Easy, Bolt-on Installation: Rack Structure & Digital Scale.
Creality Filament Rack And Digital Meter
Gear – Filament Spool Rack
Needed an additional part and pieces for the update, this Creality filament spool update.
Today, we have a filament rack update and the final accessory to add to the TPU upgrade build. Dare I call it the final piece of the puzzle for the build. What are we looking at here? It’s a top-mounted (overhead) rack, specifically the Creality Spool Rack.
The rack, or filament management rack sits atop the main brace/cross-bracket framing structure as shown below (see contents below). The rack system will hold various filament types:* PLA, ABS, Nylon, Wood, and TPU *assuming spooled filament) standard sizes apply. It’s important to note that Creality includes a portion of filament or test filament with a new or refurbished printer. This information is helpful for new 3D printer users. For the sake of the article, we are using two brands of filament, both Creality and Duramic 3D. Filament types include, PLA, TPU and PETG. PLA (Polyactic Acid) for everyday “stress” applications, TPU (Thermopastic Polyurethane) for flexible and chemical resilient prints and PETG (Polyethylene Terephthalate Glycol) for structural strength and durable parts.
The advantage? TPU specifically can unwind and pass through a top cross-brace funneling mechanism directly into the new direct drive extruder. This serves as the new static filament storage area/piece. For those of you with a Bowden drive, you may not understand, but after the upgrade, we needed a way to feed filament to the direct drive extruder. This serves as the solution.
3D Printer Accessories
Rack Install
Digital Connectivity
Rack and Meter
Creality makes this handy filament rack, replacing the OEM side mounted rack. It’s perfect for filament management – size, weight over time etc. Same as the OEM rack with a few upgrades like a bright, digital scale. The rack has a large, bright digital scale Interface, a great visual for filament volume, space and duration.
The key here, as part of the Filament rack update, the digital meter (interface) built into the rack mount. Handy to keep track of filament by weight. How about software updates, let’s cover that too. And as you can imagine, this can help predict usage, and consumption rates.
The 3D Rack features include – accurate filament estimates, smooth feeder motion, east-to-read digital meter, simple operation and strong structural support. More importantly, unit cost (per rack cost) and cost per item or printable. Seeing a trend of $25 or more for the rack unit. It’s small enough to screw to the topside of the support frame. The interface is bright enough to work in the dark, cast enough light onto the printer bed. Note, most standard size spools of filament should work on the rack, TPU, ABS, Nylon, Wood and/or PLA. All material come into scope once the direct drive is up and functioning as expected.