[SOLVED] Cable management on the Play w/ Y axis extension

[__Vinz__]

Hi everyone,

I bought the Play Y axis upgrade a few months ago and while it works great, I find myself having an issue about cable management. The problem is that the bed is now wider and when the bed is at Y max with the hotend very low (as in probing the bed when a print starts), the cable sleeve from the hotend/carriage can get stuck underneath the bed, blocked by the X axis frame.

This makes it impossible for me to use that extreme side of the bed for fear of the cable getting stuck. I already have to manually hold the sleeve up above the bed when the head is probing to avoid the issue even when using only one side of the bed. Attached are two pictures showing the problem.

Would you have any guidance here? I have seen a few parts floating around on Thingiverse which seem to address that kind of problem (just friction-related when you do not have an extended bed) but I am not sure which ones to use.

Thanks for the advice!

[RetireeJay]

Your picture doesn't show exactly where the cable comes from (and I've never seen a Play in person), but would it be possible for you to attach it to the X-axis motor? You would need to leave a long enough loop to allow full travel from X = 0 to X = Max. But then that portion of the cable between the X axis motor and the extruder motor would always be above the bed. Doing it this way separates the loop for horizontal motion from the loop for vertical motion.

And by the way, make every effort to avoid repeatedly bending the wires back and forth at a single point; that will cause fatigue failure. The best solution is Cable Chain, which manages the bending radius at all points.
X-axisCableChain.JPG

[ktfergus]

On my Play the cable bundle snakes towards the front of the housing and never goes beyond the enclosure opening until it's well above the bed. Here's a pic:



See if you can get your cables to double back on themselves closer to the uprights so they form more of an "S" to keep them away from the bed.

-Kelly

[__Vinz__]

Hi guys,

Thanks to both of you for your insight.

Jay: my pictures were unclear for sb not familiar with the Play, sorry. The cable is actually coming from both the X axis motor and the X carriage/extruder motor, from underneath the base assembly. Attached are two pictures, taken from the showing the cable and the hole it comes out of. For that reason, and because of the constrained housing, it will probably hard to affix that cable on the X axis motor (the loop high up will likely collide with the top of the casing).

Kelly: I get the same behavior as you for that part of the cable (the one from the hole at the bottom of the casing to the X axis motor). My problem comes from the other half of the cable (X axis carriage to extruder) which, when Z is low and the bed at Y max, will fall below bed level and when the bed moves back, will be hit by it.

Attached is another picture showing the issue, this time with the cable being pinched instead of fully blocking the bed. This is due to the wider bed of the Y axis upgrade (with the old bed, there would be enough space between it and the housing for the cable to not be pinched/stuck).

[ktfergus]

Do you have a zip tie connecting the cable harness to the x stepper motor? I can't tell in the picks.

Here's the back of my Play. The cables are zip tied to the x stepper motor.



You can see how it forces the cables up, away from the bed. Your best bet might be to re-position the cables & zip ties so that they steer the cables upwards. If that doesn't work, perhaps you could print out a guide/spacer that clips to the back housing & prevents the cables from hitting the bed.

-Kelly

[__Vinz__]

Hi Kelly,

Thanks for the additional insight. Yes I do have a ziptie there.

W.r.t the picture you sent, this was very useful to compare against. Could you send the same picture (that is from the back) when your printer is around Z=0 with the bed at Y=max (i.e bed fully towards you when you look at the printer from the front, front being the side with the extruder handle)?

As of now, I am looking at the zipties again to see what I can do.

[ktfergus]

Glad to hear the pic helped. here is the view you requested:

The extruder is at z = 0 & x = 0, pretty much where the first probe point would be.



Here's a close up:



And finally, a side view with the bed pulled back a bit:I bought my Play assembled (it's a re-ferb, actually) so I never really analyzed the cable management until now, but you can see how it angles up, just above horizontal, after the zip ties on the x stepper which keeps it up away from the bed.




-Kelly

[__Vinz__]

Thank you very much for those pictures! This is very different from mine and looks much better w.r.t any tangling risk. I need to check back on mine and see what I can improve here. I will report back on my findings.

[__Vinz__]

Hi there,

I am finally taking the time to look at this more closely and I noticed a big difference with your printer, Kelly (again, many thanks for the pics!): the side of the X axis motor the cables are coming out is different.

In your case, the cables are coming from the side of the motor which is closest to the bed ('bottom side') whereas for mine, the are coming from the side which is closest to the side of the enclosure.In fact, it looks like yours was assembled differently than mine, with the X motor turned 45 degrees.

I followed the Play assembly manual (cf capture below) and my assembly is in line with it. I will contact Printrbot about this and will let you know about the results.

[__Vinz__]

Hi again,

So after a ticket which I initially opened on Feb 5th followed by multiple pings to the PB support on Twitter, the PB support team seems to be leaning towards rotating the motor 45 degrees and see if that improves things (cf https://printrbot.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/ ... /204938234, where I referenced this post here).

I will keep this thread updated as the situation unfolds. Hopefully, there is a solution.

[__Vinz__]

Hi here,

Just wanted to close on this thread and thank everybody who helped, especially you Kelly! I finally rotated the motor when I upgraded to the new Z lead screw + blower fan and this has basically solved the problem. I can now use the very end of my bed and homing does not fail anymore when unattened.

Thanks again!

[ktfergus]

Nice! Glad to hear everything is working. Can you share specs/details for the blower fan mod? When I redid the fan for my Play it never even crossed my mind to mount anything "behind" the hotend.

-Kelly

[__Vinz__]

Hi there,

Sorry I am only seeing your message now. Nothing fancy about the blower fan, I am using the fan from the Printrbot website alonside their mount which you can find and print at https://www.youmagine.com/designs/print ... fan-mounts. Instructions to mount are at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ObidXxtk00

I'd definitely recommend the upgrade, it's cooling much better now, esp when doing fine, high shapes (like a small Eiffel Tower).