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Build Log 2: Latch Prototyping

A project log for Network Detached Storage Device

Ever wanted a self-hosting NAS robust enough you can throw it in your rucksack and forget about it?

sdfgeoffsdfgeoff 08/24/2022 at 09:430 Comments

Rather than have to screw and unscrew something to get access to the internals, it would be cool to have a twist-lock mechanism: twist a handle by 45 degrees and the internals slides out on it's rack. 

My first attempt at this involved printing out the whole lid mechanism. This would give me a size and visual appearance estimate:

3 hours later I had a physical part. There are two parts here: the circular "handle" which can rotate relative to the octagonal "lid". The "lid" has some print-in-place sliding bolts that allow it to engage with another par. Unfortunately the tolerances were off, so it was non-functional (print in place parts were stuck together). Still, it allowed me to fiddle with something in my hands, and spurred a bunch of thinking about how the latch would work. So a bunch of latch test prints followed:

These tried different tolerances and slide designs.

From left to right:

Then came printing a new suspension plate for it to mate with:

Immediately after putting the two parts together I slapped my forehead. Duh! I'd forgotten to leave any space for the suspension plate to move, and there wasn't even room for the bolt heads!

Well, that'll be tomorrows job. My printer is too loud to run at night.

For maximum cyberpunk feels I'm taking these photos at night illuminated solely by my computer monitors. So while they sure aren't top quality images, I'm just going to say it: modern phone camera's are pretty amazing!

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