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hello in this video i will show you components of my 3d printer nozzle cam i'll give you my recommendations on which endoscope to use how to extract the camera module improve its focus and how to position it onto your printhead this video has been a long time in the making as it took months of continuous par searching testing and many redesigns in total i purchased around 25 endoscopes and over 20 sets of lenses with my own money for this project i've sacrificed 11 camera modules and ended up with tons of useless parts i'm sharing everything i've learned so you won't have to all the parts used in this video are linked in my video description below please support my efforts by using my affiliate links first let's talk about the idea behind this project using an endoscope as a nozzle cam is not a new concept many printer builders have used them strapped to their printhead to get a better view of their nozzle and there are already many excellent videos out there on this subject however the video these endoscopes produce are usually pretty poor they have very long focal distance and their bulky size make them very awkward to mount onto a printhead i wanted a close-up nozzle cam since i first started 3d printing more than seven years ago however it wasn't until after i finished modifying my war on that i decided it's finally time to experiment and make it happen the biggest challenge is camera size and weight 4 on 2 is a very fast printer and has a very small footprint mine was built to have print volume of 310 by 310 in x and y and 325 nz yet it sits comfortably within an ikea lag table done by prushan mark 3's 210 millimeter white travel barely fits into there simply isn't any extra space on all three sides of the printhead therefore i needed to find a way to make my camera footage up to standard while making it as small and as lightweight as possible to not reduce my printer's performance i've considered tons of different options when it comes to camera module everything from raspberry pi cameras webcams to earwax removal camera yes they do exist however they each have their own issues that are too long for me to list in this video so i decided to simply strip down an endoscope and improve its video performance i've tested around 10 different affordable usb endoscopes out of them all this ventronic is the one i would recommend there are other endoscopes that are smaller or have higher resolution but after considering all the pros and cons this endoscope gets my recommendation because it's fairly easy to cut open has extra vertical resolution at 1280x960 pretty good color balance and field of view and most importantly what i found inside seems to be very consistent i also did a in-depth comparison between these five endoscopes i will add a link to that in my video description before we start cutting i want to mention that these camera modules are very fragile and were never meant to be extracted and used this way so be warned that you might have to purchase more than one just in case you killed any the first thing we need to do before we cut open our camera is to find its orientation plug it into your computer via a usb hub as it should offer an additional layer of protection to your computer just in case if we shorted out our camera while cutting or soldering on my windows 10 computer the endoscope was instantly recognized without any drivers now let's open windows camera app and you should see a live view of your endoscope rotate it until the display image is upside down we will then mark the underside with a sharpie this is where we want to cut the reason for this is because its circuit board sits horizontally inside the metal body by cutting from the underside we are less likely to cut into its circuit board as well as its ribbon cable for the camera sensor the aluminum body can be easily cut open with a dremel and a thin abrasive cutting disc but since i have a metal mill it's what i'll be using i positioned the bottom side of the endoscope up inside the middling vise zeroed my digital real and took 0.5 millimeter depth cuts until the aluminum body is breached then you can use a flathead screwdriver to twist and pry open but do be very careful when doing this because if you poke too deep you could damage the circuit board as i did here what i would recommend instead is to use a pair of snap ring pliers i was able to pry it open and extract the camera module with very little effort remember to blow off any cutting chips with compressed air as well then the next thing you want to do is to release the ribbon cable doing this now will minimize your chance of breaking it as the usb cable it comes with is very stiff and fittedly next we will peel off the led ring in front of the camera sensor we will add our own floodlight so this is no longer needed we'll cut it off with a pair of flush cutters then remove the phone ring on the camera sensor use your fingernails to clean off any remaining glue residue some camera sensors are loosely attached only by its ribbon cable this phentronics endoscope i recommend has its sensor glued to the pcb but that's not going to stop us simply trim off the glue with flush cutters while taking extra precaution not to do any damage we can now move on to its breakout board the solder is stiff usb cable and solder on a more flexible one the printed marking on the pcb can be inconsistent depending on which endoscope you use so i'll list them out on screen now but always double check pin out with a multimeter in my case this setup won't be permanent as i am still working on my fully modular printhead so for now i will solder on a female micro usb connector instead after wiring is done this would be a good time to check your camera module once again to make sure it still works now let's move on to focusing your camera when i first started making this video i was convinced using an external lens to reduce focal distance was the way to go the first camera module i tried to refocus was not able to gain enough adjustment range to focus properly then the second one broke almost instantly as i tried to turn the focus ring later i was more successful with breaking the lens string loose but the end result is never pretty you just don't know how much glue was applied at the factory then i experimented with placing a lens in front of the camera module to make refocusing less destructive and the resulting video quality was excellent afterwards i compared both videos side by side and