MINI Heatbed Cable Guide

prusaprinters

Here's another solution for routing the MINI heatbed cable sideways, rather than straight out the back of the printer.  Why?  Well, it all started when I built a nice Lexan box over my MINI.  The inside is about 17 inches deep, which causes the heatbed cable to mash up against the back wall of the box.  This worked fine for 6 months until a heatbed thermistor wire broke due to repetitive tight bending.  Yes, broken thermistor wires is a thing.  I initially printed @espr14 's Prusa MINI Parallel bed cable holder, heatbed and added a zip-tie to pull the cable into a sharp U-turn so that it pointed to the right.  While this setup kept the cable from hitting the back of the box, I now had another tight radius repetitive bend point that would lead to another broken wire. My new design (based on espr14's design, but re-implemented since I failed at importing his model into Fusion 360) adds a cable outlet tunnel with an internal radius guide to avoid sharp cable bends.  I also moved the other end of the cable to the top of the buddy board box by cutting a slot for the wires and drilled a couple holes for a zip-tie.  This end of the cable now points rearward.  The cable bundle now travels nicely in the horizontal plane, with limited rubbing with the other cable bundle behind the XZ tower.  I adjusted the cable cinch length so that when the bed is all the way to the back that the cable comes comfortably out to the right out of the cable guide.  When the bed is all the way forward, the cable comes out more rearward.  See the pictures.  See espr14's model for hints on changing the connections at the heatbed. Print the "lid" piece upside-down for a smoother beveled edge.  No supports needed.  I printed in PETG.  The screw hole for holding the lid on is intended for a small-size wood/sheet metal screw.  I used a screw with 2.1mm width at the thread peaks. I had already replaced the thermistor wires with high-strand-count, silicone-jacketed, 24 AWG wires, so between these two changes I'll be surprised if I have another broken wire any time soon.  Fusion 360 model file included.Did you build it?  Please leave a comment and rating.