IKEA TRÅDFRI dimmer 3D-printable frame

This is a 3D-printable replica of the IKEA lights dimmer frame.

There are two configations:

• One is compatible with the original IKEA bottom lid, and can be used as a replacement for it (bottom-case-ikea.stl)
• One also exposes the SWD debug header and will be compatible with our debug chip and bottom lid (which we haven't finished yet) (bottom-case.stl)

Note that, since 3D-printed clips are quite fragile and they easily break if you try to fit in the PCB, we decided that the best way to hold the PCB in place would be a slide-in holder. You can find it in the prebuilt STL downloads under other/pcb-holder.stl. It slides in on the side and in our tests it's a lot stronger than a regular clip.

Building the design

Prebuilt STL downloads: https://gitlab.com/tradfree/bottom-case/-/jobs/artifacts/master/browse?job=render

The design can be built in two ways:

• By opening one of the .scad files with OpenSCAD (tweak the the settings in config.scad)

• With make:

  make case  # Case with SWD hole, screw hole in a different position
  make case-ikea  # Compatible with the original IKEA lid
  

Support material

Since the part is very small and has a lot of tiny parts and clips, it is practically impossible to print it without supports or with normal slicer auto-generated supports.

For this reason, we decided to include tailor-made supports in the model itself. There are two types of supports:

• "easy": supports on the battery (bottom) side. Easier to print and remove because there aren't too many floating parts, but it won't look as good.
• "hardcore": supports on the PCB (top) side. Huge amount of supports, takes 10 minutes and a lot of care to remove. Top part is going to look bad but you're going to cover it with the PCB, so you'll only see it once ;)

Supports can either be enabled in config.scad by setting build_supports to "easy" or "hardcore", and disabled by setting it to "none", or with make by passing '-Dbuild_supports="easy/hardcore"' (yes you need the quotation marks)

Under /img you can find a preview of the supports (in cyan) that you can use as reference for removal. Be careful because OpenSCAD colored the bottom of the battery clips cyan but they're not to be removed.

Also beware that the bridge-y supports are supposed to be clipped off, not to be torn off. Cut them off with a clipper.

Important

The build does not flip the model if you build it with "hardcore" supports, you need to rotate it 180° before slicing.

Print settings

It's very important to adjust print settings otherwise the print isn't gonna be any good.

I suggest you use either Slic3r or Slic3r++ (fork by supermarill) and not Cura. In my experience Cura wasn't able to detect some bridges and it would generate spaghetti.

• Disable supports (unless you're using soluble supports)
• Enable thin wall detection and (if available) set it to the smallest wall size detection available
• Layer height: 1.5mm
• Optionally enable top surface ironing:
  • Cura: find "Ironing"
  • Slic3r++: set top surface pattern to "ironing"
• Use slow print speeds
• Enable bridge detection and optimization if available
• Set fan to always, 100%, if available
• Remember to rotate the model if using "hardcore" supports

Troubleshooting

Screw hole is too wide/tight

Tweak it in config.scad

Can't push battery in

Make sure you've scraped the supports away well enough. Insert the battery from the PCB side: it must be flush with the battery housing on the other side.

You can tweak the battery clip sizes in include/sizes.scad, change battery_small_clip_dimens and battery_big_clip_dimens.

PCB doesn't click in

Make sure the battery is flush with its housing. Also make sure you didn't break the clips.

License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.