HPE DL380p/DL360p Gen8+ SFF 2.5" SSD/HDD Caddy

A 2.5" drive for SFF DL380p/DL360p servers from HPE, should fit in everything that takes the Gen8 caddies (so G9 and +)
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updated January 21, 2022

Description

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This is a hybrid between 2 prints I had found on Thingiverse that had ups and downs. The first one fit perfectly, but the front looked horrendous. The second didn't fit well, but looked great. I mixed them and used that to make a cleaner mesh model that was hence much easier to print reliably.

 

The drives are for small form factor (SFF) DL380p/DL360p Gen8 HP Enterprise servers. The caddies should fit anything that also takes the Gen8 caddies, which includes at least Gen9 as far as I know. 

Assembly doesn't require any hardware, just flex the branches of the caddy enough to put the nubs inside the 2.5" drive's side mount holes and it'll be secure. When connected, the SAS/SATA connection to the drive will hold the whole thing in place, but will still be easy to remove intentionally.

 

PRINT INSTRUCTIONS

  • 2 walls, 4 ceiling/floors
  • 0% infill, but if you really want infill, use Concentric to make sure the branches can still flex when installing the drive!
  • Can print in PLA/PLA+, but since HDDs can technically reach temperatures above PLA's glass transition (temperature where the material softens and becomes malleable), I would recommend PETG at the very least if you're planning storage-intensive usages.
  • Use Supports (touching buildplate only). Nubs at the back need them, but the supports are so small, it would be wise to also:
  • Use rafts. You heard me right. The long branches will make even PLA on a coated and heated bed warp relatively frequently and the minuscule supports will absolutely, 100% of the time, fail. You can try your luck, but getting good raft settings will marginally increase print time and filament needed but DRASTICALLY increase the reliability of printing (I use 3-layers rafts about 5mm from model)

 

DESIGN METHOD AND OBJECTIVES

The objectives I had when making this model were:

  1. Make the result easily and reliable printable
  2. Make the result fit as well as one of the original models
  3. Make the result look as nice as one of the original models
  4. Make operation satisfying

To do this, I used blender since it can easily work with STL files and doesn't really care about bad meshes. I stitched the original models together and used the result as a 1:1 copy of the mesh I then had to create. 30 minutes later, I had something with roughly the exact same dimensions down to the smallest coordinate units Blender could do. A few slices and inspections later, I adjusted the model to ensure it would always print correctly and without being prone to print failures (which are common with bad meshes).

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