8mm to 10mm rod conversion

General LulzBot Mini
1

Good morning!

I’ve been thinking about upgrading my Mini to 10mm smoothed rods, over the factory 8mm ones.

I ran into a snag, which apparently AO made the parts up in Solidworks (only a couple parts are made in FreeCAD). While I normally design my parts in MoI3D, there’s no way that I can import Solidworks files into it. From digging around, it doesn’t even look like FreeCAD will import that file format. Which potentially leaves the STL file, not the optimal editing format.

Short of redesigning the parts from scratch, is there best practice for making an editable part from either of the available AO supplied formats?

Thanks!

2

It’s ok… I figured it out…

There’s a service called GrabCAD… it’s free. I loaded the SLDPRT files, exported them as STEP files and they loaded right into MoI3D where I could increase the diameter of the rod sockets by 2mm and save them out to an STL file.

I’ve done the front and rear Y axis mounts… I just need to do the bearing holders now under the bed and I should be golden.

I’m a little surprised that the rods don’t have a screw holding them in place, instead rely upon them either being pressure fit (unlikely due to the 8mm rod diameter having a socket of 8.2mm), or the exact length to bottom out on the socket ends. Easy enough for me to add one now however since I have an editable part.

3

How difficult was this to do? I’m interested in this myself.

Thanks

4

Would you post your altered files? This interests me as well.

5

I haven’t done the print bed ones… but I will post the other two for the ends. The only difference between these and the AO ones are the hole is expanded by 2mm.

I’ll post the other ones after I find out what the outer dimensions of the bearings are.

edit: I found out the 10mm IGUS bearings have an OD of 19mm, which doesn’t leave alot of room left in the surrounding material. I’m going to have to take a closer look under my printer and see what sides of the dual bearing holder can be modified safely and modify the part accordingly.
Y_rod_mount_Camellia_v1.1_10mm.stl (131 KB)
Y_end_idler_Camellia_v1.3_10mm.stl (153 KB)

6

What problem are you trying to solve with larger rails on the Mini?

Just curious, I haven’t seen any issues with my stock Mini.

7

I have some play in my Y axis, at this point primarily due to what appears to be one of the IGUS bearings having some slop to it. I figured it couldn’t hurt to upgrade it to 10mm rods at the same time if I have to take it apart anyways to replace one of the bearings.