12 Volt Power

This is on thingiverse as 12V Power Box.

I made My Electronics Cover with slots for dual 40mm fans, but I needed a way to get power to the fans (and I may be adding other fans or moving extruder fan and LED lights to this separate power source), so I made this little box to provide lots of 12 volt fan headers.

The parts I used were:

The circuit board I picked was designed for prototyping, so it already had some power strips running down the center and multi-connection strips I could use to simplify connecting the headers to the power. I soldered all the headers in first, then stripped and bent a zillion little pieces of wire and ran them through the holes from the power rails to the correct pin of the connector and bent the ends so they wouldn't move (making absolutely sure I checked a dozen times to be positive I had the right pins hooked to the right power). I then soldered in the little wires. That just leaves the power jack to connect.

I soldered the two extra long wires to the power jack. At this point things get tricky. The jack has to be screwed in from the back, so before soldering it to the circuit board, I put the nut in the nut trap and screwed the connector in by turning it, then I could see how long I needed the wires to be to reach the power strips on the circuit board, so I cut and stripped them, pushed them through the board and soldered them to the proper power strips (again checking to be sure I had it right). At this point, it isn't coming apart without cutting wires.

The power cube I'm using was leftover from something that needed lots of power. It is marked 12VDC 1500mA, so it has more than enough juice to run a few fans which say they draw 50mA.

I plugged in the power cube, stuck the connector in the jack, then tried a fan in each of the 8 headers. Miraculously, they all worked :-).

Now I need a bottom for the box, and I might as well toss in holes for a couple of magnets to stick the box to the back of the Solidoodle. I plan to just glue the bottom on since I can't think of any reason I should ever need to take it apart (and the power jack already can't come out).

Had to do a slight amount of filing on the opening in the top part to get the bottom part to fit, but as you see it goes together very nicely.

I've drilled out the magnet holes and epoxied in a couple of magnets so they can cure overnight. Morning has come and I've glued the parts together forever, and it sticks on the back of the Solidoodle perfectly.

I hooked up a power strip for the Solidoodle power supply and my new 12V power cube and I now automatically turn on power to the strip when I plug in the USB cable.

While I was fooling with fans, I replaced the extruder motor fan with one of the same Noctua fans I used in the electronics cover, and all the annoying grinding noise has gone away. I have to look at the fan to see if it is spinning.

I cut the wires on the old and new fans, leaving long enough ends to use two of the little cable splice gadgets that came with the Noctua fan. Seems to have worked perfectly.

Go back to my main Solidoodle page.