X-Carve Dual Drag Chain for Water Cooled Spindle

thingiverse

I redesigned both gantry brackets and the x-carriage bracket on my M4 bolt holes to eliminate play and sag/droop from two drag chains weighing down the system. I also reduced the overall height of these two brackets and added a chamfer toward the X-Controller, which already had clearance but now has 6mm without load in the drag chain. Double check your distances and clearances prior to running the machine. There are two versions of this bracket - "short" and "extended". The extended one will require moving the opposite end of the drag chain toward the back of the X-Carve to make the bend when the gantry is full aft, while the normal one should not need any movement. I upgraded my x-carve with a water cooled spindle and needed a clean way to get power cords and water lines to my new spindle. Quality drag chains that met my needs were hard to find, so I decided to separate the power line and liquid coolant from existing wiring to help with EMI and risk since the new spindle is ac powered. To start, I ordered a drag chain kit from Inventables along with 25 extra M5 x 8mm button head cap screws and about 20 extra M5 post assembly T-slot nuts. It was easier and more affordable to order another kit from them to make this mod instead of reusing the existing one on my X-Carve. The kit comes with most of the hardware that you'll need, except for two M4 screws on the x-axis gantry which support the bracket for the y-axis drag chains - I swapped them for button head screws that were 2mm longer to get some bite on the nylon lock nuts. I designed replacement brackets for the drag chain support stretchers that now hold two cross-bars. There is a new bracket for the x-carriage, a new bracket for the x-gantry, and a new bracket for the base of the X-Carve. I designed these brackets to fit around 3D printed covers that I already had on my machine and I designed them to clear the x-controller on the extension. The x-gantry bracket moves the drag chain out from the end plate which allows me to keep my covers and makes it easier for wires to make the turn. Disclaimer: I plan on keeping my x-controller extension but in order to make it work with the extra y-axis drag chain, I had to trim 1 5/8 inches off the upper right hand side of the board down to the existing notch. This also required that I re-drill a mounting hole on the extension board top at the notch and use a bracket as a spacer between the x-carve base and the right side stretcher of the x-controller extension base. Moving to the X-Gantry, The X-Gantry bracket moves the drag chains about 65mm aft to make them even with the furthest aft cross-bar. This makes it easier for cables and wires to make the turn. Because of the angles this causes, I had to keep the drag chains full length and move the cut surface mount aft by about 20mm. Now, start by removing the existing cross-bar support bracket on the x-gantry and replace them with the brackets included above. Add the additional cross bar in the process. On the x-carriage, remove the stock bracket and replace it with the X-Carriage bracket above, making sure the flat side is up. The rest of the assembly matches what's on the Inventables site, except for one difference - I moved all existing wiring (minus the router cord) and drag chain to the aft cross-bar so the spindle drive wiring and water lines will exit the left y-axis drag chain to meet my cooling setup that is mounted behind my x-controller. If you found this useful, tips help me cover time and expenses. Thanks and enjoy!