Ratrig VCore-3 cable support

Does your VCore-3 fail to stand to attention? Does its droop stop you performing? Well viagra probably isn’t the answer but my £5 cable support mod is!

It’s a problem all of us that have built a VCore-3 are all too familiar with and the bigger variants suffer even more than the smaller ones. Whilst you could do a massive overhaul and swap to a cable chain solution I believe that there is a simpler way. After a reasonable amount of trial and error, I found that the optimum source of springiness is actually 1mm diameter piano wire. You may think well I’ve got a 500 so I’ll opt for an even thicker gauge but trust me having tried 1. 6mm (with the same mindset) I found that it was too stiff and actually caused a visible twist to the carriage when too close to the back of the printer and snapped my 3d printer cable strain relief!

The new printed parts both have a small opening added into them to slow the spring steel wire into taking all the strain off of the wires and into the spring steel and printed parts. I suggest pairing it with some split sleeving which will allow easy access to the cables when any changes are required. Omitted in the images here to show the spring steel in place.

I was able to source 1m of the spring steel piano wire for around £5 from eBay in the UK. (pictured above) It should be relatively easily available worldwide, but I will consider adding it as a kit for purchase from my site if demand is there. I had also previously tried PTFE tubing, filament, and both thinner and thicker gauges of spring steel. 1mm diameter seems to be the sweet spot between stiffness and flexibility.

Modification files can be found here: https://github.com/dmason1992/3DPANDME

BOM

In all my tutortials and mods I try to provide a bill of materials to help you get started! They will always be the source I have used so can be trusted to work and if you buy them you help me keep producing content!

1m x 1mm dia spring steel / piano wire – Aliexpress
1m x split cable sleeve – Aliexpress