"Gandalf" CR-10 direct drive extruder (Bondtech / E3D V6 / BLTouch)

thingiverse

See my version 2 of this thing: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4235023 Here's my direct drive extruder mount for the CR-10s. I call it Gandalf because he's a cool dude who knows precisely what he's doing, and so are direct drive extruders. I found some mounts on Thingiverse that combine Bondtech + ED3 V6 for the CR-10. However, they all seem to be mounting the motor on top of the carriage, facing backwards. While that's a good idea in principle, it requires an additional piece of bowden tube between the extruder and the hotend. And I didn't want to do that; I wanted the hotend to be as close as possible to the extruder and fit directly into the respective cavity of the bondtech casing. The part cooling fan shroud is the stock Prusa MK3 one. I don't know if it's okay to include it here, so go grab it from them: https://www.prusa3d.com/prusa-i3-printable-parts/ The 5mm bore next to the cable routing can be optionally used to fit a bowden tube, which then acts as an additional cable guide like seen on the pictures. I'd suggest printing the fan shroud in ABS and all other parts in PETG. Don't use PLA; it'll melt down in no time. What you'll need: * Bondtech geared extruder or clone * E3D V6 hotend kit or clone * 5015 fan * Optional but highly recommended: BLTouch or clone * Tons of screws, soldering stuff, cable wrap, zip ties etc. * Sufficient tinkering experience (this one isn't a no-brainer obviously) Personally, I think the CR-10 should have been a direct drive printer in the first place. It's so much more convenient than fiddling around with that bowden tube. Plus, the only advantage of a bowden system is cutting on weight; however, that makes little sense to me, given the fact that by far the heaviest moving part on an i3 style printer will always be the bed. What are rapid x movements good for, if you can't do rapid y movements... On the other hand, having the precision of a direct drive system, you can not only print flexibles and other exotic materials way more easily, you can also use things like linear advance or Klippers pressure advance, which I've never been able to configure properly on the CR-10 bowden setup. And yes, I was using a Capricorn tube. I've read a nice analogy somewhere on the Marlin website: "Bowden extrusion is like trying to paint a detailed picture using a 1m long brush with a rubber handle." Having a 3:1 geared direct drive extruder is about the best thing you can have in my opinion and it makes the CR-10 a beast of a machine. I use a pancake stepper, on which I reduced the current to 700mA RMS; it only gets hand warm and extrusion was perfect so far. Here are some relevant Marlin configs: If you're using the BLTouch: ``` #define X_PROBE_OFFSET_FROM_EXTRUDER -38 #define Y_PROBE_OFFSET_FROM_EXTRUDER 13 #define Z_PROBE_OFFSET_FROM_EXTRUDER -3.35 ``` (of course, you will calibrate the z offset yourself; but ~3mm should be a good starting point) To compensate for the new carriage layout: ``` #define X_BED_SIZE 295 #define Y_BED_SIZE 295 #define X_MIN_POS -24 #define Y_MIN_POS -22 ``` So you'll lose 5mm in the x- and y direction; for me, that's no problem.