Integral Mesh Vent Cover v2

This is an updated version of my original vent cover. This one has been converted to openSCAD for ease of modification/customization. The default values are also optimized for a vent that works well when printed in a semi-flex material.

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This is a mesh vent cover that can be used for small invertebrate enclosures. It is intended to be printed with a fine mesh fabric embedded into the ring after the first layer.

Instructions

After slicing, insert a pause after the first layer. You can do this directly in prusa slicer, or by manually editing the gcode.

Start the print as per normal. Once the first layer has printed, the printer should pause, and you can cut out a piece of the fine mesh fabric, and drape it over the first layer. You can hold the fabric down and stretch it out via magnets, binder clips, tape.. whatever works.

After that, resume the print, and then once it has finished printing, use scissors to cut off the extra fabric outside the ring.

For best results, this should be printed in a semi-flex material. I used sainsmart tpu with a shore hardness of 95A. I use a .2mm layer height. The snaps do have an unsupported overhang, but it's small enough that it seems to print fine even without supports.

For the mesh material, I just cut up some cheap $5-$6 sheer curtains that I bought from my local big retail store.

Customization

If you need to customize the model for a different diameter hole, different wall thickness, etc. you can either download openSCAD and use that directly, or you can upload the .scad file to https://models.makewithtech.com/fileupload (requires free account), and modify the parameters and generate a model.

The 2 main parameters that you may want to change are

• vent_diameter: which should be set to the diameter of the hole that the vent cover is going into
• wall_thickness: the thickness of the material that the vent cover is being placed into

But feel free to play around with the other parameters to change the number and size of snaps, etc.