Compact AA battery holder

thingiverse

Compact AA Battery Holder ===================================== Smallest and most efficient AA design I've managed to come up with. My work tends to be minimalistic since I'm impatient and don't want to wait hours for a print. You could slim it further at the cost of strength, but I doubt it's worth. Printing 2 sets of the bases with a raft takes about 50 minutes, individually about 14 minutes per piece and the rods take 8 minutes each. I highly recommend printing on glass rather than a raft to get that smooth finish for the ends. However, I could only get one base to print at a time without one dislodging. I may need to switch slicers to Cura for sequential printing. Also, you have to rotate the bases to face up. How this works is: You strip some wire, make a loop insert into the bases and fit the bases onto your battery. These are supposed to press fit securely. I'm basing the dimensions for the Thunderbolts from Harbor Freight since I happen to have a ton. The negative side seems to be slightly thinner so I have made two files. Comment if your dimensions are different. Then use 2-4 rods to lock them in. Two should be enough generally. They're snap fit, so they exert pressure on the bases and ensure proper connection. NO SPRING NEEDED. I'm not sure about the longevity of this solution but they're holding the wires so securely, it's hard to even pull it out. If you can, your wire loops are too small. It might take some practice to get the rods in and out. I'm not sure how much more I'll work on these. But it would be interesting to see if they could be modded to modular. That should be pretty easy if you take the rods and double/quadruple them side by side in Fusion 360 and combine them.