Ender 3 Direct Drive Mount for Ditan Dual Extruder

thingiverse

I designed this very basic part as I wanted to mount the Ditan Dual Extruder as a Direct Drive on my Ender 3. I had been using the Ditan for a while as a Bowden Setup and was very impressed with its design and performance, but wanted to reduce the length of the filament path to the nozzle to improve overall printing quality/speeds, etc. The primary goal was not to lose any of the Ender 3's build volume (height or width) while still using the standard stepper motor. To achieve this meant that I would need to mount the Ditan in an orientation which prevented the setup from colliding with the frame, but still let the couplers line up, creating a straight filament path from the Ditan into the Nozzle. I printed the part shown in the images in PETG with a 0.8mm nozzle, @ 0.6mm layer height, 6walls (to have most of the part solid), 50% infill, 20% fan (2x 50x15 blowers) and at 50mm/s and with brim & support from the build plate. That said, I would recommend printing in PETG/ABS/PLA with at least 5walls, and a max of 0.4mm layer height to get a neater part. I printed it with the above settings as I wanted to quickly print a test part, and then intended to reprint a neater version once I confirmed it worked the way I designed it too. But the first "fast & ugly" test part I printed proved that the design worked as intended and it was strong enough plus working well enough to simply leave it on the setup... so I did just that. How to install: This plate must be installed in place of the two spacers which are located on the 2x Bolts holding the two top wheels in the correct position on the hotend assembly to run in the v-slot. (see design images) I added a 3rd wheel to help support the motor which protrudes out to the right of the hotend assembly as I had some spare wheels, but I am sure you could first try it without fitting this third wheel and it should work just as well. You will need to cut a piece off of your PTFE tubing which is long enough to fit from inside the hotend (touching the nozzle inside) to into the Ditan. This should be a snug fit to the inside of the Ditan Part which the coupler screws into and line up with the filament hole. Note the HeroME (as seen in the images) does not fit as a standard part. I had to remove the cable guide and also the part of the base which hooks around the right hand side of the hotend mounting plate to get it to fit. I will be changing to the CR-10 / Ender 3 Dual 40mm Part Cooling Fan Ductinator (thing:3594440) for part cooling in the near future.