Duplicator 4 Active Cooling (40mm x 20mm Blower) by calvintam

Last crawled date: 3 years ago

This Active Cooling System is made for the Wanhao Duplicator 4 series and Flashforge. This variation is made to fit blower type fans that is 40mm big (24V), 20mm thick, although 10mm thickness would probably work too.
UPDATE! (V2)
Hey guys, if you have downloaded the previous duct, please redownload V2. I noticed there's some problems with the fan position being too high that it hits the casing when the extruder is being homed. This has been corrected in V2, it now sits below the case with a certain gap space. Also I have changed the fan bracket to the bottom, so now there's no need to print supports for it. Notice that the 3 holes on the screws mount are significantly smaller than the fan's screw holes, this is intentional. Use woodscrews (Screws with sharp ends) and screw it into the screw mounts to securely fasten the fan. Also I have redesigned the entire vent so that fan sits comfortably on top of it. Overall, this design is vastly superior to the first version.
Why Active Cooling?
Most of the time when it comes to insufficient heat, the solution is simple, increase the temp (bed/nozzle), wall up the printer sides so retain heat. However while increasing heat could help with bed adhesion and extrusion, plastic also needs time to cool to properly layer and bridge. If you spot areas in your print where lines are drooping or bowling upwards, your plastic isn't cool enough.
Active Cooling Helps
Active Cooling enables the plastic to cool down much quicker enabling bridging longer distances possible. Also when printing at higher speeds, active cooling enables layers to harden before the next layer is printed. Without Active Cooling, your nozzle could press against the previous still molten layer, thus causing it to bowl up and ruin the print.
Wiring the Active Cooling 3rd Fan
There's a tutorial on how to wire the fan in the 5th image panel, however this is just a suggestion. I added this because other active cooling projects did not detail much on this, and I had to find it out for myself. As for why this is a suggestion, this method is just tapping off power from the motherboard fan to power your AC fan. This means it is always on, regardless of printer states. This is sufficient for active cooling, but you might want to embark further into transferring the wires to the extra fan port, enabling you to control the fan using gcode.
Printing Settings
Without ACS, it's better to print with supports. I went with 0.2mm with 30% infill.