MakerFarm 8" Prusa i3v Enclosure

[gmay3]

1stage, thanks for the suggestion, I hadn't thought of that!

It's coming along and looking good. The only thing I see that might cause a problem is that the hinged door doesn't look like it will fold back and lie on the top when you open it. It looks like the too/rear edge will hit the top surface when the door is a little past horizontal. It will be awkward to have to hold it or to create something to hold it up. Plus you'll have to reach under it all the time when going "in." I think a piano hinge might be a better plan for the front door. That way you can open it and lay it back on the top surface, out of the way.

RobH2, thanks for your reply. After some research at Lowe's I actually did replace the two hinges with one single piano hinge in a more current drawing.

I want to apologize for the quality of the drawing pictures, I don't think it makes the door movement too obvious. Currently I see the action of the door movement in 2 steps:

1. Pull the door up so that it is level with the top of the enclosure (parallel to the ground). This will be achieved by the piano hinge.

2. Push the door straight back to the back of the enclosure so the handle ends up in the place the hinge used to be. The piano hinge is mounted on a flat maybe 2" long sheet of wood or acrylic, I'm calling this piece "The Sled" and it's red in the previous screen shot of my drawing. The Sled will be resting on the top of the enclosure and will be held down by an L shaped pieced of wood or acrylic which will allow the sled to travel smoothly (hopefully) without lifting off the top of the enclosure. The sled will travel on the top from the front of the enclosure to the back of the enclosure.

So the final resting place of the door will be on top of the enclosure and to close the door again, I would pull the door so the sled is back in the front completely. Then I would lower the door using the hinge once its back in position.

Yes, I'm not sure about the venting part of the case. I think I'll try it (FOR SCIENCE!) but if anyone has experience with this it would much appreciated. It would be much easier to seal it up while printing, and I could always wait until the print is done until turning on the fume extraction fan. I think that might work?

I'm still trying to think about where to put the RAMPS and LCD if I put them outside of the case. Think think think. And the location of the spool, I'm thinking on the side, mounted so that the flat side of the spool would be parallel to the side of the enclosure to save space.