Enclosed Planetary Embroidery Floss Bobbin Winder

Description

This is a 'simple' (for assembly and use, at least) winder for embroider floss with a 4.421 : 1 ratio. That means that one crank of the handle gets you almost four and a half turns of the bobbin winding up your thread or floss. What 'enclosed' means for you is that the chance of floss getting tangled up in the gears is almost gone.

My daughter had called and asked about getting me to print her some bobbins so she could put her embroidery floss up cleanly so her cats wouldn't keep attacking and ruining it. After printing her out some bobbins (I really liked this design), I looked around for winders I could print her to go with them. Unfortunately most were just 1:1 simple setups, or exposed gears that just looked ready to chew up your floss as soon as you weren't watching closely.

Time to design a new one!

I started trying to center around standard 608 gears (since I could pick up a pack of 50 for only $12, much better than she pays for her roller derby skate ones). The next consideration was to try to leverage a planetary gear system, since it had the potential to make many things smoother. I ended up with a gear ratio giving about a 4.5:1 ratio that in testing felt decent and gave good control.

The FreeCAD source file is also included for downloading in case you want to tweak it for your needs. If you change teeth combinations on the gears be sure to run check geometry on all of them.

Related

Check out the first functional version of a mini swift to use with the winder.

Updates

Update June 28, 2026

• Added new socket with the gap reduced to 0.95mm. Turns out that the most recent DMC on my local store shelves are down to just 0.9mm thick!

  • No new source, just changed "bobbin thick" in the spreadsheet to 0.95 and exported.

Coming Soon

• watch for a link to a floss swift. The minimal version is almost done. first version now in early release

Printing

Settings

This winder is designed to be printed with 0.28mm layers, but should work with smaller ones if you like how your printer handles them.

The parts should already be oriented for best printing.

Print with normal supports enabled, although the majority of the pieces should not need much supporting at all.

STEP vs STL

I've included .step files because they give smoother results with smaller files as long as your slicer (such as Orca Slicer) supports them. The .stl versions are included for those who need them for their workflows, but are normally of a poorer quality due to tessellation being baked in.

Do not be fooled by the Printable's 3d preview. They recently added support for .step files (nice!), but run their preview conversion at a much lower quality than Orca slicer and its ilk use when opening .step files. So it is still better to use the .step versions if your slicer supports it.

Parts for Printing

Pick either the .stl versions or the .step versions (I prefer the latter for better printing). The main point to choose what to print is with the connectors. I have provided three different versions depending on your mounting needs. These should also be easy to change later if you realize different needs.

Parts Needed

For optimal assembly you will need 608 bearings (although you can substitute with the "pivots" I published as part of my parametric spool hub adapter.

• 5x 608 bearing or 'pivots'

• 1x m3 hex nut

• 1x m3 12mm cap head bolt

Assembly

Start with all of the parts printed and ready. You can print all in one color or split things up with two or more colors depending on what you feel like. Only a single connector of the three possible will be needed, but it should not be too hard to switch them out later if you need to change how you are mounting it.

Insert the bearings

First, get bearings set into each of the four gears and the crank. In general it might be slightly easier to to insert them from the top if there is any elephant's foot going on. Or you can lightly clear the opening with a de-burring tool:

Then firmly push them in until they are fully seated and centered. The gears and crank are all 7mm thick so should match the bearings: 

Set them aside for later.

Assemble the clamp

Take the clamp base and gently thread in the bolt:

After making sure you have it going in without damaging the threads, screw it close to the top until there is just enough gap to slide the cap in and then loosely fit the cap on the ball end (it does not have to be snapped on at this time):

Carefully yet firmly continue to screw the bolt in until the cap becomes fully seated and flush with the top of the clamp base. Generally there will be a loud snap as the cap fits itself onto the bolt, so do not be surprised:

Insert the connector

Select the converter you want to use (straight, 45°, or 90°) and then gently push it into the slot on the clamp base:

Firmly push down until it is fully seated. Depending on your print this might take a bit of force, and I often use a mallet to gently tap it into place.

