Filament Spool Holder for 3kg or 1kg spools

I recently got a 3kg spool of eSUN PLA+ from Amazon because it was on sale. But the spool seemed to be too large and too heavy to trust the spool holders on the printer, so I decided to build one that I can put next to the printer.

Needed materials

1. Two prints of either the 1kg or 3kg holder. Pieces must be identical
2. Four prints of the Bearing Axis.stl
3. Four ball bearings 6000zz, 10mmx26mmx8mm
4. Four bolts M6x20mm
5. Four M6 nuts
6. Filament of choice. I have used PRINSFIL black PLA filament

Printing

No supports required, but if you use a material prone to warping you might want to print a brim or raft to prevent warping of the rather long, narrow pieces. If you want to build the 3kg spool holder, print two of the “Spool Holder 3kg.stl” files, for the 1kg holder, use “Spool holder 1kg.stl” twice.

Either way you will need four of the “Bearing Axis.stl” (unless you want to try without bearing, see below)

Building

• Take the bearing axis and press them into the center of each of the ball bearings, making sure that there is about half a millimeter sticking out on both sides.
• Use a screw and nut to screw the axis into the holder. You can fix the screws tightly, the axis does not need to spin.
• Place the finished holder parts parallel on to the table, next to your printer.
• Rest the filament spool on top of the ball bearings.
• Give the spool a spin. It should spin freely on the bearings.

To improve stability, you might want to stick some rubber pads underneath the holder to prevent it from being pulled towards the printer.

I've used this design for several prints now and it works surprisingly well. I haven't tried if the 3kg spool works on the 1kg holder, it might but for extra stability the 3kg holder is recommended.

If you don't have bearings

You might get away without the bearings and print “Bearing Replacement.stl” four times instead of the bearing axis. In this case, do not tighten the screws and possibly put a counterlocked nut to prevent the nuts from unscrewing themselves. Make sure to use some grease. I haven't tried this, and it is probably not a good idea. The bearing replacement need to be printed with supports, and possibly a raft.

Credits and License

.blend file is included if you want to adapt to other bearing types or spool sizes. I place these into the public domain, feel free to do whatever you want. If you want to credit me, that is appreciated but not required. This is entirely my own work, but then, not a lot of engineering is required for this :)