kit)

[RaySuave]

I have been running the new Maker Farm 10" i3v Kit for a while. As far as I understand, recently it starting coming with a spool holder, but the holder wasn't working out that well for me so I had been searching Thingiverse for alternatives. I ordered some bearings (R4-ZZ Ball Bearing - 5/8" x 1/4" x .196") from http://openbuildspartstore.com for a new spool holder. I really liked the placement of the Maker Farm holder so in the meantime I had been thinking of possible mods to make it more useful for me.

The issue was that the stock holder used a flat wood piece as a bearing for the inside diameter of a filament spindle. So far, I've only bought filament from a one supplier from eBay and the way the filament is routing around some of the spools, a small piece of filament protrudes into the center hole of the spindle which interferes with the stock spool holder bearing (see photo). I tried cutting off this protrusion as much as possible but it wasnt enough to stop the interference. This issue made it necessary for me to nurse my print jobs when using these types of spools. Basically, I would have to unspool the filament manually to leave a lot of excess for the extruder to grab so it didnt have to pull on the spool for more material.

I replaced the stock spool holder bearing with a piece of hobby wood stick (see photo) called a "Woodsie". I just so happened to have these laying around my garage to use with other projects. The bearings (R4-ZZ Ball Bearing - 5/8" x 1/4" x .196") fit over the wood sticks really well, nearly a press fit. The wood sticks also fit into the stock spool holder really well also. So I attached two bearings over the wood stick so the spool could freely ride on it. I used a little super glue where I wanted the bearings to to stay on the wood stick even though the fit is tight enough where glue may not even be necessary. There are many improvements that can be done like attaching more bearings or making a new woodsie/bearing with the bearings at a different location to handle different configurations of spools and adding shims to raise the woodsie up a little if more room is needed...or even strengthening the woodsie to handle heavy spools. This was a quick dirty mod (my favorite type of mod) that will suit my needs just fine and maybe others.

STOCK SPOOL HOLDER




FILAMENT PROTRUSION


WOODSIES


BEARINGS ATTACHED TO WOODSIE




MOD INSTALLED ON STOCK SPOOL HOLDER

[gmay3]

Cool mod RaySuave! Sometimes the stuff you have laying around at home is just the thing to solve your reprap problems

I didn't have any specific issues with the spool holder but I recently added this to my holder.

http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:326641
by neonpolaris

This reduces the friction a little bit and is a quick solution, but clearly bearings are the way to go!

[printbus]

Leveraging the idea a step farther, you could also use 1/4-inch steel rod or long bolt as the cross bar. Unless the 10-inch i3v has taller uprights in the holder than the 8-inch i3v, I'm not sure the narrow larger diameter (10 inch) spools would fit with this - they might hang too low and hit the bottom of the holder. Using a steel rod opens up the possibility of using any of numerous printable spool hubs with or without bearings. The hubs are especially handy for the common spools that have different IDs on each side of the spool.

[Tachout]

I have the same spool holder on my printer. My problem is that the last batch of PLA I ordered (off of EBay) the spools were wider than the one that came with my printer and the holder does not fit the wider spool. I am going to have to either look on Thingiverse, design my own or something. In the interim I just took the PLA off the wider smaller diameter spool and rewound it on the spool mine came with but that is a real pain in the butt. I think I am going to incorporate your bearing idea as I think I have a couple old bearings in the garage from another project that I could use. I will post up my solution when I come up with it.

[RaySuave]

I have the same spool holder on my printer. My problem is that the last batch of PLA I ordered (off of EBay) the spools were wider than the one that came with my printer and the holder does not fit the wider spool. I am going to have to either look on Thingiverse, design my own or something. In the interim I just took the PLA off the wider smaller diameter spool and rewound it on the spool mine came with but that is a real pain in the butt. I think I am going to incorporate your bearing idea as I think I have a couple old bearings in the garage from another project that I could use. I will post up my solution when I come up with it.

How much more room (inside width) does the spool holder need to fit the wider spool? If you have something like a belt sander, you could shave some of the inside thickness of the spool holder to create more room.

[RaySuave]

Got a few new filament spools that arent compatible with the stock spool holder, but are compatible with the mod introduced in the first post of this thread...see pics