Battery holders for AA and AAA types

Those are battery holders with integrated wire connectors for AA and AAA batteries. It is partly a derivative of http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:9805 .

The electricity from a battery is conducted to wires through M3 countersunk screws and M3 embedded nuts. Wires are fixed between holder connectors and embedded nuts. A battery holder can be mounted using two M3 countersunk screws.

There are several holder models published both for AA and AAA batteries. Their filenames start with a battery type followed by an amount of batteries in a holder.

Instructions

1. Print it (AA_1_Battery_Holder.stl for a single AA battery, AAA_1_Battery_Holder.stl for a single AAA battery). If you are printing from ABS plastic and have a cooling fan (e.g. http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:32465 ) make sure that the fan is turned off. I have printed it using ABS plastic with 0.3mm layer height.
2. Clean the wire holes (which lead from bottom to nut holes) with a 2mm drill bit. You may use the following technique for cleaning holes: http://vimeo.com/14492980 (starting from 00:58 of the video).
3. Prepare 2 M3 nuts, 2 M3 countersunk screws, and 2 wires (per battery, see Details.jpg).
4. Put the M3 countersunk screws into battery connector holes (from battery side).
5. Insert stripped wires into 2mm connector holes and make sure that wires are visible in nut hole. It is shown on ConnectingWires.jpg.
6. Embed nuts and gently tighten screws to make a reliable connection, but do not over tighten them because the plastic part of a battery holder may crack.
7. Use another two M3 countersunk screws (not shown on Details.jpg) to attach the battery holder to a thing which needs it. For example, I have used it for boosting several toys which mistakenly believed that 1.5V alkalines are better to use than 1.2V NiMHs (UseCase.jpg). :-)

Category: Electronics