3D Printed Stand / PCI Express Support Bracket

[geerlingguy]

I am testing this thing with more and more graphics cards... and some of them are getting quite large and unwieldy! This is not nearly the largest, but the Intel A750 has required me to set up a little box under it so it doesn't pull hard on the PCIe slot on the adapter board:

I think some sort of platform that could have screws through the adapter into it (for physical stability), and a part that rises up and can hold the PCIe cards in place (ideally with heat set threaded screws, but alternatively with just some sort of pegs or something), would be perfect.

I didn't know if @mfolejewski had worked on that at all yet, but if not I will take a stab at it soon. The PCIe bracket works perfect for the Pi4GPU card!

[mfolejewski]

I have created very basic stand for the whole setup, which could be further improved.

https://github.com/geerlingguy/pi4gpu/blob/master/STEP%20models/PCIE_X4_X16_ADP_stand_v1.stl

If you have any comments that changes should be included, please let me know, due to I don't have these PCIe cards and even 3D printer, so I can't verify such model in the direction what can be improved.

This simple stand should be compatible with M4 threaded inserts. I added 5 holes with 6mm size (for M4 inserts with outer dimension equal to 6-7mm).

[geerlingguy]

Thanks! I was considering trying to adapt a design like that into OpenSCAD so it could be simple to manage via code changes (a lot of 3D modeling software is complex to modify unless you're already familiar with the particular package!).

I'll take that file and see what else I can do to make it stable for supporting the bigger cards.

[geerlingguy]

Working on a basic stand just because the 4090 is basically impossible to support just jamming books underneath like other cards, lol.

[geerlingguy]

Stand works, wish I could print it a little larger to support more of the card, but this works for now:

[geerlingguy]

Some improvements:

• Reduce the height on the backside by 1-2 mm so it fits in the PCIe card cutout a little better (right now it barely nudges the card up a bit)
• Add press-fit threaded insert holes in at least 4 locations around the inset base, so one could screw M3 screws in, securing it to the stand
• Add an extension and vertical brackets to allow screwing the PCIe brackets into the structure (this could get complicated)
• Make it modular so you could print an extra extension to add onto the end to support even more massive cards like the 4090

But... this version works fine with the few cards I'm testing, so I'm rolling with it for now.

[geerlingguy]

One more picture, just with the base installed: