Nintendo DS Lite clip

Last crawled date: 4 years, 2 months ago

A Nintendo DS has a hinge that's supposed to open just the right amount and stop. In order to go further and open it all the way or to close it, you have to actually push or pull on it. Gravity alone can't pull the top screen out of place. It's like a car door that stops at a few angles rather than swinging wildly.
The hinge broke on the DS my brother gave me after years of good use, meaning it began just swinging freely rather than stopping at the sweet spot. It would cost a lot more to repair it than to get a new DS, which would only be around $40 since it's an old system. If I wanted a replacement I'd probably just get a newer system, and I wasn't even sure I wanted a replacement since I should probably play fewer games anyway.
However, the idea struck me that I could use this as an opportunity for invention. Rather than repair the DS, I could create a clip that would hold the DS open at the correct angle. I had some experience with a 3D printer but only printing decorative trinkets that other people mostly designed. Printing functional components that are meant to fit onto real-world objects with precise measurements is much more difficult than printing art, and I'd have to learn to design it myself.
I spent weeks learning how to use Blender, the 3D-modeling software. Then once I became competent in Blender I spent weeks working with it to model my DS clip. Eventually I was ready to print my first draft, so I transferred the digital model to the 3D printer at my office. And then I discovered the printer would not work!
It seems that at some point after the time I had printed those trinkets I mentioned, the 3D printer had become clogged so that no filament could be extruded through it. I asked the Internet for help and I got in touch with a former employee who had previously been responsible for the printer. When I couldn't adequately answer the questions they posed to me about the problem, it became clear to them that I was a 3D-printing amateur. I said that I wanted to disassemble part of the printer to remove the clog but they insisted that I learn more about 3D printing before I attempted something so drastic, since there is often a simpler solution to these problems.
So I spent weeks studying 3D printing like I had studied 3D modeling. The usual approach to remove clogs is to just heat the hot end up hotter than usual so the clog melts, but I had to figure out how to even do that first. Eventually I had tried all the Internet's advice and I decided I knew enough about 3D printers to try disassembling the printer with the help of a crafty coworker. Once we found and removed the clog it became clear that we couldn't have done it without disassembling the printer, so my original idea from before all my studies turned out to be right all along. And the printer was working again!
After the exhausting journey of learning Blender, using Blender, learning about 3D printing, and fixing the 3D printer, I was finally able to start printing. My first draft was so incredibly flimsy that I carried it home in a loosely-closed fist because I was sure it would break if I tried putting it in a bag. Of course this meant it couldn't hold up the weight of the top screen on the DS, so the clip didn't last long. I had to modify my 3D model to make the shape much thicker, and I also tried modifying the settings in the printer software so that the density would be higher. After more weeks of printing draft after draft, I finally ended up with the functional version you see posted here.
I'm including the .blend and .stl files for all my drafts, but 5 and 6 are the finished product (one for each side of the DS).