MY DIY hand held retropi system

leejsmith

This is something I have worked on over the summer. I designed the case from scratch and spent many hours 3d printing until everything fits and feels nice to hold.

My plan is to make resin copies of the case and sell kits for people to make them. I will also pass on the 3d models if people want to print one, but it's not an easy thing to print and uses a lot of support material.

you can see my project grow.
http://imgur.com/a/9Rvfd

Thanks for looking

Lee

Pifan

Nice work Lee. The case looks pretty comfy to hold, I especially like that it's an original shape. Everyone is making Pi Gameboys at the moment (I'm guilty of this) and it's nice to see something different.

I enjoyed seeing your process on Imgur. I would be interested to see how the resin case casting goes if you do decide to go down this route.

leejsmith

Hi Pifan, I have had the case SLS printed and will be making a resin cast fir kits. I had to get one part re-printed as I designed everything to fit on my printer and the tolerance on the SLS print is so good the snes controller and screen was very loose. I have used it for a few weeks and although it's not uncomfortable I think it could be a little better and have thought about adding some rubber grips to the back.

I also made this while I waited for the SLS prints.
http://imgur.com/a/1GcqZ

Zigurana

Very nice! What price point do you have in mind for these cases?

leejsmith

@Zigurana At the moment I wont know until I work out how much resin is needed. I am hoping for £15-£20

monstermadeofman

@leejsmith

Where did you get the pads for the controls? not the buttons but the buttons/pressure sensor underneath

leejsmith

@monstermadeofman I just brought cheap usb snes controllers from ebay and used the pcb, pads and buttons.
http://imgur.com/a/9Rvfd

obsidianspider

Very cool project. 3D printing is something I hope to learn more about. What made you decide to reverse the Start and Select buttons?

leejsmith

@obsidianspider I was not paying attention and corrected it as soon as I noticed it on the model.

obsidianspider

@leejsmith Oops. I re-watched the video with audio.

How did you go about modeling things? Did you just measure carefully, or did you have some sort of scanner to get the dimensions of the parts you put inside the case?

leejsmith

@obsidianspider hi, did you see the gallery I posted at the top http://imgur.com/a/9Rvfd ? I started with the controller and used my digital calipers. The only problem with doing this are the tolerances of the 3d printers especially if you are trying to print as quick as possible. so holes need to be a little bigger ect. When I had the case pro printed using SLS it was the opposite and I had to make everything a little smaller than I model.

obsidianspider

@leejsmith I saw the gallery, but I didn't see any mention of calipers. Thanks for clarifying.

Man… now I really want a 3D printer.

leejsmith

@obsidianspider I enjoy watching it print and find it fascinating how they work out the paths ect. Every now and then a print will have a strange odd point that makes no sense as the print head moves from one side to the other just for one point and then it moves back and carries on with what it was doing before. 3d printing is a very frustrating game until you work out the kinks of your device and then it's super satisfying .

obsidianspider

@leejsmith Did you build your own printer, or did you buy one premade?

leejsmith

@obsidianspider My first printer was the M3D Micro which was the cheapest option in the uk at the time. It was a good introduction to printing, but was also not a very good printer. I felt I would make good use from a decent one so sold it and a few other bits and brought the Flashforge Dreamer and it's fantastic. I didnt want to build a printer because just because I didnt want to spend time setting up and calibrating before I could get decent prints. The Dreamer was worth every penny and had proven to be super reliable so far.