CR-10 v3 Y-aligned Spool and Filament Holder

thingiverse

**NOTE** The filament holder requires a longer than stock cable. I crimped myself a new one, but it's likely possible to buy an extension for the stock one. Most of the spool holders that attach to the frame that I see have at least one of two flaws: 1. They require unscrewing and screwing something to change spools 2. They don't prevent the spool from rocking \#1 makes it more difficult to change spools with the worst of them appearing to require three hands, one to hold the spool, one to hold a shaft, and one to screw on an end stop. \#2 on the other hand seems to not actually solve the problem of the spool holder creating wobble in whatever it's attached to. If the spool is sitting on something round with a smaller diameter, it will tend to rock when jerked. This motion will be damped by transmitting it to the frame, potentially creating print issues. With that in mind, I've created a new spool holder that slides into the 2020 v-slot extrusion on the top of my CR-10 v3 printer. \#1 is solved but it simply sliding to clamp the spool in place, and \#2 is solved by having two "rods" instead of only one. I've also seen many designs that use bearings, which seems very popular. I'm worried about the spool unrolling prematurely given that while printing, the extruder tends to jerk the filament, so I originally designed this to optionally allow for using four 608 bearings. The bearings are not required, and I suspect they'll only create more problems, but at least I can change my mind without reprinting anything. For v3, I removed the slots that allowed the 608 bearings to be installed. v3 does not support 608 bearings. They're completely unnecessary, and the slots weaken the supports. The safety bar slides between the two upright pieces to catch the spool if it falls off the pegs and make the structure a bit more solid. It's easy to use and no real hassle at all. My initial V-slot extrusion had a bit too much slop, so I moved the extrusion up a bit. It still has 0.25mm extra space, so it may need to be tightened up some more. It would be a good idea to cut the bottom off and print just that to test fit rather than waste a bunch of time and filament just to discover it doesn't fit properly. If it's too tight, you can move the extrusion down up to 0.25mm to add some slop. This works well, but some of my spools won't fit with 608 bearings on the posts. However, it almost rolls too easily even without the bearings, so they're not at all necessary. The slots in the posts are not needed if bearings won't be used... I'll likely delete them if I end up needing to reprint this. I've updated with a v3 design that mounts the filament sensor on the support arm. There's two filament sensor arms, to allow the filament sensor to be mounted on either side of the spool. For v3 you'll need one regular support arm, one with filament bracket, a filament arm, and the safety bar. After using this for a few kg of filament, I'm very happy with it. Quick and easy to change, safety bar not an issue at all... I use it all the time, even when I pull out a 500g spool of specialty filament for a quick print.