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EE-Emerge / EE-Emerge2021_Mechanical

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Control Box Enclosure #2

Open SeanAlling opened 3 years ago

SeanAlling commented 3 years ago

There are two options for the control box enclosure,

1) Off the shelf 1) 3D Printer/Laser Cut

Which of these options would make sense for the prototype? What is the cost comparison for both these options.

SeanAlling commented 3 years ago

Some resources for premade enclosures

ScottyMcCotty commented 3 years ago

For prototyping, I'm strongly leaning towards 3D printing. We need to have control and customizability when we're prototyping, and with 3D printing we can rapidly design/test each iteration of the model.

As for the final product, or later prototypes, purchasing off-the-shelf enclosures seems more convenient (once we've decided exactly what size we need, buying them in bulk shouldn't be too hard). I tossed in some pretend dimensions for the Polycase link and it looks like units are about 3-4$ each. The boxes I was looking at weren't flattering, though. Either I didn't explore enough options, or we should consider a different source.

The Hammond Manufacturing plastic enclosures looked better, but I'm still not sure. I couldn't find pricing per unit for those guys (specifically I was looking at the ice blue polycarbonate enclosure 1591DTBU). It's obviously the wrong size but seemed like a reasonable comparison.

ABS filament for 3D printers is about $20/kg. Without knowing the exact shape of the box, I can't say for sure how many boxes a single roll could make, but I would guess at least 7-8, which makes them a bit cheaper than purchasing off-the-shelf (but I've heard that printing with ABS is tricky, so convenience should be factored in)

oceanofthelost commented 3 years ago

Starting with 3D printing for the prototypes could work out. It does allow iterating on a design much quicker than using off the shelf enclosures.

One thing we could do is use PLA for the initial prototypes and then once a final design is selected we switch to ABS. This should actually cut down on the cost for filament and also not need to worry about actually printing ABS.