X-Wing Pilot Chest Box - Snap-Together

• V2 UPDATE

You need:

1 Body (Gray)

1 Rear Cover (Gray)

1 Inset Plate (Black)

3 Buttons (2 Blue, 3 White)

2 Switches (White)

3 Switch Retainers (Any Color)

1 Jack (Silver)

1 Knob (Silver)

1 Switch OR Alternate Switch (Gray)

4 #8 x 3/8" OR M4 x 8mm Type B Plastic Screws

3 Small Zip Ties (~4")

I've decided that snaps were a dumb way to do this (although the original version is still available here) & redesigned it from scratch using crush ribs & zip ties for the hose. It should still assemble without too much fuss, although I'd recommend a small dab of superglue on each piece as you assemble it, just to be on the safe side.

Many thanks to Pfalter for their guidance in revising the new design to be closer to screen-accurate. :)

Print Settings

Printer Brand:

FlashForge

Printer:

Rafts:

Yes

Supports:

Resolution:

High Detail

Infill:

Notes:

Body - Print on one of the diagonal endswithout supports! Wow!

Buttons - Print face-down

Switches - Print on their side - bridging should be fine.

How I Designed This

Crush ribs are a good solution here for a couple reasons:

• The parts are small & shallow, with a cosmetic surface that wants to be printed face-down, limiting the kinds of snap features that can be printed in the correct orientation (parallel to the plane of the bed).
• They need to be snug without any rattling after assembly (as would be necessary for a snap).

The challenging part of this model is the layout - the grid-like arrangement of the buttons/inset plate/stripes means that their size & spacing all interrelated, & have to be specified together from the outset. I drove them all from a single fairly complicated sketch, which is normally a bad idea, but necessary in this case.

I used wall thicknesses of 2mm, made my crush ribs 2mm in diameter, then gave them 3 degrees of draft to achieve the right feel of interference on assembly. (The feel may vary based on your slicer software, but will probably still work on anyone's setup.) I tried to keep the parts symmetric about all

Category: Props