Projects

 

3D Printed case for a 3″ disk drive

After having been impressed by Keir Fraser’s work on the FlashFloppy project (check it out here) I decided to try and install the Gotek hardware (with FlashFloppy firmware) in my CPC6128 and Sinclair +3. As there seemed to be no ready-to-print designs available, I decided to design my own.

Here’s what I came up with:

 

The case includes support for the OLED display, the rotary encoder, and the sound mod. The Gotek LEDs were removed and the drive activity LED (originally green) was replaced with a rectangular red LED which mounts in the front panel. The small interface board at the rear of the case is to convert the 34 pin Gotek interface to the 26 pin 3″ drive connector (for details see the CPC Wiki page under the heading ‘Adaptor Cable for Internal Floppies/HxC emulator’).

Important: The +12V and +5V power connections are reversed on the 3″drive power connector.

The STL files for building the case can be found here

Included are the base, front, a cap for the rear of the rotary encoder mount, and the rotary encoder knob. The parts are printed so as to be an interference fit so some minor trimming may be needed for the end cap and encoder shaft to fit.

The base has slots for four captive 3mm hex nuts so that the original mounting screws can be used.

Note that the OLED is carefully slid into the front panel slot before the base is screwed to the front panel (with four 3mmx6mm CSK screws). The OLED is very fragile so great care is needed in placing it into position. It will happily sit in place but can be secured with a small amount glue from a hot glue gun if needed.

Installation in a Sinclair +3 is straight forward as the drive cable has sufficient room under the case. On the CPC6218 the drive cable is best not run under the case but instead over the top of the case to the rear connections.