# 3D Printing > 3D Printer Parts, Filament & Materials >  Wax Filament

## Wes@MachWax

We have been working on a wax that will function in the filament type printers. Yesterday was the first time we were able to prove the concept! We are still in the very early stages, but I still wanted to share this exciting development. Let me know what you think!

----------


## awerby

If you get it working, it would probably burn out better than PLA, so metal casts will likely be cleaner. I don't see it being fine enough for jewelry or dentistry, but for simple functional parts it could work well. 

Andrew Werby
Juxtamorph.com

----------


## Wes@MachWax

Correct on both points.  It will definitely burnout cleaner than PLA, and the detail would be sub par for most jewelers/dental labs.  There is some minor interest for the smaller operations who may not have the money to buy the more expensive printers who would be willing to print, and modify by hand to suit the finer detail necessary with jewelry.

----------


## LambdaFF

Let us know how it goes. Sounds interesting.

----------


## curious aardvark

Hmm, I'm guessing the flexibility with sufficient hardness to go through an extruder is the hard part. 

Interesting though :-)

----------


## Wes@MachWax

> Hmm, I'm guessing the flexibility with sufficient hardness to go through an extruder is the hard part. 
> 
> Interesting though :-)


It is a delicate balance.  It wants to wrap around the filament feed motor much like the ninjaflex type filaments.  I am going to modify the drive slightly so I can insert some ptfe tubing to help guide it down to the heat block.  



I used Simplify 3D for the first time printing this smaller NASA wrench last Friday.  All the settings, besides temperature were default.  I came in Saturday to try some larger scale items.  It didn't go as well.  I had issues that mostly were ironed out by slowing down the feed rate while extruding.    Then, halfway through a decent looking print, the filament jammed.  So, I just called it a day, and decided to continue it on Monday.

----------


## Wolfie

Hmm...3d printed Nips.  Well there is a curious thing right there eh?  Wondering, can you make this stuff food grade?

----------


## Wes@MachWax

It could be food grade if we pursued the certification, but for it's intended purpose of casting, I don't think we would.

----------


## Wes@MachWax

I did a 5mm step calibration test.


I also ran a few surface calibration prints.  This was the better of them at 50 micron.  The wrench supporting it was a 200 micron print.


Not exactly where we want to be, but getting very close.

----------


## Wolfie

> It could be food grade if we pursued the certification, but for it's intended purpose of casting, I don't think we would.


For your intended purpose of casting, no.  But why not broaden its market by getting certified at some point and then branching out into the culinary market.  AFAIK, the only thing available in that market is the ChefJet which has yet to ship.  Since you are working with low temperature source material, chocolate, butter, even stuff like fondant could be in your grasp.  

And I was wondering if anyone had considered stuff like caramelized sugar and isomalt.  Isomalt melts at 150c ish.  Right in the range of many extruders.  Can you say 3D printed candy?

I was also wondering if anyone had considered a cooling bed instead of a heating bed, perhaps using peltier chips?  Might enhance deposition of cool melting products like wax, chocolate etc by more rapidly solidifying it before it can sag/ooze.  Not thinking actually frosting a beer mug cold but more along the lines of sinking heat away from the deposited material and taking it down to room temp or slightly below before it can distort after being deposited.  Just a thought.  Dunno if it would help or hurt.

----------


## curious aardvark

looking pretty good :-)

----------


## Wes@MachWax

> For your intended purpose of casting, no.  But why not broaden its market by getting certified at some point and then branching out into the culinary market.  AFAIK, the only thing available in that market is the ChefJet which has yet to ship.  Since you are working with low temperature source material, chocolate, butter, even stuff like fondant could be in your grasp.


I have inquired with the boss about this for our other wax blends, the answer I was given was that direct food contact certification is costly, and also adds a liability issue.  






> looking pretty good :-)


Thank you!

----------


## Wes@MachWax

Last week, we sent out a few spools for testing. One of the gentlemen agreed to cast that Yoda print for me. I wanted to smooth it out a bit, so I made a new print @ 50micron. I also tried some techniques to smooth the surface finish. I kept getting a hole in the same spot on the neck. I think the .stl I got from thingiverse is the cause of this. Because of this, I also tested to see how well it takes additive wax. This wasn't a parameter we had in mind when designing the filament, but I was pleased with how easy it was to bind new wax to the old wax. We don't have proper tools for this, so I improvised by using a lamp dimmer, and the soldering iron that I like the least for that task. I also tried a candle, and some dental picks, but I preferred the soldering iron over this method.  

