Developing this for the Geeetech G2s, but the twist-lock hotend concept may be useful elsewhere.
Originally shared by Jason McMullan
Working on a new hotend swapout mechanism.
The idea is to use a clamp-and-twist lock to secure the hot end, with a ducted fan to cool it.
Once I get the E3D version good enough to print with, I’m planning on making a fully parametized version available on Thingiverse.
Sorry for the rough bottom of the effector - my raft was a bit more attached than I expected.
That happens with my rafts all the time. Cura used to produce awesome rafts. How solid is the hot end sitting in there?
It seems the lower fins of the hotend, the hottest ones, aren’t getting much airflow from the fan that is situated a bit higher. The upper the heat creeps on the hotend the longer the area where the plastic is not solid and takes a toll on print quality because you can’t control to a higher degree the extrusion rate/etc…
@Griffin_Paquette - the hotend is very solid. Surprisingly so, in fact.
I’m still fine tuning the tolerances and wall sizes on the twist lock, but it shows great promise when printed with less brittle filaments like PETG or High Impact PLA.
I would not suggest printing it in “classic” PLA, as PLA tends to wear out of tolerance rapidly.
@Florian_Ford - excellent point. I’m trying to maximize for total Z printable area, but you’re right about the lower fins.
I’ll try a few ducting variations, see if I can get some cooling going on down there.
But what is it? 
It’s an effector (the thing that holds the hotend) for a Delta printer, specifically the Geeetech G2s
Wow this is a great idea and design I can’t believe nobody else has had the twist lock idea before now it seems so useful. Nice!
What keeps it from untwisting and falling out?
@Ryan_Carlyle - friction, if I’ve designed it right.
Although… If I put a ridge on the effector around where the fan holder goes on, that should completely prevent back-out of the lock…
One last thing, for anyone doing twist-locks: I’ve found that the easiest way to make them nicely tight is to make the vertical mating tolerance 0.0mm, but the horizontal mating tolerance approx 0.25mm.
Use Nylon, PETG or High Impact PLA (plastics with a little ‘give’, and not brittle) for the mating pieces.
