Creality Hi - Top Mount Spool Holder Replacement

I have 2 Hi's. I should be thankful that I learned on an Ender 3 Pro so I'm used to troubleshooting and fixing stuff myself. Being a multiple-times Creality owner signals that I have come to an inner peace with the struggles, failures, and frustrations of life.

On my Hi#2, the top spool holder bracket randomly broke. I was not overloading it (I only use 1kg spools). I use it frequently when don't want to have to fool with the CFS for a quick print.

The Creality OEM bracket had a very poor design using very thin ABS (or maybe PC - not that it matters since it's in the trash now). Also, the front clearance is only about 2.5mm from the top ganrty/frame to the print head at top of its startup gyrations (so, not much room for error). I included pics of the broken bracket and my temporary T&B Ty-Rap fix. The entire part that wrapped around the gantry was this thin material with the weight bearing part the same thin 2.5mm as the front depth limit - just a poorly thought-out and doomed design.

Both of my design options below use the nut and the retainer bar (the Blue parts in the AutoCAD screen snip). The retainer bar holds the bracket snugly on the top cross arm and requires (2) M3x10mm self-tapping screws to fix to the printed arm of your choice below. The weight of the spool is not carried by the thin 2.5mm thick material. The differences are slight between the two "arm" choices (only what type of Bowden tube connector you're going to use), but both are very close to the original part geometry and spool location/offset.

• Option 1 (the Red parts): The Bare Minimum with Creality Swivel. This design reuses the stock Creality spool and swivel Bowden tube guide. For this, only print the arm, nut, and retainer. But there are options below if you want/need to use alternatives. The arm is on approximately the same angle as the original, but not exact (close enough). Reusing the Creality swivel Bowden guide requires an M2.6x6mm screw (size not critical, anything close to this will probably work).

• Option 2 (the Purple parts): Make Your Own Bowden Tube Mount. If your swivel didn’t survive or you hate it, I have included 2 options for mounting a threaded Bowden fitting (6mm or 10mm) and each of these has a separate bracket (you only need whichever one you're going to use, not both). I don't print threads this small so I used a tap to make mine. You'll need one (1) additional M3x10mm self-tapping screw for either of these.

If your spool is ok, reuse that. If you need a spool, I suggest this one:  https://www.printables.com/model/548230-creality-k1-bearing-spool-holder I think Creality only has one primary spool design so anything made for Creality products should work. There are many spool models already available so I didn't recreate it.

Designed in Vanilla AutoCAD 2027 / Sliced using Orca Slicer 2.4.2.

Printed in PETG with 50% infill (I wanted it plenty rigid and strong) - no supports.

P.S.  Murphy was an optimist! Unless there is a tremendous improvement of general overall quality at Creality, these will be my last Creality products. I've had nothing but issues, malfunctions, CFS jams, random errors, jammed extruders, blobs of death, and buggy firmware - I don't have time to go over all of it here, but if anyone wants to start a support group ...

73 de K4ZX