The order was kept for all pictures. They were just rotated 90 degrees between takes.

These are before any manipulation. Some with the supports still attached. 


And post op. The far left had the neck hole filled, and polished a little with a shop towel, and mineral spirits. The middle one was brutally assaulted with a heat gun. I tried to be gentle, but it melted a bit more than I would have liked. A pen type heat gun would have probably done better than the full size I was using. The right side one was filled in the neck area, as well as the ear holes. I also built the ears up to make up for the pieces that came off with the support pieces. I also polished this one a little with mineral spirits. The right one is the only one that was printed at 50 micron. The other two were at 200 micron.

----------


## LambdaFF

Your product is interesting. Let me know when commercialised.

----------


## wenganxiang

What is the temperature? Need glue on hot bed?

----------


## Wes@MachWax

The extrusion temp so far seems to range between 135°C, and 145°C depending on the printer.  I have been using hair spay on 75°C glass for adhesion.  I have been told that gluing a sheet of regular printer paper to the bed worked well too.

----------


## curious aardvark

you shouldn't need glue. Wax doesn't warp and sticks to pretty much everything.
Blue tape should be fine. 

Those yodas look really good. 

Any idea on the actual cost of the final product  ? 
I can see this stuff really taking off.

----------


## Wes@MachWax

Thanks. I am hoping to see the one in brass in the next couple days.  Super excited for that!

We don't have a final price yet.

There will be spools, and a pellet form available.

----------


## Wolfie

For repairs, have you considered making your wax product into the proper diameter for a low temp glue gun?  Low temp guns run at 120 °C and high temp ones run up to 190 °C which might be too much for your wax.

You can get low temp guns at almost any hobby store as well as Joanns and Michaels for only three bucks.  If you made your wax product into the same length/ diameter as the glue sticks and at a melting temp in the range of the low temp guns, those cheap tools could be used to extrude your product for repairs.  It could also be leveraged for adding spews for casting.  Thoughts?  Or even other creative venues outside 3D printing.

----------


## Wes@MachWax

> For repairs, have you considered making your wax product into the proper diameter for a low temp glue gun?  Low temp guns run at 120 °C and high temp ones run up to 190 °C which might be too much for your wax.
> 
> You can get low temp guns at almost any hobby store as well as Joanns and Michaels for only three bucks.  If you made your wax product into the same length/ diameter as the glue sticks and at a melting temp in the range of the low temp guns, those cheap tools could be used to extrude your product for repairs.  It could also be leveraged for adding spews for casting.  Thoughts?  Or even other creative venues outside 3D printing.


Not a bad idea.  We may give that a try.

----------


## awerby

Have you tried using this wax filament as a support material for PLA, using a dual extruder machine? So far, most people don't seem to be having much luck getting PVA to work with it, but it's not too hard to dissolve wax in hot water. If it worked, there would be a large market for it. 

Andrew Werby
www.computersculpture.com

----------


## Wolfie

Not meaning to hijack the thread but whats this you say about pva?  I just got my dual extruder and bought a half kg spool of pva for support.  I tried to look up info about pva here but you can't search for pva here,  search won't let you.

----------


## awerby

PVA has potential as a support material, but the reports I've heard (I haven't tried it myself) indicate that it won't stick to PLA, so it doesn't work too well as a support for that material. Apparently people have had more success using it with ABS. If you try either of these things, please report back and tell us what worked for you. But yes, it would be best to start a new discussion thread for that. 

Andrew Werby
www.computersculpture.com

----------


## Wes@MachWax

> Have you tried using this wax filament as a support material for PLA, using a dual extruder machine? So far, most people don't seem to be having much luck getting PVA to work with it, but it's not too hard to dissolve wax in hot water. If it worked, there would be a large market for it. 
> 
> Andrew Werby
> www.computersculpture.com


Using the wax for a support material has been an afterthought, but it has not been tested for that yet.  I am in the middle of converting the D4S we are using for testing into a dual E3DV6 bowden.  I got my final parts, and should be able to assemble tomorrow.  I think I may test for this once I get it back together.  I will post the results when I do.

----------


## Wes@MachWax

> Your product is interesting. Let me know when commercialised.


