Get a handle on your bits

Did you get handle on your bits, if not, we're here to help.

The Bit Handle Upgrade

The long awaited and previously unobtainable handle storage!

Thanks to your positive response and after checking everything over with the manufacturer, we have settled on a design that we can safely implement as an add-on.

We wanted to keep this new design as simple as possible and with as few moving parts as we could to ensure no issues crop up during manufacture and no delays are introduced to the project.

Originally we thought we would not be able to introduce something like this, as we knew at the time the cost would have pushed the whole product into an area where we were not comfortable with. But thanks to the ideas from our backers of introducing these parts as additions that you can switch out yourself, it really made us rethink the approach.

Alrighty then, let's look at the new design!

So we have the same aluminium handle shape, then with an end cap that un screws to reveal 5 slots that are 54mm (2.1”) deep that can either house 5 x 50mm standard or double ended drive bits or 10 x 25mm standard bits.

Like with the steel barrel add-on, the Bit Handle will be supplied with an allen key to change out the sub-assembly.

We've also placed a rubber washer at each end, so whatever size bit that goes into the Driver it wont rattle around with that loud metallic clanking sound of loose bolts in a washing machine!

Here we have an operational 3D printed prototype of the design. Next to our machined pre-production driver.

  And then here attached to the driver with the cap unscrewed

The bent arm will still operate by clicking into place with the sprung ball plunger on the end. The look of the whole driver when fully assembled will remain totally unchanged, so it will maintain the same look as everything we have done to this point. There is one caveat however, so we don't end up with any delays further on down the line - we have restricted this add on to just be in the black colour.

We looked hard at all of your suggestions on this and there were some really great ideas, a lot of them would require injection moulded parts that would take a lot longer for us to develop, so we have kept with the classic design we have here, using all metal. But thank you for the ideas, it could be something we do later on down the line or maybe one of you will be ale to design a version that can be 3D Printed and share it with everyone to provide even more variety!

MetMo Driver Blueprints

These blueprints are specifically designed to be a workshop friendly version of the MetMo Driver Technical Drawings, that you can make from scratch at home, much like the video from our early update which showed us making the very first MetMo Driver prototype. >

This is in the style of other hobbyist blueprints, all presented on one A1 page. We released this little add on as a digital file so you can download and print them locally yourself, our aim is to make them look good too, so that it could be displayed as a poster. These are somewhat simplified technical drawings, so not for the faint hearted. But will give you the freedom to make a working driver from any material you choose, as well as giving plenty of space for modification and customisation. We have also released a printed version to accompany the digital file at an extra cost, but I would advise that they will be folded to aid with our shipping/logistics, as dealing with poster tubes internationally is going to be a nightmare. So if you are after a display print, go for the digital file and arrange for the print locally!

Free CAD Data

Thanks for all of your feedback on this one, as mentioned in the previous update we were looking at making the handle open source to allow modification and customisation. Since there is some good demand we will make the CAD data for the handle freely available with some recommended design constraints so it can attach to the rest of the driver easily. Then you can modify, 3D print, turn and experiment how ever you like to make the driver your own.

We would love to see what you guys come up with too!

We will set up a free file sharing space so everyone can get easy access to it for free. We will release it as a Step and Parasolid file, we can also expand on this, if you have any specific requests just let me know in the comments.