newbie to 3d printing - some questions

[gazzalp]

Hi all,

I have recently thought about purchasing a 3D printer to make some building models. I currently use Autodesk Revit to produce 3d cad drawings of buildings, and would like to start printing these out. This would be my first 3D printer so I do not want to spend too much in case I don't end up getting into the printing side of things all too much. I am looking at spending at most $1500, and therefore have thought the Flashforge Creator would best suit my needs, would this be a good choice? The main things I would want are great detail, ease of use, and good size of the printed model. I also have some questions in relation to the software that the printer comes with to print. These questions are:

1. If I want to print a model larger in size than the machine will fit, I know I can split the model and print it in a number of prints - would I have to do this within Revit, or can this be done in the printers 3D software?
2a. If I have to do this within my software (Revit) when I import it to the printer software, will the printer import it to the correct scale, so if I do 5 different imports they will all be the same scale and therefore print correctly, or will each of the 5 imports import in and print to the largest size possible of that machine? Can I scale down prints to a specified scale?
2b. If I can specify the splits with the printer software, will this keep printing automatically once I take the previous print out?
3. If splitting a model, can the software add joins to each split so when they are all printed I can join them together, or would I have to add a join manually to each split within revit?

Thanks for any help, I look forward to hearing responses and any other information you might have.

[GOC]

- Note: I use Repetier-Host as my software and CuraEngine as the slicer.

Recommended 3D printer - For this question I have little experience. Like you, I wanted an inexpensive printer for personal use that still had a lot of capability. When I shopped around I found that I really liked the mechanics of the delta style printers. From there I started looking at build area and printing resolution (layer height). The Orion Delta from SeeMeCNC was the choice I landed on. It was $1300 with a 6in diameter build plate and a 0.05mm resolution. I have put quite a few prints through it (~150) and used a few different filaments. The results have been great.

Splitting Larger Models - As of my knowledge so far there is no software that auto-splits the model and adds connections/tabs between the pieces. You will have to split the model into an assembly and model the tabs for connecting them manually.

Print Scaling - The scaling will stay the same as the model (as long as your modeling in mm). Though you will have to model to account for material shrinkage. I detail a bit of that in my blog article on printing accuracy HERE.

Hope that helps a bit,
-GOC

[gazzalp]

Thanks GOC for your help. In terms of print scaling, I don't necessarily need to print to a scale (IE 1:100) but if I split the model in uneven parts, I need each part printed out to the same scale. For example if I split a 30m tall building into two parts, one which is 20m tall and the other part is 10m tall, I want to first print to come out twice the size as the second. My fear was that if I split the model, when it gets put into the printers program it will just scale to fit, therefore both parts of the building will print out at the same size, even though in reality the second part should be half the size of the first. Does that make sense?

[GOC]

- That makes sense, your simply just worried about the software auto-scaling your model. The "Repetier-Host" software that I use doesn't auto-scale. It keeps everything to size (in mm). If you do need to scale down (which I'm pretty sure you do, because there isn't very many printers that can print 20 meters tall), just make sure to apply the same scaling ratio to both pieces.

*Side Note: If your printing taller parts I'll again recommend the Orion Delta from SeeMeCNC printer. Its print height of 230mm is nice.