New 3D printed case for the Ignitron

[barsk]

My 3D printed version of the Ignitron is based on gratuitously donated CAD design by @intaker.

My version is now complete after quite a bit of work getting everything to fit perfectly, The main changes from the @intaker version is:

• Dedicated LED sockets under the Preset slots (1-4).
• The sliding lid has been removed for a screw-on design (3mm countersunk screw, about 6mm long). The shell has four round standoffs that goes through the inner main part almost the whole way. You slide the inner (main) part into the shell and put the lid on securing all parts. The screws goes into plastic making its own threads, which works fine. All RC cars are made this way.
• The shell is easy to remove and replace with another color as a "skin" upgrade.
• Used an actual CAD model of an 1.3" OLED, to get the dimensions and hole positions correct.
• Used an actual CAD model of a 38 pin ESP32 devkit with mounting holes.
• Created a mockup of the PCB board with all ESP32 holes in the correct places to be able to assemble the PCB andESP32 devkit in order to use it for correct dimensions in the case.
• If using the ESP32 devkit with mounting holes, there are now mounting holes that match. There is too little space in the ESP32 devkit to fit a 2.5 mm screw despite the hole there so you need to file off some material with a file or dremel. Easily done and then a screw will fit nicely.
• The cutout and standoffs for the display has been modified. The cutout goes through all the way. The screw standoffs are stronger.
• The standard PCB is used for mounting and it it will pass through the inner (main) wall completely and face the shell, which is also made as thin as possible nearest the PCB. This way the USB port is reachable from the outside.
• The owner initials is changed to "IGNITRON" centered above the OLED display, with two green serial connected LEDs powered from the J1 port on the PCB. The wire from the +5V pin has a 47 ohm resistor in series to reduce current. This will only work as long as you have a USB connection powering the device as we are harvesting the +5V from there.
• The LED mounting holes for the 6 LEDs have been moved down to sit exactly on top of the texts (DRIVE/MOD.. etc). Those holes to not go through entirely leaving just a little (0.2mm) so that light gets diffused. Looks great with a transparent plastic. I used PLA natural, but a transparent PETG would serve just fine too.
• The thickness of the inner wall of the main part and supporting walls has been reduced to 6mm (from 10). Still sturdy enough for some foot work!
• The overall height has been increased by 5mm for the internal PCB, connectors and wires.
• The case is slightly smaller in x/y-dimension. From 21 x 14 cm to 21 x 13 cm.

[barsk]

Latest design with dedicated LEDs for the preset slots.

[barsk]

In case anybody is interested, and it is Ok with @intaker, I will share this design on Thingiverse and similar.

[intaker]

Great job @barsk, I'm very okay you sharing the design to wider community.

[barsk]

Ok thanks!

I have made some more revisions to the design. I added 4 extra LEDs so that the current preset number is now lit by its own LED. The LEDs that light the FX pedals on/off are thus "free". So I made changes in code to light the LEDs in the same way as they are in "Manual mode". That made the FX symbols in the OLED design redundant, so I instead made them display the current Mode: Preset/FX manual/Loop Config/Loop Control. There is also some changes to easily configure for SH1106 OLED driver. So some changes in both 3D design and firmware.

I will update the pictures above with the latest (hopefully final) design.

I hope to work out with @stangreg how to contribute this as a pull request. I'm a bit newbie to the more advanced usages of Git I'm afraid.

[itarozzi]

Hi, thanks for sharing. Will the CAD file be available. I'm curious: what CAD are you using?

[barsk]

Yes, I have no problem sharing the CAD file, which is Fusion 360.

[barsk]

The 3D case is now up on Thingiverse! 😄

[xjordanx]

Thank you so much for this!! It's VERY NICE. I did make my own print of this and it's very sturdy and looks fabulous.

I too am a Fusion user. I'm thinking of making slight modification to the LED ports to create more of a "light pipe" for each LED, which would hopefully spread and diffuse each LED to make the light more like a soft even background for each of the legends.

I am also using extra LEDS for bank up and down (instead of a multi-color 3D print, since I don't have a printer that can do that).

Here's my initial attempt:

I'm also considering my own PCB layout which added connectors for the extra LEDs, so each switch with 2 LEDs is on harness as a group:


Obviously these connectors stand too high so I will probably just cut them off and solder the wires directly to the board (once I've debugged everything).

This board has a single-cell Li charge controller, so the extra USB-C is for charging the internal LiPoly cell:

Forgive my very rough paint job on the shell. I printed that part in black PLA+ and used a grey primer/filler, sanded it a bit, and then a cheap white gloss appliance paint. The white paint goes on so thin and needs so much filling that I lost patience and didn't care if it still looks home-made: after all - that's what we do right?

[intaker]

Good job! Looks pretty cool. I indeed wondered the colour of the print and it was painting! I would say you have pretty good painting skill and, yes the custom made look gives the feeling otherwise we can just go and purchase 😄 Thanks for sharing.

[barsk]

@xjordanx Looks great! I was not the original designer of this case, as you can see in another thread here. So a big cheer to those guys. The design with an inner translucent shell that spreads the led light was a new concept I had not seen before, I think it looks absolutely awesome. But I was given the Fusion files and modified it quite a bit. It looks very similar to the original, but I can tell you that most of the inner details are changed a lot and a lot of hours and prototype versions was spent before the final version. Glad that the effort was appreciated by someone else! 😃

I did not paint mine though. The final version was printed with a smooth PEI sheet with some Polymaker Polyterra PLA. It is a matte PLA that gives a superb matte quality that does not even look printed. So recommend you try that out if you end up printing another. Will save you some time for sure. And with that approach you could even print several "skins" and change depending on you mood. 😉

Another remark. The PCB that is used is great, but since my modifications (extra LEDs) requires some modding with soldering directly on the pins one could actually consider using a standard prototyping PCB and just make the routing neccesary directly there in true DIY manner. There is just a few resistors needed so if I would have started this project over I would most likely go that route. Of course the mounting of the Arduino and pcb inside the case may need some modding then.