MK7 Stepstruder Filament Drive Block
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Published on October 3, 2011
This thing was Featured on October 3, 2011
Description
This is an earlier, printable version of the new MakerBot MK7 filament drive block. During the development of the MK7, I was hoping we could make the filament drive portion of the design printable. It worked really well for testing and prototyping, but it was not feasible for us to scale it for production. Instead, we converted it to injection molding and that is how you have the MK7 we offer today.
This filament drive block is a nice, single piece and prints really well on an MK6. It will print even better on an MK7. It has dual filament inlet channels, and you can probably mod it to do all sorts of cool things. I've provided the original solidworks and an STL output for your ease of use.
A couple things I'm proud of:
* The 'mouse ears' on the corners help it stick better and remain flat, yet are easy to peel off.
* The tiny hole slots which cause the holes to be printed as part of the outer shell. The slot is too small to show up in the final part, and you get a really nice looking bolt hole.
This filament drive block is a nice, single piece and prints really well on an MK6. It will print even better on an MK7. It has dual filament inlet channels, and you can probably mod it to do all sorts of cool things. I've provided the original solidworks and an STL output for your ease of use.
A couple things I'm proud of:
* The 'mouse ears' on the corners help it stick better and remain flat, yet are easy to peel off.
* The tiny hole slots which cause the holes to be printed as part of the outer shell. The slot is too small to show up in the final part, and you get a really nice looking bolt hole.
Instructions
Print and use as you would the normal filament drive block.
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NumberSix
on
October 4, 2011
said:
Thanks for sharing this nice bit of work. The 'mouse ears' are a brilliant inovations also! :)
I am curious about how the pressure is applied to the filament though, and what material that 'plunger' is made of? (may have missed that detail along the way. Sorry if I have)
Tks,
NumberSix
nycdesigner
on
October 3, 2011
said:
The holes for the Delrin plunger need to be a tidge bigger because it's next to impossible to ream those, if necessary. Everything else seems perfect.
feilen
on
October 3, 2011
said:
Hmm, would be interesting if there was a mouse ears SF plugin, as a replacement for rafts...
qharley
on
October 3, 2011
said:
There should a be a manual of "Great FDM hacks" including stuff like these mouse ears and the slots, together with Prusa's strengthening cuts etc.
Thanks!
License
MK7 Stepstruder Filament Drive Block by hoeken is licensed under the Creative Commons - GNU GPL license.
More from hoeken
Any hints on tweaking the plunger? The normal 2 plastic + 3 metal was working for me with the stock extruder, but I had to remove one metal washer to get enough room for the filament with this version ... but now it's not quite enough and the filament won't feed fast enough to keep up with 5D printing :(