Connecting the case

Once you have the connector centered fully in place, turn the clamp base onto its back:

Note: At the point you can decide if you want the crank to be over the table it ends up clamped to or hanging out away from it depending on if you fit the case in open side up or open side down. In these pictures I go with the crank over table/socket away from table orientation.

Align the case and match up the dovetail:

Firmly push the case down until it is fully seated. You might need some gentle tapping, but I've also found using pliers and gently squeezing together from each side in turn repeatedly to be quite efficient:

Preparing the carrier

Take the carrier and the M3 nut and line the nut up to insert into the slot in the central shaft of the carrier. The nut should be inserted with sides flat and parallel to the direction it is being inserted in and point first when inserting. It is helpful to use needle nosed pliers to hold the nut and slide it into place:

Be careful not to break the center shaft of the carrier. Once you have it fully inserted you should see a point of the nut facing outwards (the nut also strengthens the center shaft so concern of breaking is now minimized)

Assembling the gears

Take the carrier along with the four gears and prepare to assemble them. Note that the sun gear will go print-bed side down and the planet gears will print-bed side up. Check to make sure that the planet gears are on the proper side to allow meshing into the sun gear.

Being careful to keep the gears just on the tops of the shafts and not fully pushed down place the sun gear then each of the planet gears so that the planet gears just start fitting onto the shafts and are properly meshed into the sun gear:

Once all are in position and meshed correctly, push the gears down fully onto the carrier's shafts:

Placing the ring

Take the ring and place it around all the gears. There is a gap cut in the ring so that you can open it wider to fit over the planet gears. Gently open it and move it down a tooth at a time until you have it meshed with all three gears and the ring is centered evenly on them:

The gap at the bottom will remain, but when pushing gently the two open ends should touch wile staying evenly meshed with the gears.

Fitting to the case

Being careful to keep the ring and gears together, gently lift the entire carrier/gear/ring sub-assembly, turn it over and set it down on top of the opening of the case. Align the tabs on the outer part of the ring with the slots in the case:

Once you are sure that things are aligned and that all the gears are evenly spaced within the ring, gently push it down fully (keep in mind that the hex shaft on the sun gear will extend out the opening of the bottom, so the case can not stay flat on the table):

Assembling the lid

Take the lid and line it up so that the tabs on the lid match the slots on the outer part of the case. The one slot at the bottom of the case where it goes on to match with the connector is a good place to start with:

Once all the tabs are lined up, gently push the case down evenly until it snaps into place. Be sure not to push down on the table as the sun gear protruding will end up pushing the carrier back up and out. Using your hands to grip the left and right of the case and lid and squeezing is most effective. (Be careful not to pinch your skin):

Preparing the crank and handle

With the end of the crank that does not have the bearing hanging off the edge of your table, and its three tabs pointing downward, push the shaft down fully into the bearing:

Once it is set, take the handle and push it firmly down onto the shaft. If your fit is not tight between the shaft and handle it is fine to add a bit of glue to hold them together:

Fitting the crank to the carrier

Prepare to connect the crank to the part of the carrier visible through the opening in the center of the lid. Line things up so that the three tabs on the crank will fit into the three slots in the carrier:

Fit the crank down and push firmly into the slots on the carrier, but do not worry if it is not easy to fit all the way down; fitting in and tightening the screw should finish the placement. Tighten the cap head screw until it seats into the nut. Note that at first the screw might be going through the plastic on the holes, so be sure you keep going until it is holding to the nut. It should end up set fairly well away from the top of the crank:

Fitting the socket

Turn the winder over so that the hex shaft is visible and prepare to fit on the socket:

Fit the socket down onto the shaft and firmly push until it is seated well. With the layer lines from printing you should end up with a decently tight fit.

Checking the assembly

Finally check that a bobbin fits into the slot on the socket and all should be ready for use

Usage

With the winder firmly clamped to a table or other solid base, slip a bobbin with floss fixed in one of its slots into the slot on the socket. Crank with one hand while loosely holding and guiding the floss with your other. That's it. You should be all set now.