Toolless Drive Cage - 4x HDD (SATA Backplane)

Description

This is a drive cage designed to go with my custom 4x SATA backplane. It is vibration isolated using rubber standoffs.

The cage holds the 4 drives using the bottom four screw holes in the HDD. Using din912 m3x6 screws, the head itself can slide in the 3D printed cam. We therefore need no printed slides etc. without having to screw the drives to the cage.

Print Instructions

• Print in the orientation the .stl files are in
• You can print without support
• Print from ABS or similar (do not use PLA in case the HDDs get warm)

Links

• More Information about the Project/PCB on my Blog (Design considerations, full wave FEM, limitations)
• This Project on GitHub
• The rubber standoffs I used (m3x8, see image): amazon.com, amazon.de (affiliate links)

Regardless of how you mount the cage, you will need at least 8mm screw length to screw the cage to the PCB itself.

Assembly Tips

• To get a perfect sliding fit between the cams and the screw heads with zero play, print with a brim. Do not remove the brim entirely. Using an old drive, push the drive/screws into the cam. This will push the brim out the way such that it takes up any slop.
• Use m3 heat set inserts in the front and back plates to secure the top in place.