One of the 3d-printed parts on my new 3d printer cracked. The printer still works, but who knows for how long, so I’m trying to print a replacement. May finish printing by tomorrow at lunch, if all goes well. (I’m new to this, so that’s relatively unlikely.)

#reprap

Michael K Johnson January 15, 2016 23:05

$22-25/kg for filament seemed expensive until I realized how light most parts are. This part will take about 14 hours to print less than 100g. So this printer uses I suppose roughly $4-5 of filament per day if I could run it continually.

Eugene Crosser January 16, 2016 03:29

Natural selection between 3d printers: those who can print new parts for themselves faster than these parts break survive.

Michael K Johnson January 16, 2016 05:59

After 7.5 hours, my part is 17.3mm tall (out of 61.5), and I optimistically misremembered the estimated build time; it’s actually 16 hours 41 minutes and won’t finish until around 3PM, if it finishes successfully. I chose the correct side of the part to orient to the bed, since it warped a bit at the ends, but I think in a way that won’t affect the utility of the part. It should in any case make it easier to remove the part from the bed when it finishes.

The problem with its non-typical bed (200mm x 270mm, larger than some other Prusa i3-class printers) is that I can’t seem to source borosilicate or tempered glass in that size, and BuildTak isn’t available in that size either. So I’m printing on blue painter’s tape for now.

I can’t print with ABS yet because I need to make an enclosure first—in open air, the bed won’t heat above 97⁰—so I’m printing this part in PETG and hoping it is strong enough. If I had an enclosure probably the PETG wouldn’t have warped. I had hoped it would fit in a common US medium-sze moving box (3 cubic feet, 18”x16”x18”) because we have a few left, but the bed wouldn’t fit.

I’m pondering designing and building my own printer from scratch, using this printer to print parts for the next one. One approach to an enclosure would be to buy aluminum extrusion intended eventually to become the frame for a new printer but initially use it to make an enclosure for this existing printer.

Michael K Johnson January 18, 2016 06:14

Sadly, the part printed a bit warped, and I don’t know whether it is usable. Since the cracked part hasn’t failed yet and the replacement exhibits substantial Z-ribbing as well as warping, I think I’m going to wait to mess with it at least until I have dealt with the Z-ribbing problem.

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