MakerBot Industries

MakerBot’s R&D all-stars have been printing up a PLA storm on our MakerBot Replicators and getting impressive results! Last night we did an overnight time-lapse of this skull and it turned out beautifully!

Success!

Thingiverse user arkatipe recently posted their designs for a “device to repair plastic hangers.”  The device itself is little more than a hollow plastic cylinder.  However, the way arkatipe used this simple PLA cylinder is particularly interesting.

This is intentionally a little bit smaller than the hanger diameter. I’d recommend that you clean it up, drop it in a cup of water, then stick it in the microwave for a minute or so. After it’s softened up, press it on the hanger and hold it in shape until it hardens.

PLA softens at a much lower temperature than ABS and tends to hold the heat a little longer, staying malleable.  Having a little plastic part that can be printed very close to what you need, softened, molded, and then left to cool and harden could be incredibly useful.  It really opens up a world of possibilities.  If there were a particular shape that one could foresee being very useful, you could print up several of them and keep them on hand.  When you’re read to use them, moisten, nuke, mold, harden.

Thanks arkatipe!

Device to repair a plastic hanger by arkatipe

Because hangers cost $1.00, and the plastic to fix them is less than $0.01. Design is intended for PLA. Additionally, this can be used to justify the expense of your 3D printer to your significant other, provided you have several hundred broken hangers.

This thing brought to you by

ABS, PLA, PVA, Oh My! In this episode of MakerBot TV we explore the ins and outs of our three printable plastics. Find out what they’re made of and how to print with them. Also hear about the tiny green men that are invading the Bot Cave! Don’t miss this stellar episode of MakerBot TV! Thank you Thingiverse users tbuser for the f-bomb design and gpvillamil for the flying saucer and tiny green men. 

The Stuff of Invention

Today we are launching the third round of our ABS and PLA plastics as they switch to being supplied on spools in Kilogram weights. The last of our classic colors and styles are now available in both 3mm and 1.75mm filament formats, and some previously unavailable formats are now up in the store! I am happy to report that our crowd-favorite UV reactive “Nuclear” green is now in our classic 3mm format, so Plastruder MK4, MK5, and MK6 3mm users rejoice! Also notable is PLA 4043D filament is now available in 3mm and 1.75mm formats- so hop to it if you want some of this great print stock.

Here’s the full selection of new plastic offerings!

Nuclear Green ABS 1kg Spool 3mm Filament

Blue ABS 1kg Spool 1.75mm Filament

Blue ABS 1kg Spool 3mm Filament

MakerBot PLA 4043D – 1kg spool -1.75mm

MakerBot PLA 4043D – 1kg spool -3mm

Yellow ABS 1kg Spool 3mm Filament

Fluorescent Red ABS 1kg Spool 3mm Filament

Red ABS 1kg Spool 3mm Filament

Check out our full variety of plastics in the MakerBot Store here!

BetaSolution

If you’ve got a dual extruder in your 3D printer, you’re not far off from printing with support material.  A few months ago our friends at iFeelBeta published the details on their newly developed formula for a solution that would dissolve PLA and leave ABS intact.  As these chemicals are no joke, it’s no wonder that it’s taken several months for them to get the legal clearances to be able to ship this solution throughout Europe.  (It’s basically the equivalent of a heavy duty drain cleaner)  However, they now have BetaSolution up for sale on their website!

Once again, thanks to these guys for being amazing open source innovators and blazing this trail for everyone.  Now that they’ve launched their shop, be sure and buy the solution from them!

Also, be sure and read their safety data sheet and manual before using it!

One of the more frequent questions people would ask us at CES was “what’s the difference between a Thing-O-Matic and a Cupcake?” We’d tell them about the improved Z stage travel, microstepping, mechanical endstops, etc. but sometimes it’s easier to show than tell:

Thing-O-Matic on top, Cupcake below.

Completely Printed Chess Set

Not only have I finished printing a full chess set, but the black pieces are in ABS while the clear/white-opaque pieces are in PLA.¹  When I was rocking my MK4 Plastruder² the 5 pound roll of PLA I had purchased was a sore subject for me.  Given the amount of heartache I went through trying to print with clear PLA, it seemed a natural foil to a black ABS side.

Basking in the warmth that follows a nice big Thanksgiving dinner I played chess against my younger brother, whom I haven’t bested in about ten years³ , on a board made by our father, using pieces designed by cbiffle, and printed on my MakerBot.  After a hard fought game⁴ with only nine pieces left on the board, I was up a knight, offered a draw, and we shook on a good game.⁵⁶⁷

1. Printing a full chess set has been on my to-do list for nearly a year, even before I had an operational 3D printer. [↩]
2. If you’ve got a MK4 Plastruder, I highly highly recommend upgrading to the MK5.  I could gush for days about my MK5.  You really deserve an extruder like this. [↩]
3. In chess.  Well, or anything else for that matter… [↩]
4. With much kibitzing from our dad. [↩]
5. Call me a coward, but I’d rather offer the draw while I was up, rather than fumble the endgame and get brow beaten by a pawn I forgot to take.    [↩]
6. See Allan?  I’m not ALL bravado! [↩]
7. Now, where’s did I place that printed thimble I keep all my humility in??? [↩]