We recently added 10 meter coils, and 1 lb. spools to our website. http://www.machinablewax.com/product.php?product=52

----------


## LambdaFF

> We recently added 10 meter coils, and 1 lb. spools to our website. http://www.machinablewax.com/product.php?product=52


Thank you for getting back to me. I hope you find a reseller in Europe : for a hobbyist it is difficult to admit to pay more in shipping than in product. I'd love to try it though. My brother keeps asking me to do a lost wax cast project together for the summer holidays.

----------


## Wes@MachWax

> Thank you for getting back to me. I hope you find a reseller in Europe : for a hobbyist it is difficult to admit to pay more in shipping than in product. I'd love to try it though. My brother keeps asking me to do a lost wax cast project together for the summer holidays.


If you like, I could edit the price for you to make it cost more than shipping!  :Smile:  lol, j/k!  Understandable.  

For the sample packs, the bulk of the cost is the shipping by design.  The remaining few dollars may cover the material/packaging cost, but definitely not the time, and energy it takes to extrude the wax into filament.  We just want people to be able to test it for themselves so they can see first hand how much better this material is for casting than plastic.    

Maybe we will have a European distributor at a later date, but for now everything ships from the US.

----------


## curious aardvark

wrong way round pva sticks to pla but not to abs.

And yep, those prices are way out of my wallet zone.

----------


## Wes@MachWax

> wrong way round pva sticks to pla but not to abs.
> 
> And yep, those prices are way out of my wallet zone.


I attempted to test for using the wax as support, but I still need to the nozzle heights.  They are off enough to cause issue.  I have been more focused on other things, so I will revisit that later.

Please keep in mind that the price includes shipping charges.  Also, every ingredient, including the plastic spools are made in America.

----------


## Wolfie

The price seems extraordinarily high.  $50 for 450g?  And I thought $54.38 for 750g of BrassFill was a bit steep.

So much for this as a potential filler or support material.

And its a shame its only available in 1.75mm.  Plans for 3mm?

----------


## Wes@MachWax

Since PVA is slightly cheaper, and water soluble, I feel it would be a better alternative than wax filament for support structures. That's assuming wax would even work for that purpose. But, it was never really intended for that purpose either. 

We have been working on 3mm, but as of now we are not happy with our results. We are waiting for some parts to arrive that we hope will improve things. The material is much more difficult to extrude than ABS, so we are still experimenting, and learning. 

We will be adding a 1kg option in the 1.75. This will be a lower cost/gram than the 1 lb. spools.

----------


## Wes@MachWax

The person casting the YodaBuddha sent this teaser pic today.  Not completely done, but I think it looks great so far.


This pic was just after hosing off the investment (before any polishing).

----------


## bford903

Very nice....it is. Want one I do. :-)

----------


## 3ddplas

We together with Chinese Academy of Sciences supply a 
Wax filament ,only 3.0mm available
some photo show :


below one photo is not wax filament print made, it is metal. something that if you are a engineer doing iron mould will understand. make iron model with wax model inside then melt flow out, then make the iron one.








we are , www.stronghero.cn
if you want to order just contact: sales01@stronghero.cn
$30/kg ,on roll,paypal available

----------


## 3ddplas

How every one think? it worth for 3D print do a good job for engineer?

----------


## Wes@MachWax

Those look nice.  But, would you mind making your own thread?

And from your pictures, your filament looks very much like plastic.  What are your printing temperatures?

----------


## 3ddplas

sorry sir, I don't look through all this thread, sorry for my rude come in.
it is a real wax filament, not plastic, process temperature for extruder is only 100deg. 
I think call it PE-wax filament will be more accurate, it must can be melt to flow and can be extrude to be filament ,much like plastic, a low melt point plastic

----------


## Wes@MachWax

> sorry sir, I don't look through all this thread, sorry for my rude come in.
> it is a real wax filament, not plastic, process temperature for extruder is only 100deg. 
> I think call it PE-wax filament will be more accurate, it must can be melt to flow and can be extrude to be filament ,much like plastic, a low melt point plastic


My mistake then.  It was the string pattern at the bottom of the solo Buddha that made me think that.  

Great job on the prints.  What printer are you using?  What resolution were the Buddhas printed at?  The cast part came out well too.

----------


## m0delista

Great
Awesome

----------

