Palmtop Filament Straightener

While working on a project recently, I found that I couldn't easily find metal pins of the exact length I needed, and I didn't have the tools to cut them to size. I did, however, have plenty of PLA filament that was the right diameter! All I needed was a tool to straighten it.

Enter the Palmtop Filament Straightener! A 100% 3D printed and assembled solution. 

When installing the wheels, keep the arrow side up: there is a lip to keep them secure on the spring pins. For best results, after pulling the filament through the straightener, cut the filament by the exit and by where you were gripping it. 

This tool was able to straighten my filament enough to solve my problem, but you may require something more robust for your use case. There are other solutions online that use bearings in-place of 3D printed wheels, but I wanted to make something accessible to those without the extra hardware lying around. If you have any ideas of how to improve the design, the STEP files are available for you to tinker with!

Happy printing!

Background music credit: Vanish by Bormsen and Waxamilion