New test prints and tips

Here are a few more test prints of household items. The stemwinder was actually pretty tricky to get the right printing parameters because the steep, thin-section overhang of the helix (about 60 deg.) is one of the trickier things to print. It required a single perimeter with no infill, and the perimeter line width had to be set to a specific value. Also, because each layer prints so quickly it actually worked better to print multiple copies so that each copy had time to cool before the next layer went down. (You could simply wait between layers, but why not print more!) It is a good example of the advantage of having the designer work out all of the printing parameters for you.

Another handy tip: when printing on blue tape, cleaning the surface with isopropyl alcohol gives much better adhesion - even if it is a fresh layer of tape. The stemwinder was printed with no raft or brim, and is shown exactly as it came off the printer.

Attachment 1674 Attachment 1675 Attachment 1676

The stem winder is pretty impressive, I'm guessing is was printed at a pretty low speed to keep it from shaking under the extruder?

Also, were the drawer pulls printed face-down, or were they done as a bridging test?

The stemwinder was printed at 30mm/s - slow, but not painfully so.

The first drawer pulls were printed face down with a 0 deg. infill angle to get an interesting grain effect on the front surface.

The second drawer pulls were actually printed as 3 pieces (1 bar and 2 stand-offs). People love printing things as a single piece, but some things are a lot easier to print as multiple parts.

These are very impressive looking. What is the fast you can print with the MOD-t. If these were done at 30mm/s, what is the fasted you can set it to print at?

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Originally Posted by Yancy

These are very impressive looking. What is the fast you can print with the MOD-t. If these were done at 30mm/s, what is the fasted you can set it to print at?

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We've tested printing at up to 100mm/sec and slewing at 200mm/sec, but for the most part, you'll want to limit the print speed to more like 80mm/s (this is the value listed in the specs). How fast you can print depends a lot on the particular part geometry and also on the print quality you are looking for. The stemwinder is a very flexible part, and hence, needed a lower print speed to maintain good quality.

What is the speed for the best resolution and quality that you recommend?

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Originally Posted by Luv2Fight

What is the speed for the best resolution and quality that you recommend?

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Generally, printing slower tends to improve the quality, although printing slower than about 20mm/sec can cause other problems. I generally use 30mm/sec for parts with fine detail and 60 - 80mm/sec for general purpose printing.