Voron0_BatteryPower

Make your voron even more reliable and more portable

Disclaimer - read first

This mod allows you to run your voron up to 1-2h with batteries. It's also a great UPS for it.

The original PSU is now external, connected using XT60 plug. Now you can also power your printer with USB-C charger (12V and 20V).

The mod also includes space for an external RJ45 to usb adapter, form which you can connect your voron to pc via usb-c without connection to your home network.

Gallery

photos

Parts required

Base battery power

• 6x 21700 li ion battery
• 2x 21700 x3 holder
• 6s BMS
  • Watch out fot BMS's that don't have voltage balancing!
• 150W Step up converter
• 400W step up cc/cv converter
• LM2596 step down converter
• MOSFET PWM module
• USB 20V PD trigger (prefferably one that senses the highest possible voltage from charger and supports PD as well as QC)
• USB C header (or USB A to USB C otg adapter)
• pair of XT60 connectors (one to screw to the case)
• cables that can hold at least 6A
• High current low voltage drop schottky diodes (at most 5)

Power meter display (optional but recommended)

• current sensor (5A or higher)
• arduino Nano
• 0.96 inch OLED i2c display (design is made for the smaller design)
• 1:5 voltage divider
• SMD tact switch

Hardware

Preload 0 nuts for 1515 extrusions

• I made this design as easy to assemble as possible. No need to preload any nuts or modify existing voron hardware.

Print everything with ASA / ABS

• it needs to be temperature resistant
• due to its size, I extended it in compensation of ABS shrinkage

Insert inserts

• every hole that looks like it needs an insert, needs an insert

bolt everything together

• bolt the whole thing together. You may use any length of bolts that fits, I made the design with ease to assemble in mind.
• Make sure you have a handful of M3x6 BHCS screws
• sometimes parts need to be assembled in order to fit. Assemble plastics first, then electronics.

Wiring

• There's a slot for 2 WAGO 221-415 connectors for batteries

• connect everything like on the schematic

  • 

• I created 2 custom boards:

  • one for creating soft-start for cc/cv boost converter, which also works as current limit switch (so on 12V in it's drawing 1.5A, on 20V it's drawing 3.25A)

  • one for communicating RPI with the power electronics (RPI knows when I flip the power switch, electronics turns off the printer when RPI shuts down) - so the switch shuts down the printer correctly, by executing shutdown now command

    These boards are mandatory for the system to work, but I created them by hand and I don't feel confident enough to share them with you. I'd love to hear if anyone knowing electronics (prefferably mostly designing of boost / buck converters) to collaborate and create one common board for the electronics instead of all the Parts Required section electronics. In that way it'll increase in power efficiency for sure, and be smaller and better to wire.

Software

Power display

• upload PowerDisplay code to an additional arduino nano
• calibrate its values so it measures voltage and current reliably

Power switch

• Copy PowerOff into your voron home folder
• create a new system service:
  • sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/PowerOff.service

  • [UNIT]
    Description=Remote power off
    
    [Service]
    Type=simple
    WorkingDirectory=/home/pi/PowerOff
    ExecStart=/usr/bin/python3 -u main.py
    Restart=always
    
    [Install]
    WantedBy=multi-user.target
    

  • sudo systemctl daemon-reload
  • sudo systemctl enable PowerOff.service
  • sudo systemctl start PowerOff.service