Thingiverse
MK8 Bowden extruder with pivot and quick release idler by mokash770
by Thingiverse
Last crawled date: 4 years, 7 months ago
Hi everyone I finally added a pivot to the extruder to better align it with the filament. Before the extruder was at a fixed angle placing stress on the filament, making a squeaky sound (which can be fixed by drilling the bottom hole) and in some cases of very brittle PLA even breaking the filament. Now the extruder mounts using an M4 screw to the support on the bracing M10 rod. For those who don't want to disassemble the bracing M10 rod supporting the printer (myself included) I added a simple adapter to connect to the old mounting method. (Later I realized you could probably drill out one of the old supports to 4mm but whatever.)
I also added a little tab at the top of the idler and adjacent to the fitting to allow a quick release of the filament by pinching it. As of now the one I printed was colorfabb nGen which is much softer than PLA and flexes a bit more. That along with a very strong spring make the top pinching method not work for me but it should work in PLA, let me know in the comments, eIther way it doesn't hurt.
The extruder should be printed with support touching the build plate just to hold the new little tab.
You can find the PC4-01 fitting herehttp://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2050601.m570.l1313.TR0.TRC0.A0.H0.XPC4-01.TRS5&_nkw=PC4-01&_sacat=0
About $5 shipped from the US orhttps://www.aliexpress.com/item/3D-Printer-Pneumatic-Connectors-PC4-01-1-75mm-PTFE-Tube-quick-coupler-j-head-Fittings-Reprap/32361630920.html
$0.50 from chinahttp://www.aliexpress.com/
Product ID: 32361630920
I ordered it on Aug 05 2016
it arrived in LA today Aug. 18 2016 so not too bad.
I also added a little tab at the top of the idler and adjacent to the fitting to allow a quick release of the filament by pinching it. As of now the one I printed was colorfabb nGen which is much softer than PLA and flexes a bit more. That along with a very strong spring make the top pinching method not work for me but it should work in PLA, let me know in the comments, eIther way it doesn't hurt.
The extruder should be printed with support touching the build plate just to hold the new little tab.
You can find the PC4-01 fitting herehttp://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2050601.m570.l1313.TR0.TRC0.A0.H0.XPC4-01.TRS5&_nkw=PC4-01&_sacat=0
About $5 shipped from the US orhttps://www.aliexpress.com/item/3D-Printer-Pneumatic-Connectors-PC4-01-1-75mm-PTFE-Tube-quick-coupler-j-head-Fittings-Reprap/32361630920.html
$0.50 from chinahttp://www.aliexpress.com/
Product ID: 32361630920
I ordered it on Aug 05 2016
it arrived in LA today Aug. 18 2016 so not too bad.