LED light bar

 I have completed my design for a LED light bar for the gantry. I tested various designs and materials and this final solution seems to work well. The design in in three parts. There is a central light diffuser which houses the LED strip and a pair of endcaps which enclose it, hold it in place and also (as with my other designs) incorporate cable tie mountings for strain relief of the cables.

Diffuser with endcap

I experimented with both white and transparent filament for the diffuser and without a doubt the white PLA worked out best. The design is a single 0.4mm skin so it takes some careful consideration of slicer settings to print (I did consider trying it vertically in vase mode, but didn't need to get that far).


The video shows the bar cycling through the Neopixel start up test. It does seem to work very well and actually turned out to be easy enough to print.


To fit the strip, install the LEDs into the diffuser in the position that you need them. Once installed, fix the diffuser to the gantry and hold it in position with tape. Install a screw and a t-nut into each end and fit it to the gantry either side of the diffuser. For the end(s) with cabling, thread the cable through the slot as you slide the endcap over the end of the diffuser and tighten the screw. 

I managed to fit 19 60/m Neopixels into the diffuser quite neatly. As discussed in the blog, I plan to use the 20th as a nozzle LED in a later project. 

In my case, the strip is connected to my BTT SKR 1.4 Turbo mainboard. 

The model is downloadable from Cults 3D and it should be generally compatible with most machines using V-slot extrusion. 

I have now created a modified MK2 version of this. Although the original worked fine, I discovered that the adhesive used on the rear of the Neopixel strip I was using wasn't strong enough. To resolve this I modified the diffuser to be in two parts so that the strip can be glued down to it. The new cover then slides into the base - creating the same form as the original. There are modified endcaps to fit the slightly wider profile too. I have added this new version to the original download location. 

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