Portable Earphone Holder

Have you noticed that whenever you want to take your earphones on the go, they always manage to become a horrible, tangled mess? Most of the time the earphones are shoved into a random pocket and get mixed with anything around them. Then whenever you want to use the earphones, the mess is too much to deal with.

After trying to solve this problem with no success, we designed a portable earphone holder that minimizes tangling and keeps them accessible. The earphone holder is designed to hold one set of earphones and be small enough to be secured to the back of any phone. With this instructable, we will explain how to design and 3d print your own portable earphone holder.

Materials:

Solid modeling software

3d printer

Adhesive (Command strips)

Step 1: Create the Base

Using a solid modeling software, such as solidworks or inventor, decide the length and width of your earphone holder. You should pick a length and width that are smaller that the phone you will be attaching the holder to and larger than 2 in by 1.75 in. Create a rectangle in a sketch with your chosen dimensions. Extrude the rectangle 0.1 in.

Draw another rectangle on top of your extrude with the same width, but a length of 1 in. Extrude your second rectangle 0.25 in.

Step 2: Create Earbud Holder

Begin by drawing a centerline that bisects the width of your second extrusion. Draw a circle centered in one half of the second extrusion with a radius of 0.30 in. Next, draw a rectangle conecting the circle to the base of your second extrusion with a width of 0.30 in. Use the trim tool to eliminate lines that are unneccessary. Use the mirror feature to repeat the slot onto the other side of the extusion (refer to the second photo). Complete the sketch and make a blind extruded cut 0.25 in deep.

Step 3: Create Wire Manager

For this step you will be using the loft and mirror features.

Create a sketch on top of the first extrusion directly below to earbud holder. Draw a centerline spliting the sketch vertically. Then, draw a circle with a diameter of 0.45 in and is centered in one half of the sketch. Complete your this sketch.

Create a plane that is parallel to your completed sketch plane and is offset 0.25 in. On this plane, draw another circle directly above the first circle with a diameter of 0.6 in.

Use the loft feature to connect your two sketches.

Offset a second circle on added plane with a diameter of 0.68 in. Extrude this circle up 0.1 in to complete the wire manager.

Lastly use the mirror feature to replicate the wire manager.

Step 4: Optional: Fillet

To make the earphone manager more user friendly, you can choose to create a fillet on as many edges as you wish. We used a 0.025 in fillet on the hole part.

Step 5: Use It!

All thats left to do is print your headphone holder. Depending on the size, this process should take less than an hour and half.

Once you have printed the earphone holder and have cleaned it up, you can put it to use. We used a comand strip to attach the holder to a phone. You can choose any adhesive to attach your holder to virtually any surface you want.

Now you will never have to worry about what is happening to your earphones ever again. Let us know how you decide to customize the earphone holder!