3D printed battery covers

A little while ago I discovered that my father's Canon camera battery was supplied with a plastic cover that snaps over to protect the contacts from shorting out. And I thought to my self, my K-r battery didn't come with a cover. When I got my K-5, I had the same issue.

So I thought I would make one, or even two, partly inspired by Gwyn's mention of one in this thread.

I would be interested to see the ones Gwyn mentions as I have not seen the ones she refers to.

But here are the results of mine...

For the D-Li90 (K-5 and I think K-7, K-3 etc)




And for the D-Li109 (my K-r and I think K-x, K-30 and possibly k-50)





The cover for the Canon battery could be fitted either way and showed a window in black or white so you could 'mark' whether the battery was full or dead which I thought was quite a nice feature.

But because of the asymmetrical arrangement of the possible clip features on the Pentax batteries I had to think of another way to achieve the same thing. So there is a little slider on the front that can show full, half or empty battery.

Thoughts and comments would be welcome.

Does the slider move easily? As in if you set it to half, will that actually still be like that when you remove it from your bag later?

Interesting idea, I applaud the effort.

Thanks Rich,

I have put 3 indents in the rear so that it needs some force on it to move it to a new position. I don't know if this picture shows it well enough but it does seem to do it's job.

Can I put in my order for 3 x K-5 battery covers before everyone else rushes in?

Looks great, well done!

That's a very good idea. I recently received my first ever 3D-printed products - a set of adapters to use 135 format film in a 120 format camera. They seem solid enough, though I haven't used them yet.

3D printing has considerable potential for the manufacture of spare parts for cameras, especially the older mechanical ones.

I also wouldn't mind buying a few of these (seriously), I have three batteries for my K3. If you make some for sale, please let me know.

I have had two for years, and have said about them on this forum several times. I bought them from Shapeways.com. If you search their site for Pentax you will find them.

Ok thanks Gwyn, Found them now.

It is interesting that the Shapeways design uses the cover one way or the other depending on whether you want to mark it as depleted or fresh. Do you use this feature?

Thinking about it now it can be done with the K-5 battery but not so easily with the smaller battery for the K-r.

I have looked at shapeways before but never thought to look for the Pentax bits.

I would be quite happy to make a batch for people on here but I'm not sure whether that would contravene the terms and conditions of the site. Perhaps John Riley would give me some guidance?

Yes I always put the battery in the holder indicating full or empty. I bought them for the K-5 batteries since they didn't have the nice covers the K20D batteries had, and I was sick of carrying them in separate plastic bags all the time. Schiphol security can be pretty hot on Li-Ion batteries being properly covered, though the last couple of times no-on checked.
Printed in Eindhoven so they didn't take too long to get here, and no problems with the taxman. They also sent me a couple of e-mails to keep me up to date on the printing process. I just chose the cheapest option and they are great.

I don't see why you can't put some in the classified adverts section, they are for use as a Pentax accessory after all. I have 5 batteries for my K-5IIs but would certainly consider buying 3 (bit pointless buying another 2 for the batteries already in the body and grip).

I had to buy some for my Canon batteries too but they were freely available.

Be careful you don't impinge on the copyright of those on Shapeways. The guy who designed them probably doesn't sell a lot of them, but he did go to the trouble a long time ago of designing them and making them available to the rest of us.

The prohibition on Pentax User is for commercial traders - as per the section heading. Ads have to be Pentax and photo related and private sales.

I think Gwyn is right that you would need to be mindful of copyright/patent violations as people do get pretty stroppy about their designs being used without agreement.

There is no copyright on products. You can pay for Design registration, which covers the aesthetic or a Patent which covers function (but only if it is particularly novel and has never been done before or someone else has a patent on it). It is not comparable to photographs in respect to intellectual property.

Just because it performs the same function, doesn't make it the same.

And my design is not copied. It is my design, it is different and in my mind better. I hadn't even seen the one on Shapeways until Gwyn pointed me in that direction earlier on today.

Perhaps Mr Pentax shouldn't have designed a different camera since Mr Kodak had gone to the trouble a long time ago of designing them and making them available to the rest of us?

You asked the question anymat, and people gave you what they hoped were helpful answers. Nobody was suggesting anything beyond that.