Replacement "Transformable" D-pad for Xbox 360 controller by emertonom

Last crawled date: 3 years, 1 month ago

A replacement for the Xbox 360 controller "transformable" d-pad. This kind of controller has a spring pushing on the dpad while a screw pulls down on the shaft; eventually it fatigues out. But it's pretty easy to disassemble, and with a replacement d-pad, you can reassemble it and get the controller working again.
Strength is critical for this piece, but I eventually came to the conclusion that it is possible to make it on an FDM machine, provided you anneal the part after printing. I found it sufficient to crank the headbed up to 75C after printing ended, and let it sit at that temperature for an hour before letting it cool again and removing the print from the bed. For FDM, I recommend the "nocurve" model of the STL, which is the one I've actually gotten to work.
I originally made a version that had a soft curve on the surface, similar to the original dpad, but this doesn't work very well in FDM--it just messes up the surface finish, and that's not desirable for something you'll be pushing your thumb against. So I removed this curve, and got the pad to work; this is the "dpad-nocurve" model, and this is what I recommend you print. But just in case someone has a much nicer printer than mine, where the curved surface would come out well, I've also uploaded dpad-curve.stl, whose shape more closely matches that of the original part.