# 3D Printing > 3D Printer Parts, Filament & Materials >  What quantity do yo want to buy your 3D printer filament in?

## iDig3Dprinting

We would be interested to know what quantities people prefer to buy 3D printer filament in.

For example do you like to buy in 1kg spools or would you prefer to buy it by the meter or perhaps somewhere in between.

We would be very interested to hear your views.

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## sn00zerman

I'm missing an extra option: per 5 KG !

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## iDig3Dprinting

> I'm missing an extra option: per 5 KG !


Apologies. I don't think I can add an extra option now.

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## Wolfie

And 750g spool.

And 1500g spool.

And 2200g spool.

Frik, I wish there was some standard here.  1kg.  Be done with it.  ALL spools should be the same size/weight.  Haven't we had enough of the size to price garbage in other products?  I swear the manufacturers are selling .75kg spools just so their prices look like other's 1kg spools and hope the consumer doesn't realize they are only getting 3/4 of what they get somewhere else for similar price.

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## iDig3Dprinting

> And 750g spool.
> 
> And 1500g spool.
> 
> And 2200g spool.
> 
> Frik, I wish there was some standard here.  1kg.  Be done with it.  ALL spools should be the same size/weight.  Haven't we had enough of the size to price garbage in other products?  I swear the manufacturers are selling .75kg spools just so their prices look like other's 1kg spools and hope the consumer doesn't realize they are only getting 3/4 of what they get somewhere else for similar price.


The point of the question was really to get an idea of what sort of quantities people like to buy their filament in. You are right, standardization is important, especially with regards to the spool and attaching it to the printer. Some spools have a too small a core which is not good for the filament and feeding.

Basically do you prefer to buy your filament in bulk, have a lot of the same type or do your prefer to buy smaller amounts but then perhaps have lots of different types of filament?

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## Mjolinor

1kg or more to use but maybe I would buy smaller to try but for sure not less than .250kg, it's not worth lacing the head for less than that.

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## Wolfie

Well, with my recent fiasco with trying to order from GlobalFSD, I really don't have an option but to order spools.  Yea, I would like to get a US company to drop me 5m or 10m chunks of a new filament to see what its about and whether my printer will be happy iwth it.  But, unfortunately, such a company or opportunity doesn't exist.

Would I like 10m of BrassFill?  Sure.  Not an option so ColorFabb is sending me a 750g spool.  Would I like 10m of bioFila Silk to play with?  Sure, but I can't even buy it from any US retailer that I can find.

So, for filaments I know, I buy spools.  Ones that are new or I don't know about, I try to find samples to buy.

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## curious aardvark

I ticked 1kg - but it depends entirely on the filament. 

I'd like some conductive pla - but I don't need a kg. 

And some filaments would just be too expensive if they were sold in 1kg rolls.

'Standard' (if there is still such a thing)  abs and pla 1kg. Exotic filaments - 10 metre samples and larger amounts depending on their relative cost.

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## GOC

> ...Basically do you prefer to buy your filament in bulk, have a lot of the same type or do your prefer to buy smaller amounts but then perhaps have lots of different types of filament?


-    All of the above, it depends on the job. For PLA I would love to get this stuff in 5-10Kg spools at a good bulk cost because I go through so much. On the other hand, lets say I need some FlexPLA; in this case I would only need a 1Kg-2Kg spools because I don't use it very frequently (_sucks that its only available in 0.5Kg_).





> ... Yea, I would like to get a US company to drop me 5m or 10m chunks of a new filament to see what its about and whether my printer will be happy iwth it.  But, unfortunately, such a company or opportunity doesn't exist...


-    These are also important packages to offer. As wolfie states, its very nice to be able to give the filament a try before committing to buying a whole spools worth. I always wanted to try some of the exotic filaments, but because samples are hardly available and I don't feel like burning $50-$60 to only try one type I choose to only gamble once in awhile on some of the wild stuff.

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## iDig3Dprinting

Really we just want to know what are the best quantities to sell filament in. We stock in 1kg spools but think some people may prefer to buy smaller quantities. Rather than make up our own mind we thought we would ask, carry out, dare I say it, some market research.

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## curious aardvark

Actually, as long as the price corresponded to the weight, 500gm spools would be cool as I could buy more colours for the same money. And that's still a fair amount of plastic. 

Just as long as the manufacturers use 30mm holes down the middle. In the past I've made my own spool and respooled for taulman nylon. Cut out the centre of a spool of filaflex witha rotary tool, because recreus think 10mm is going to fit everybody's spool holders - oh really !  
Or like the poxy laywood filament, actually put the damn stuff on a spool, as it comes in a big tangled reel without any spool. 
That stuff is brittle as hell and spooling it by hand was a frigging nightmare. 

So on reflection. I'd buy smaller quantities just so long as they were on a decent spool that doesn't cause me more grief than getting the filament to work :-) 

So 1kg, 500gm and 250gm spools and 5 & 10 metre samples. 10 metre if you can only have one length.

