What would be the best way to go about selling filament?

[Anton_Chigurh]

I am always looking into ways I can make a few bucks and have fun doing it. I am considering buying a Filastruder to make my own filament, and sell it cheaper than most suppliers.

First I thought Ebay, but I don't know how steady sales would be. I also have considered finding people who wish to purchase filament at a steady rate and supplying to them.

Anyone have any good ideas on how I could market cheap filament?

Or if anyone is interested in contracting with me?

Thanks.

[BurnItDownBaby]

I would say you could open a website storefront, but there are a ton out there already, so competition will be pretty stiff. If you did this, you could probably buy ads on Google Adwords for filament, and sell it that way.

May I ask you where you are planning on getting your materials for the filament?

[Anton_Chigurh]

I would source the cheapest fine pellets I can. So far I am looking at $6/kg on Ebay and some suppliers on alibaba however it is unclear what their exact price is and how they will ship.
Even if $6/kg shipped is the lowest I can get, it still allows me to have cheaper prices than anyone Ive seen, granted the quality could or could not be on par with them.

I have been planning on opening a web store to sell 3d printers I plan on designing when I have some more money saved up, and I will of course add filament on there.
But it will take some time to Index my page and get noticed. I guess it is a good way to go.

I better get to work.

[JohnA136]

The make or break for filament is quality and tolerance. The size (diameter) must be consistent or you will never get a repeat customer. The word on bad filament suppliers spreads like wildfire on the 3D Printer boards and blogs.

[jimc]

yeah put crap in get crap out. there is a certain grade abs for 3d printing. you dont want to just throw any old thing in there. abs for printer filament is pa-747. be sure your pellets are that grade. as john said, consistency is the key. i cant imagine a $300 machine having quite the tolerance that a $100k extruding machine would. they all have laser measuring to be sure everything is right as well as filtering. you need to pre-bake the pellets as well to make sure the moisture content is non existent. with that said, if you can consistently put out a good product, you will eventually get regular customers.

[Anton_Chigurh]

Hmmm. Interesting. It seems that this little idea I had isn't as good as I thought. Well I suppose I will forget the selling idea and still pick up a Filastruder when I have some extra coin. Maybe if I have good success with the filament I will start selling it.

Thanks for the good advice!

[Anton_Chigurh]

It turns out Filastruder is partnered with a pellet company called Open Source Printing LLC. Their price is $80 for 18Lbs of MG94 pellets. About $10/kg.

[elmoret]

yeah put crap in get crap out. there is a certain grade abs for 3d printing. you dont want to just throw any old thing in there. abs for printer filament is pa-747. be sure your pellets are that grade. as john said, consistency is the key. i cant imagine a $300 machine having quite the tolerance that a $100k extruding machine would. they all have laser measuring to be sure everything is right as well as filtering. you need to pre-bake the pellets as well to make sure the moisture content is non existent. with that said, if you can consistently put out a good product, you will eventually get regular customers.

Wow - lots of incorrect information here. Here goes.

PA-747 is popular, but not the only grade. Stratasys uses Sabic MG94, which is what is included with the Filastruder and sold by OS Printing. If you contact Filastruder or OS printing, they can offer better prices on MG94 in bulk.

The Filastruder has no problem holding +/- 0.05mm, most users report +/-0.03mm. Industrial extruders need closed loop laser based control because they go much faster.

The Filastruder has melt filtering built in.

You don't need to pre-bake ABS with the Filastruder.

Check the testimonials page (http://www.filastruder.com/pages/testimonials)

[jimc]

Elmoret, im not saying anything against the filastruder. I would love to have one. Think its pretty cool to be able to make your own filament. My point as said in my first sentence and what i was trying to convey to the op is that you cant just get any old abs and throw it in there and get good filament to print with or to sell to people. I have used abs of unknown grade and it would print terrible. There may be other grades good to print with but pa-747 is the most popular and prob the easiest to find. You just dont want some unknown pellets and drop em in there. The op was asking questions concerning having a small side business and with that in mind, what john said nails it. Filament anymore is all about quality and consistency. I am self employed, name and reputation will make you or break you. The prebake is always a good practice and again boils down to pellet supplier, moisture content, wanting to sell it and consistency. Good to hear there is a filter built into the filastruder and it holds tolerance really well. One of these days i might get one.

[Anton_Chigurh]

Yeah, I see what you guys are saying. My original assumption was ABS is ABS and quality would depend on purity.. like drugs I guess :P

I didn't know there were grades. I also didn't know that recycling the plastic gives lower quality filament. Discouraging considering how much scrap builds up over time.
Getting a Filastruder to sell filament would bring low profit with a high amount of work, probably why I haven't seen anyone doing this. Not worth it to me. But I will assuredly buy one for my own printing needs. That's where it saves money.

If I didn't come here I would have bought alot of junk filament from China and gotten some angry customers and probably a messed up printer. So.. Thanks