Close

Making things easy for the Judges

A project log for Simple but Effective Shelf Retention Bracket

A 3D printable bracket to both support and hold a shelf in place.

hank-cowdogHank Cowdog 02/19/2018 at 17:590 Comments

How well did the repair work?

Much better than the original brass pins.  This clip top is wide enough to grasp the top of the shelf and prevent it from popping up if knocked from below, but thin enough that it allows the shelf to drop down from above and lock in place.

My parametric design worked well, but making it available in Thingiverse's Customizer is thus far a failure: not because my design is flawed, but because Customizer itself is currently broken.

The part, and it's parametric design, is still usable, but currently would require the installation of OpenSCAD to use.  I hope to address this once Customizer is fixed.


Was 3D printing a better solution than just buying a part?
Yes, for several reasons, including:

Availability: I have seen similar clips provided with some flat-pack furniture, but not all brands.  My parametric design allows an OpenSCAD user to set two variables and print out a clip that should work well for their particular project, regardless of the original manufacturer.

Performance: the clips work better than the pins that are available for purchase.

Ease of Printing: The parts are small enough that they print in about 20 minutes each (YMMV) and one can plate up several on a single print.  I can fit 8 on my small delta 3D printer's 4.25" round bed.  Larger printers could easily print a dozen or more at a time.  The design is such that print failures are unlikely - it's a simple, clean design.

Effort-Savings: I could customize and print out a pair of brackets quicker than I could drive to the local big-box store and buy replacement pins, and the clips

How well is the project documented? Was design of the 3D printed parts explained?
I believe I covered this pretty well, from the initial inspiration (helping out a friend), to the initial hard-wired designs in Google Sketchup, to the final parametric re-implementation in OpenSCAD.  The .scad code itself is also reasonably well documented.

Is the project open source? Could the work be replicated based on the documentation?
Yes, it is Open Source and the file is available both in the Hackaday.io entry as well as on Thingiverse.  The source .scad code will make it easy for others to make their own customized brackets.

How complete is the entry? Projects don’t have to be complete or working to enter, however those which are finished and working by the deadline may be judged higher.
Well, I think I took it as far as I can without having the Thingiverse Customizer working.

Discussions