Flat Wire Spring

youmagine

This is a compression spring, 50 mm tall x 16 mm OD, the design uses a flat "wire" 2 x 1.5 mm. I needed a compression spring for another 3D model I designed this one. Material was PLAPrint with coils spiraling upward.Support everywhere was turned on, using lines. This cleaned up surprisingly well. (I was not worried about trying to make it pretty.)Print speed = 20 mm/s (travel = 120 mm/s)Infill was 25% (I meant to try 100% but forgot to change this. It came out okay regardless.)Shell, Top, & Bottom thickness = 1.2 mmSpring Rate is about 0.04 N/mm (0.22 lbf/in) This should be higher at 100% infill of course, but this is doing what I need. I do want to point out that like most plastic under stress, this design will probably experience "creep" and lose its springiness over time.EDIT: 12/8/15 After several week compressed to 50mm the free state of the spring has "crept" to 22mm. Not unexpected, but I'm going to do a 100% infill and look at this again.