Tevo Tornado Oversized Control Box (3 versions) by Zinoberrot

Last crawled date: 3 years ago

Edit : I've uploaded Fusion 360 files of the two boxes (lost the file of the third). Feel free to remix them as you see fit.
I am not particularly fond of tight spaces and I particularly hate noise whenever I can avoid it. Things got especially tricky when I wanted to replace the PSU and the board, as I would have to mod the living hell out of the small control box. Since space next to the printer is not a problem for me, I decided to design a new, much larger control box for the Tevo Tornado.
Edit: There are now three versions of this design.
Version 1
The box comes in two parts - front and rear. The front part opens from the bottom and the rear part from the top. They print separately and are held together by five screws.
Regarding the front part:
Not much to say here, it is designed to hold the stock LCD screen. You will notice a lot of dead space at the front. I intended to place a small tool holder there for the various bits and parts (glues, Allen keys, etc.) but I left it open for each one to insert whatever is most useful for them.
Regarding the rear part:
The rear is designed to hold an MKS Gen L or MKS Gen V1.4 board. You can fit the stock board by printing the MKS Gen L adapters and fitting them in reverse (if you are changing the whole control box, chances are that the stock board is paperweight by now).
It fits the stock AC relay and the stock PSU (on the side). It can also fit the Meanwell NES-24-150 or the LRS-24-200 PSUs just in case you want/need more power, as well as the "standard size" NES-24-100 or LRS-24-150 if you just want something more reliable.
It fits two 120mm fans, one in the middle and one in the rear. They create a "wind tunnel" from the front to the rear of the box. Obviously, the airflow of these fans is manyfold greater than that of the stock 40 mm fans, so low-speed high flow fans ought to work great and be relatively quiet. The holes are 3mm, meant for rubber standoffs. Normal fan screws should hold as well. Chances are you'll want to use quiet and widely available PC fans, so there is a slot for a small 5A DC-DC converter next to the main board. The screws fit all 5 × 2.4 cm converters that you can easily find everywhere for like a $/€ each.
It fits the stock AC switch and the two stock GX16 cables. There is a 25 mm open hole for the rest of the cables. The size was intended to fit widely available 25 mm rubber grommets.
There is plenty of space to work with, add more hardware (e.g. Pi mounts), cable management, etc.
I haven't added any feet to the design (yet). They are not really necessary but you can add your own or just $0.1 rubber pads from a hardware store.
What you'll need:
-Longer LCD cables. The 60-70cm ones that are selling for a couple of bucks per set will do just fine.
-About twenty M3×12 screws (forgot to count). Self-tapping screws might work better.
-Two 120 mm fans (duh) and a DC-DC converter if they are 12V fans.
-New wires from/to the PSU (the stock ones will most likely be far too short for this box).
-25 mm rubber grommets are optional.
-Coffee.
Edit :
-Added screw holes for 140 mm fans. I'm not sure why people even asked for them, the cooling from the 120 mm fans is already insane, but who am I to argue.
-Removed the fan guards. After testing I realized that they cause air turbulence noise. If you want/need a fan guard, a simple fan guard will do (it is likely that one will be included if you purchase retail fans).
-Optimized the position of the front panel openings, they ought to be closer to where they should be now.
Version 2
The second version of the box was designed with my own personal needs in mind. It is somewhat shorter than the first version but has certain limitations.
It comes in three parts: front, rear, and the top cap.
Main differences compared to the first version:
-The front prints fine without supports.
-It supports only the MKS Gen L board.
-It can be used with the stock LCD connectors.
-The board is rotated and its USB connector facing inside the box. It is supposed to be connected to an Orange Pi that will also be mounted inside the box but it is possible to use a USB cable that will be permanently connected and exit alongside the other cables from the rear of the box.
-There is space and holes for an Orange Pi PC or Orange Pi Lite to be mounted right underneath the MKS Gen L board (as seen in my pictures). These little things sell for like $15 and are plenty powerful for running Octoprint, I find them more cost-efficient than Rasperries.
-An SSR heatsink is required for the mounting of the AC relay. I found that my relay was getting quite hot, so its better to be safe than sorry (costs like $2.5 in Aliexpress).
You will need long copper spacers/pillars for the mounting of the board above the Orange Pi. I recommend getting eight 10 mm spacers and four 20 mm spacers. This will allow the Pi to be mounted 10 mm above the box's bottom and the MKS Gen L to be mounted 20 mm above it. Plenty of clearance for heatsinks as well.
The best place to mount DC-DC converters is on the PSU, using copper spacers. The PSU has mounting holes on its sides, so just insert a spacer and attach the board on it (two can be seen in my pictures, one is 5V for the Pi and one is 12V for the fans).
Version 3
That's an even smaller, simpler version that I made for a friend. This can be printed in a single go (it's less than 300 mm long). It uses two 80 mm fans instead but everything that fits in V2 also fits here. Once again, an SSR heatsink is required for the AC relay, there is space for an MKS Gen L board and for an Orange Pi PC.