6/7/8/9/10 AA battery pack rubberband secured (remix of 6 x AA Battery Pack by NozzleClog)

thingiverse

I was making a battery pack to replace a dead 7 cell nimh pack that was in my airsoft rifle, when I made the original battery pack I was having power drops that I thought were due to a lack of power due to lack of cell count so, thinking I needed more batteries in my pack I made a couple of pieces to add batteries. it wasn't until after making a piece to give me 7 batteries that I figured out my problem was in the springs, it turned out that I had bad solder joints on the springs, I just couldn't get the springs I was using to tin properly and so when I probed the power while testing the rifle I was having power drop when I tried to draw power from the pack at this point I had already totally disassimbled the airsoft to see if anything was wrong internally and I didn't see anything that would be harmed by an extra 1.2V of power so I decided to try to use rubber bands on an 8 cell pack. after some experimenting I have found that I can use the same cap I made with the ears for the rubber bands and secure the bands to the screw at the other end of the 6 battery tube and it works fine that way, although a little slower (go figure, right? hehe). the file titled ¨8AA-battery-cap_(+2_for_springs)" is the file to use if you have good spring contacts, if you don´t you can do as I did after realizing my problem, I made some square copper contacts and modified the STL's to use rubber bands. (but you don't have to modify the STLs!) the file titled "AA-battery-case+2-" is a piece you can add to the original tube to add 2 batteries, I believe this is properly sized so that you can add as many as you feel the need to add (but I haven't actually tested that) the file titled "AA-battery_case-_+2-W-end-cap4(and_plane_to_print_without_support)" is my solution to the problem of no usable springs. it has ears on the sides to secure the end cap with rubber bands pulling tension for a good contact with simple copper contacts (you could probably even get away with just using coils of stripped wire in the endcaps..) please note that if you separate the end cap from the +2 extender you will end up with an extra plane or flat rectangle that (in blender) I set into the battery tube part at the height of the starting point of the tube, I did this so that it would have a solid printed layer at this height (as can be seen in the pictures) so that the print can be done without support and standing vertical as it is oriented in the .stl file the file titled "8AA-battery-cap-(4mmholes_at_18.5mm)" is the piece I used to mount the pack to my airsoft, I used a pair of screw holes that were used for a piece of rail, I could re-do this is the future to actually use the rail, but as it is it mounts closer to flush than it would have been able to with using the rail so I probably wont.. I will also include the original files by NozzleClog "extra-battery-cap-for-6-to-7-cell-convertstl" is a file that has the mounting screw holes and a single battery slot that I made so I could do a 7 battery pack as the original battery pack called for but I don't believe it is necessary at this point because the airsoft works fine withe the sliding rubber band secured cap on 6 or 8 batteries and I don't really think it's necessary to make it 7. if you wish to use it I'm not really sure about the length spacing , you may need to modify it so that you don't have to use a spring.. it has a channel built into the side so that the wire can ride in the slot and go from one contact to the other.