PLA Pawn temperature tests

Above are twelve nearly-consecutive print-tests of Cliff Biffle’s pawn.  Once I pulled the black ABS filament out, I inserted the clear PLA, and ran it until it looked reasonably clear.  However, you can see how the plastruder was still clearing out the remaining black ABS for the first three prints.  Here are the relevant Skeinforge settings for the above pawn prints:

• The entire top row was printed way too hot – at 230 degrees Celsius.  Each print looks essentially identical, except for the variation in their coloring.  The bases are very well defined – but the “stem” of  each is slightly warped.  This is likely the result of the layers not having sufficient time too cool before the next layer is deposited.  Molten PLA holds its heat longer and stays gooier longer than ABS, so it is more prone to having layers pushed around slightly when a layer is put on top of it.  The little globe at the top of the pawn is droopy and doesn’t look very spherical.  Overall, these pieces could be acceptable as playing pieces, but I’ve seen some amazing prints in PLA and I want better for my 3D printer.
• For the middle row I tried lowering the temperature and experimented with Skeinforge’s “Cool” feature.  Notes on these prints, left to right, follow.
  • The far left pawn printed at 190 degrees Celsius and with the “Cool” feature set to 20 seconds.  The “Cool” setting made the extruder trace over the perimeter of the layer until it had spent a total of 20 seconds at that layer.  If you look closely at the picture, you’ll notice there appears to be a slight gouge out of the spherical part of the pawn.  I believe the gouge was created as the extruder essentially tore bits of plastic off the layer.  That said, this print has two other interesting qualities.  First, this pawn is significantly whiter than all other prints.  I believe this was caused by the “Cool” feature being set so high.  Secondly, aside from the gouge this pawn turned out better than any other print.
  • The next pawn over was printed at 190 degrees Celsius with “Cool” set to 10 seconds.  This print is slightly less opaque than the prior and has much larger gouges throughout the model.  This was one of the most unsuccessful prints.
  • The next pawn over to the right was printed at 190 degrees Celsius with “Cool” set to 5 seconds.  I canceled this print part way through because it was evident the stem of the print was badly mangled.  However, it was slightly more clear than the prior prints.
  • The last pawn to the right in the middle row was printed at 195 degrees Celsius with “Cool” set to 5 seconds.  This pawn’s stem was also mangled and the entire model deformed.
• The bottom row contains three prints with the “Cool” feature set to 1 second.  I’m not sure this helped at all.
  • The far left pawn was printed at 195 degrees Celsius.  I didn’t see much of an appreciable difference between this model and the ones printed at 220 degrees Celsius.
  • The middle pawn was printed at 187 degrees Celsius.  I didn’t see an appreciable difference from the prior print.
  • The far right pawn was printed at 210 degrees Celsius.  I didn’t see any appreciable difference from the prior two prints or any of the prints at 230 degrees.

I’m not sure how to proceed with testing.  The one print that looked the best, except for gouges, was the one printed at 190 degrees Celsius with “Cool” set to 20 degrees.  One potential issue with Cool set so high is that this print took more than 27 minutes versus about 7 minutes when Cool was set to 1 second.  I suspect any of these print settings might be acceptable for larger objects, allowing the rest of the layer to cool sufficiently to support the next layer.  However, I’m more concerned with dialing in the quality for smaller objects – if I can print those I should be able to print nearly anything.

Do you print successfully with PLA on your Cupcake?  What settings do you think are the most important?  What suggestions could you offer to help others?

Also, one additional photo of the same pawns as above, but with the flash on my phone turned off.  This might help seeing some of the details.

PLA pawn tests - no flash

PLA jam!!!

My MK4 Plastruder is made of entirely stock parts, except for a printed insulator retainer, and worked great with ABS.  My first attempts with PLA about six months ago were alternately wondrous and horrific.  While trying to dial in the proper temperatures for my Plastruder for use with PLA I cranked it too high, the PLA tried to expand inside the insulator retainer, and liquid PLA was forced around the threads of the extruder barrel.  As I said, it was a horrific mess.

How horrific you ask?  Just take a look at this picture of my MK4 plastruder after I tried to extrude PLA:

BLOCKED

Yeah.  It was that bad.  Well, this weekend I gave PLA another shot with my MK5 Plastruder.  At one point I realized I was trying to print while still using the ABS profiles – and heating the PLA up to 230 degrees Celsius.  This was also happening while I left the area to put my daughter to bed.  The result was the extruder was operating way way too hot for way way too long.  These are not good things.

The result is the extruder kept the heat at 230 degrees Celsius, the PLA formed a blockage, and extruder motor kept forcing new PLA down into the extruder barrel.  However, due to the way in which the MK5 is designed, there was no place for the PLA to create a mess.

When I realized what was going on I shut down the extruder and pulled out the filament, pictured at the top of this post.  What you’ll notice is the area of the filament to the right is still clear/translucent while the filament to the left, which was down inside the extruder barrel, is a milky color.  Interestingly, the clear area of filament is still just as flexible as a normal piece of filament while the milky white section is extremely rigid.

This situation, running the extruder too hot for too long, would have been catastrophic for my MK4 plastruder and was basically shrugged off by my MK5.  All I had to do was loosen the thumbscrew for the Delrin plug, yank out the filament and blockage, cut that section out, shove newly cut piece of filament back in, and tighten the thumbscrew again.  This was the difference between a 30 second fix with my MK5 as compared to a problem that actually ruined my MK4 insulating barrier and kept me from printing until I got a replacement.

I’m still dialing in my temperature settings for PLA and will be posting some of my results later today.