PLA Heart Gears for Replicator 2

cults3d

Many of us are frustrated to discover that the pins for Emmett's Screwless Heart Gears aren't compatible with PLA. They're too stiff, and in my experience, trying to force them in can crack the pins and damage the piece itself. So I started designing some alternative pins for PLA. My first attempt was to make flexible end tabs, but while this worked, the gear heart axle is too short to support this approach. In the next attempt, I altered the internal structure of the tip of the pin to make it more flexible for PLA and redesigned the protrusions. These new pins were designed using an ACIS solid in Shark FX (sfx file included), so they'll behave well with Makerware, ReplicatorG, and skeinforge. They snap into place with moderate force and rotate freely. UPDATE Version 2 of the pins has 0.25 mm more protrusion on each side at the tip; they still insert with moderate force but have a firmer hold.