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"Crystal" lithium recycling (read the description)

Published on Fri, Sep 13th 2024 Science & Technology Rectangular HD

Reclaiming the lithium cell from a crystal brand device.

Always be aware that lithium cells have very high energy storage. Take extra care to avoid damaging or shorting out these useful cylindrical pouch cells. They should be stored in a suitable rack, or individually bagged to avoid shorting them out.

These can usually be recharged using a suitable lithium cell charge module set for around 500mA.

You do this entirely at your own risk. The technically inclined will find many uses for these rugged little lithium cells.


Openscad is a very interesting piece of open source software that lets you create 3D objects with a raw scripting language, allowing complex results from very tight code.
The openscad software can be downloaded here:-
https://openscad.org/

The script for the battery tray is included at the bottom of this description. You literally just copy and paste it into the text box of openscad to adjust it as desired, and create your own custom STL file for your 3D printing system.

The six variables you can adjust are:-
Width - The number of battery cups wide.
Height - The number of battery cups high.
Depth - The depth of the battery cups.
Diameter - The internal diameter of the cups - slightly wider than your battery.
Thickness - The thickness of the cup walls.
Base - The thickness of the base.

When adjusting the values, be careful not to remove the "=" and ";" as they are part of the script.
To see your changes quickly, press the box with two arrows.
To build the final object press the box with an hourglass in it.
To save your custom STL file press STL. (After building with the hourglass button.)

The STL file can then be used with your preferred slicer (I use Cura) to make the gcode file for your choice of 3D printer.

I recommend making a single test cup (1X1) to test sizes before making a bigger tray of them.
You can also just choose a width and height of 1 to make a single large cup for other purposes.

Here's the openscad script. Copy and paste the text below into openscad to use it.


//Custom battery tray - bigclivedotcom
$fn=50;
//You can adjust these variables.
width=4; //number of horizontal cups
height=4; //number of vertical cups
depth=10; //internal depth of cups
diameter=15; //diameter of cylinder AA=15 AAA=11
thickness=1; //thickness of wall
base=1; //thickness of cup bases
//don't adjust stuff below here
columns=width-1;
rows=height-1;
wall=thickness*2;
dia=diameter+thickness;
cup=depth+base;
difference(){
union(){
//main body
for (x=[0:columns]){
for (y=[0:rows]){
translate([x*dia,y*dia,0])
cylinder(h=cup,d=diameter+wall);
}
}
}
//hollow cores
for (x=[0:columns]){
for (y=[0:rows]){
translate([x*dia,y*dia,base])
cylinder(h=cup,d=diameter);
}
}
}