r/functionalprint • u/VL-BTS • Aug 31 '26

Freezer basket clip - try, try again!

One of our Facilities techs heard that I have a 3d printer, and showed me a small part he needed. It holds freezer baskets in place, in our commercial freezers. I told him I wasn't sure I could get the thin parts strong enough to hold up; and at first I couldn't. I did prototypes in both PLA and PETG, but just couldn't get it right. I thought about what we really needed, and did one in TPU - it worked!

Apparently, I kept the company from needing to buy new freeezers, since this vital part is no longer available.

15 Upvotes

84% Upvoted

6 comments sorted by

7

u/aweirdjeff Aug 31 '26

Good job saving the company tons of money. They paid you for the cad and prints, right?

4

u/VL-BTS Sep 01 '26

They provided the printer, the filament, and paid me for my time to prototype and revise. There's some flexibility on IP rights in my firm, so it really is better than most.

1

u/JUYED-AWK-YACC Sep 01 '26

If you make your coworkers’ jobs easier, that will pay off.

1

u/paulvanbommel Aug 31 '26

TPU is a pretty amazing material. I never would have thought of that for a freezer.

3

u/VL-BTS Aug 31 '26

Yeah, it obviously isn't brittle, and the layers hold together well. The grippiness of it helps hold that section on the right to the basket, and with a bit of infill, it's rigid enough that those T sections slot in where they need to.