Avoid PLA Moisture Damage

Clinton Freeman, a senior software engineer in Australia and a 3D printing aficionado, has studied ways to make sure 3D printing filament stays in tip-top condition. Freeman says scientists who tested the strength of prints which resulted from filament exposed to various levels of moisture found that some PLA prints were up to 33% weaker in tensile strength than their properly stored counterparts. You can read the whole story here: http://3dprint.com/49058/filament-moisture-damage/


Below is a photo of objects 3D printed with nylon filament affected by various levels of moisture:
http://3dprint.com/wp-content/upload...ture-nylon.jpg

Submerging for 30 days in water might represent an extreme exposure level here. I'd like to see real world exposure levels to see how long you can leave it out or if you should use it within a finite amount of time.

For Nylon and T-Glase, we keep them in ziplocks with desiccant when not in use. ABS, PLA, we keep sealed until we start a roll, but then we don't worry about special storage between uses.

I once received PLA that was "moisturized" from a Chinese supplier. Sending back from Europe to China was way to expensive, so I did put the PLA in an oven at 60°C for about 20 minutes. After that, it printed perfectly :-)
I keep my opened reels inside sealed plastic containers, with moisture catching bags inside ...
Depending on the outside weather, leaving a reel of PLA "unprotected" (sitting on my desk), for about 2 weeks, is enough to see the print-quality degrading ! (I use RRW PLA, bought from 123inkt.nl)

3D printer filament moisture should be avoided because it could give you a very uneven low-quality print. For PLA filament, keep it in a sealed bag when you are not using it. PLA is an organic material so it will be broken down eventually when exposed to UV light.

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Originally Posted by sn00zerman

I once received PLA that was "moisturized" from a Chinese supplier. Sending back from Europe to China was way to expensive, so I did put the PLA in an oven at 60°C for about 20 minutes. After that, it printed perfectly :-)
I keep my opened reels inside sealed plastic containers, with moisture catching bags inside ...
Depending on the outside weather, leaving a reel of PLA "unprotected" (sitting on my desk), for about 2 weeks, is enough to see the print-quality degrading ! (I use RRW PLA, bought from 123inkt.nl)

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Define "degrading"... I have yet to see any real data, particularly scientific data, showing this kind of degradation. Submerging in a water bath isn't what I call an acceptable data point.

If you can afford vacuum sealing between usage, that usually would be optimal. External "room" temps between 65 - 75 deg F is also good.