BLV Enclosure - BETA

BLV Enclosure

For MK3S+ / Prusa Mini - (Work in progress)

The BLV Enclosure is a universal enclosure designed entirely for 3D printers. Designed to be quick and easy to assemble, practical, modular, customizable, and most importantly affordable!

Hi, My name is Ben Levi (BLV) I'm an open-source 3D Printers developer. The main reason I chose to develop the BLV enclosure project is because of my dear wife. our house is not that big and as the number of printers increased, she thought they were really ugly and not suitable for the house. Therefore, I chose to create an enclosure with a modern design, clean, round lines, and delicate contours that she might like.

NOTE 1: It's an open BETA and the frame kit is available here

NOTE 2: after the beta, it will be probably available for more printers too

Last update: 23/10/21 check the changelog

Small video about the project

Disclaimer

- Before I start telling you more about the project, I need to note that all the work I personally invested in the project and we are talking about over a year of work - is entirely a contribution to the 3D community. I get no profit from it. no seller, manufacturer, or store paid me for it. The only thing I got was the prototype parts I needed to complete the project and the joy I could share with you - the 3D community that I came from. And of course, the fact that my dear wife allowed me to keep my printers as long as they are inside the new BLV enclosure.

- Please don't buy the Beta parts, unless you have read everything and understand what you need. For example, this user got the frame but unfortunately didn't bother to read the project and left this feedback. If he had read the project page, he would have understood that the panels are self-sourced and the handle/hinges are 3D printed. - BETA - it's a beta stage. I chose the Prusa MK3S+ and Prusa Mini to be the first to have the BLV Enclosure. Beta - which means in other words that there is no guarantee to have a perfect enclosure right out of the box. The plans may change, the quality of the parts may change, you may need to re-print parts, develop parts by yourself and be part of the project yourself. if you have any corrections, comments, fixes, or any other information that may help - I encourage you to share it with me and the community. Please, come and be a part of the project. Feel free to improve and repair, add parts, re-design panels by yourself, offer different sizes for different 3d printers or Prusa setups, and make the project even better. Any improvements you offer are welcome, add remixes as you wish.

- Known issues (BETA) - 14/8/21 - If the Plexiglas cutting is not done accurately, there will be a problem during assembly. You can manually sand the edges and proceed with the installation

- 17/8/21 - brittle corners parts: The factory decided to produce the first corners batch from a different aluminum type alloy which is lighter but softer than the commonly used type. Therefore the part where the screws are located may break if you apply too much force during assembly. Note that the enclosure parts must fit together without the need to apply any force. If you are required to use force - please stop, you may break the corners by doing so. I attached a photo showing how it looks like when it breaks. in my case, I even tapped it with an M4 instead of an M3, making it even more brittle. I will update you with any change

OK, now that you have the background and the known issues here is the project:

The project has 3 parts:

- Aluminum BLV Enclosure frame. - Self-sourced panels (Plexiglass/perspex/composites). - 3D printed parts provided for free (STL, CAD/Step files) by me and the Community.

1. The BLV Enclosure frame

As part of the project, I designed from scratch a new aluminum extrusion system . The extrusions can be cut to any length and match a wide range of 3D printers . Throughout the extrusion, there is a channel on which you can mount any custom 3d printed accessories such as door/Panel hinges, camera mounts, cable holders, tools holders using M3x7x2 Square nut or any 1515 T-nut. You can easily mount COB led's strip inside the extrusion panels too. by using the Led's Double side sticker, it help dissipates the heat and extending the leds' life. I wanted it to be practical - Let's be honest, it is very difficult to maintain your 3d printer through your enclosure doors. The best way would probably be to take the enclosure off and do what you need to do. The frame is 65% lighter than a regular aluminum extrusion frame wight, making it very easy to move and take off.

As you can see in the picture below, these are high-quality production parts, with a semi-matte black finish

In addition to the extrusions, I designed suitable aluminum corner brackets that were manufactured from casted aluminum using molds. The brackets are also equipped with channels for panels. Each BLV corner bracket joins 3 x BLV extrusions together using 6pcs of Hex set screws (provided). it has an auto aligning feature - so that during installation they would align themselves to the other extrusions quickly and easily. each corner assembly takes less than 1 min. Making the corners took a long time and required several (expensive) attempts until perfect corners were created. The BLV corner brackets are very light, beautiful but can also be a bit delicate. I don't recommend sitting on the frame or applying too much force to the components while installing it.

Dimensions

Since it's a modular design, the extrusions theoretically can be customized and cut to any length we need. The max recommended length would be 1.2m length for a rigid structure. I asked the manufacturer to consider making for start only with two BLV enclosure sizes: one for the PRUSA MK3S/MK3S+/MK2S and one for the PRUSA MINI and he agreed. I hope if and when the project develops and becomes mature enough, there will be more sizes to choose from and even customized lengths too.

Here are the dimensions for the BLV enclosure:

PRUSA MK3S+ enclosure dimensions:

centimeters inches

Height 43.5 cm 17.12 in

Length 60 cm 23.62 in

Width 52 cm 20.47 in

PRUSA MINI enclosure dimensions:

centimeters inches

Height 48 cm 18.89 in

Length 48 cm 18.89 in

Width 48 cm 18.89 in

Frame assembly

Assembling the case is quick very simple, Just slide the corner into the extrusion and lock the provided set screw using the Allen tool. panels assembly is even easier and just needs to be slid into the internal channels.

I even asked my wife to try and assemble the frame without any previous knowledge or guidelines. instead of 10 minutes assembly, it took her 17 minutes but I was very proud of her since she had done it without any guide or manual.

BTW, next week I will add a complete video guide showing how to assembly the enclosure. I already took the video, just need time to edit it.

Here you can see how all the parts join together. Each corner has 6 Tapped Holes and using 6 Setscrews the parts can be easily fixed together.

It has a self-alignment feature, so while screwing the set screws the Corner pushes the extrusions to the right place.

Please notice the channel inside the extrusion using an M3x7x2 Square nut or any 1515 T-nut you can fix any add-on or mount to the frame.