to my surprise both end up looking nearly identical each method has their own pros and cons using an external lens shows the camera module from radiating heat while refocusing the original lens requires one less part so in this video i will show you how to do both the choice is yours my first prototype i was able to get a very nice focus using a tiny magnifying lens cut from a plastic ruler however i needed something more repeatable so i looked through my parts bin and found these cheap wide angle lens kit for phone cameras the macro lens in this kit was almost perfect for my application but was too tall to mount the camera sensor low enough so i reduced it to a rectangular shape around five millimeters tall on my bench grinder you can also do this with a hem file or dremel this lens worked out perfectly i set up a simple test and found its ideal focal distance was around 18 millimeter which is perfect as it will fit onto most print heads without being too close to the heater block i was ready to reveal my project at this point but it turned out this lens was purchased more than 5 years ago and it appears the factory at some point switched over to a bigger micro lens these are too big and too thick for our application i've ordered 20 more kits from different sellers on amazon ebay and aliexpress and even contacted sellers to make sure they match their product page pictures but all the ones i received were the wrong size and no sellers had any idea what i was talking about part availability was a major issue unfortunately i also destroyed the only extra lens i had at the same time further testing were stalled and this was the reason it has taken me this long to release this video thankfully a fellow warrant discord member informed me of these blip stunts so i ordered a few to test first impressions were good and definitely easier to cut to size i then designed and printed this test platform to find its focal distance with an exacto knife i cut the blips lens to size and mounted to my test platform the resulting focus was around 17 millimeter nearly identical to my previous plastic lens this turned out to be a great alternative the second option is to refocus the existing lens on the camera module to do this i held the camera module securely with pliers then i used an exacto knife to scrape off as much glue as possible of reds of the focus ring and finally using a combination of flush cutters and pliers i broke the focus ring loose once it was able to rotate i place a subject about 18 to 20 millimeters away and manually adjust until it is in focus in order to get a good camera view we need to mount our camera assembly as low as possible from my experience the ideal angle is to aim around 4.75 millimeter in front of the nozzle tip tilting 17.5 degrees downward with the camera module mounted around 18.75 millimeters away if you are using a lens it should be placed one millimeter in front of the camera module you want to aim slightly in front of the nozzle tip to be able to see better when printing and it also allows the whole nozzle to be more in focus your nozzle view will look cooler if you place your camera slightly off angle instead of directly in front of your hotend i will also include my thinking first link to a mock-up camera step file if you want to create your own nozzle cam if you watch my in-depth endoscope comparison video you will see that most of these camera modules video don't look particularly great most will even reduce its frame rate depending on how much light there is so the solution to make your footage look better is to flood your nozzle area with lots of lights you can experiment with placement of led lights just make sure they are not directly visible or shiny directly into the camera lens i have positioned one led fairly low mirrored from the camera and two more leds higher up one on each side of the hotend to flood the surrounding area with lights this provided excellent lighting and the nozzle cam looks great the leds i used were salvaged from a spool of 5v led tape they are 50 50 form factor and can be purchased individually but for me it was simply cheaper and easier to desolder these leds and use this resistors i chose five volt leds because my voron is running three separate 5 volt 12 volt and 24 volt power supplies 12 and 24 volt are switched on and off by relays using octoprint enclosure plug-in only 5 volt is separate from my printer's power switch so i can separately turn on my nozzle light even when my printer is powered off to switch print heads these 5050 leds are tiny and a bit hard to solder the side with cut corner is negative and the other side is positive 5050 leds are technically three separate led diodes packaged into one so i soldered on 30 gauge wires bridging all three pads and added a current limiting resistor on negative side per led i then added a dab of super glue and heat shrinked it securely first i plug in my camera module into my usb hub to make sure it is still working then a quick test fit to prevent any fitment issues i wrapped the breakout board in kapton tape and aluminum tape to give it additional shielding then a little dab of super glue to secure the lens in place i then spray liberal amount of super glue accelerator on both sides from my experience if you soak super glue with the accelerator it won't develop white residue versus letting it air dry after it cures i then install the camera module making sure it is in the correct orientation i then added just a little bit of super glue on the back side of the camera as well as tape portion of the circuit board to secure everything in place i also applied liberal amount of super glue on the wires to act as an anchor to protect against any accidental pulls i then glued leds into position and wire them to the appropriate power pins once all the glue cures you can now install your hotend to ensure your nozzle is in focus either run your usb plug directly to your computer or set it up as a secondary webcam on your octoprint using chris riley or teaching text excellent guides if you build a nozzle cam please post your printer video link in comments below as i love to see your end results once again this video took forever to make but i am glad my nozzle cam is getting the attention of youtubers and printer enthusiasts please help support my efforts by using affiliate links in my video description if you have other printer modification ideas please send me a message or post in comments below i'm always up for a new challenge thanks for watching