Anet A8 Plus Lightweight and Unobtrusive X-axis Cable chain

thingiverse

The best X-Axis cable chain design I've seen on Thingiverse is by a guy that goes by the name of Juh, and was designed for the Anet A8. Juh's model was created for the classic Anet A8. By the time I'd purchased my Anet A8 last year, Anet had cheapened out and replaced the aluminum bearing holders for the X and Y axis' with much thinner injection molded plastic bearing holders. I posted a remix of Juh's design to fit the plastic bearing holders on the X-axis carriage. Juh's original model: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2785408 My remix: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4778071 I recently purchased an Anet A8 Plus, which uses the same X-axis design, and most of the same parts as the Anet A8, to include the crappy plastic bearing holders on the carriage. A search on Thingiverse revealed there weren't any spectacular designs for cable chains for the A8 Plus, save for one that similarly rolled horizontally, as Juh's model. That model: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4226008 is a terrific design, yet it costs the top 40mm of your Z axis ceiling. Juh's model for A8 cost nothing to print dimensions. I decided to try my remix of Juh's model on my A8 plus. It turns out that Juh's model that works spectacularly on the A8, works beautifully on the A8 Plus as well. The only thing I changed, or added to my A8 remix of Juh's model was a 12 link solid segment to replace the first 12 links, which would remain straight anyways. Otherwise I suppose the 26 required links would have a tendency to sag. Since I made the 12 segment replacement fully open on one side, it's much easier to feed the hotend cables through the only 14 required links for this model. I'm still using the popular cable links by ModelStation, https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:11978 As I said, my remix with the 12 segment rigid piece requires you to print and feed wires through only 14 links. I tried to reference everything from which this model derives, however, I also included all the files that need printing for this chain on the Anet A8 Plus. NOTE: Some of the cables to the hot end carriage are arguably too short without using a chain. Rather than lengthening wires that wouldn't reach the mainboard, I opted to raise the mainboards mounting position upward by 10cm on the Z. Note also that my A8 Plus uses socket head screws with large heads for mounting parts to the carriage, where as the A8 used smaller cross head screws. I couldn't fit the head of the socket head screw inside the carriage mount piece because of the oversized head. I simply replaced the top screw with a smaller headed M4 screw. The bottom screw fits as is. Enjoy!