The curse of ABS (Warping)

[DrLuigi]

Hey guys,

As everyone knows PLA and ABS are great plastics with both there cons and negatives,

Now i'm trying ABS for a few days now when i am pretty known with PLA,

With small parts ABS works GREAT, But once i am like at 100mm for example its starts to warp,

It used to only warp at the bottom due i used Hairspray as i did for my PLA parts, So i went and made some ABS glue,
This was a great improvement, It didnt warp anymore from the bottom,

But now it started to rip parts of some layers apart,
Like in the middle of a print, it has a rip in it, Not the whole print layer but a side of it.


Anyone a idea how to fight Warping?

My room temprature is aprox 20c,
Its next to a heater, so i could tune that a little up, But the wood were the makerfarm is made from could always warp due sudden heat i guess.

My print head is at 225c and bed 105c.


Thanks guys ^^

Best regards,
DrLuigi.

[Black_sheep]

Hi DrLuigi,

I haven't used ABS much since I prefer PLA but still I might suggest you to use closed heated chamber.
If is is possible add some acrylic glass sheets around your working area thus the heat coming from heated bed will be trapped
inside and temperature will be significantly higher than the surrounding.

Another pretty simple thing you can try is to set skirt to the same height as your printed part is. That might also help to prevent
cooling of the perimeters.

Hope it helps

- Filip

[DrLuigi]

Well already thought about the heated chamber, But i don't realy have a large table or enough space for it realy,
Will consider it in Aluminium/acrylic but not sure yet.

About the skirt, never realy heard about that one, and isnt a option in Cura,
Btw i am kinda a Cura fan :P it should need more options/parameters but after that its just great to use it ^^

[RP Iron Man]

Well already thought about the heated chamber, But i don't realy have a large table or enough space for it realy,
Will consider it in Aluminium/acrylic but not sure yet.

About the skirt, never realy heard about that one, and isnt a option in Cura,
Btw i am kinda a Cura fan :P it should need more options/parameters but after that its just great to use it ^^

As a quick fix, you can wrap a plastic garbage bag over your printer to trap the heat from the bed inside and prevent any drafts. This is what I do and I get no warp when printing on glass coated in elmer's glue stick. The increased ambient temperature inside the chamber really helps eliminate delamination.

Eric

[Black_sheep]

Hehe I never saw anyone put a garbage bag over 3D printer but if it helps why not

Well slic3r has option to print skirt more than one layer thick. It slows down printing a bit and uses more filament though. It will prevent direct exposure to any excess airflow from the fan and also trap some heat.

I agree Cura is awesome but I got sort of used to slic3r + pronterface combination and it's pretty hard to kick the habit of using those

- Filip

[MeoWorks]

Yeah unfortunately keeping the printer sealed is one of the best ways to help with warping and edge curling. I run slic3r and pronterface and the brim feature helps a ton with PLA curling at the edges, even with a heated bed and hair spray. It should help you immensely with ABS warping if you put a large enough brim.

[DrLuigi]

Imo Cura lacks parameters/settings, after that its awsome!

Also about the Skirt ye that seems like a great idea, But i just aint sure if it will work,
I might make a aluminium case, Its just i dont have the place for it atm, will think about it i guess :P

Thanks for the help guys ^^

Kinda went back to PLA at the moment for a larger piece, but ye ABS is great for smaller stuff, PLA is very brittle with small diameters/sizes, i guess ABS might do better with that.


/edit
Didnt see your comment yet MeoWorks,
Well i use ABS glue (acetone + abs) and it kinda reacts as a Brim,
I could perhaps use a combination of ABS glue and a Brim, But the problem is then, that the plastic layers will actualy rip,

https://www.dropbox.com/s/cb8kyte9nr...2014.11.08.jpg
That was my last attempt on a larger piece :P 120x50x60 if i remember the size well.

[Black_sheep]

Please accept my deepest condolences for such a nice print, it really looked well until it cracked :/

Another although quite wasteful solution would be to put one or two of those IR heating lamps on the printer so they heat the printed part.
But you will use lots of electricity :P

I don't think that brim of any size will help with that part since the cracks appear all over the object due to inner tension.

- Filip

[MeoWorks]

Agreed a brim won't help here. I think the only way to remedy this is to keep the piece uniformity heated since it really does seem like it's cracking due to internal stress from uneven cooling. The heat lamps sound like a good idea, I use standard 40w bulbs for keeping wax warm while I sculpt, and shouldn't cost you more than $3/yr

[Tom]

Try lowering the printhead for the first layer to get better adhesion, also not sure if the fan is pointing on the print or ducted towards the head but have you tried without the fan? Some swear without a fan is the way to go for ABS. One last thing is printing on a raft helps many people.