I don't care if the spools are made of cardboard or recycled yak hair. Cheap is good, as long as it works and has a decent sized hole down the middle :-) 

We were talking to a filament manufacturer and supplier at the tct show. He was using really narrow cardboard spools and we asked if he had a machine specificially to load them. 
Yes he said, it's called a lithuanian woman. Small hands and cheaper than a machine.

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## Wolfie

> Really we just want to know what are the best quantities to sell filament in. We stock in 1kg spools but think some people may prefer to buy smaller quantities. Rather than make up our own mind we thought we would ask, carry out, dare I say it, some market research.


And that is, the proper thing to do.  And the answer is...ALL of it.

Supply, 1kg spools of everything (not odd weights like 750g, be consistent PLEASE).  Also offer short run sizes in 1m, 5m or 10m of everything.  Larger sizes are good too for those bulkers.  Also be willing to send a couple inches of something out for color matching (am finding this rare) and be willing to do it without purchase, maybe a nominal shipping fee.

Analyze the various situations.

Why 1kg spools?
1. The customer doesn't want to fool with small pieces
2. The customer knows the filament
3. The customer knows they need large amounts of it
4. The customer has storage for the larger spools.

Why short pieces?
1. The customer doesn't know the color/properties of a filament and wants enough to print tests with
2. The customer doesn't need a lot of a specific one because they are doing a one-off project.
3. The customer doesn't want to store big spools, they want to buy as they need it (think small apartment dwellers).

Why short (almost) free samples?
1. Because yall (as in filament makers/retailers) almost never provide accurate color information.
2. Customer may need to get their client's approval of a color before purchasing a large quantity.
3. Customer may need to provide choices (ala a color swatch book) to their client for proposals or to choose from.
4. Maybe they are an artist/decorator type and want to look at other materials it will be used with (paint, stains, wood, tile, etc)

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## GOC

> Really we just want to know what are the best quantities to sell filament in. We stock in 1kg spools but think some people may prefer to buy smaller quantities. Rather than make up our own mind we thought we would ask, carry out, dare I say it, some market research.


-    Your taking the right steps to becoming a great retailer; being that your reaching to the community for what they want in a desirable product. The answer to that question on the other hand for me is varied by the simple fact I desire both. I want to sample some product before committing to larger purchases. More product choices can only expand your customer base.

_*Side Note_: As a US customer you should try to get your shipping calculator expanded, it's a deterrent in having to send an email to get shipping costs.




> And that is, the proper thing to do. And the answer is...ALL of it.
> ...
> Analyze the various situations.
> 
> Why 1kg spools?
> 1. The customer doesn't want to fool with small pieces
> 2. The customer knows the filament
> 3. The customer knows they need large amounts of it
> 4. The customer has storage for the larger spools.
> ...


-    Very well put, couldn't of said it better.

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## curious aardvark

Oh yes one other thing (lol) 
You're pla prices are currently among the highest in the uk. Drop them :-) 
At the moment if I'm looking for good filament not just cheap. 3dfilaprint offer me reprappertech ltd for £18 a kg. 
The cheapest I've found on your site is £22.80 for the same amount. 

That's a significant difference. And unless there was some really obscure filament type I was looking for I'd go with the reprapper tech pla as that is very nice stuff indeed. 

So there are more things to consider than just amount of filament - you need to be competitive price wise as well. At the moment you're one of the most expensive for basic filament. 
That said I might by a 250gm roll of something I didn't need a lot of. 
There are a lot of parameters you need to take into account :-)

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## iDig3Dprinting

> Oh yes one other thing (lol) 
> You're pla prices are currently among the highest in the uk. Drop them :-) 
> At the moment if I'm looking for good filament not just cheap. 3dfilaprint offer me reprappertech ltd for £18 a kg. 
> The cheapest I've found on your site is £22.80 for the same amount. 
> 
> That's a significant difference. And unless there was some really obscure filament type I was looking for I'd go with the reprapper tech pla as that is very nice stuff indeed. 
> 
> So there are more things to consider than just amount of filament - you need to be competitive price wise as well. At the moment you're one of the most expensive for basic filament. 
> That said I might by a 250gm roll of something I didn't need a lot of. 
> There are a lot of parameters you need to take into account :-)


Very much appreciate the input. We will update the prices to make them more competitive (£18.35). We will do that over the weekend. Our aim is to gear our offerings around what people want so asking questions and canvassing opinions on forums like this are a great tool for us. The idea is that everyone gets what they want out of the relationship between buyer and seller.

Thanks,

IDig3Dprinting

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## sn00zerman

I think you can divide 3D printer users largely into 2 groups:
- The ones that print "something" from time to time, nothing to big, like gadgets, arduino cases etc ... I think those people prefer 10m and 0.5kg etc ...
- The ones that print 24h/24h - 7d/7d (I have 3 printers up and running, 24 hours a day). I do really big projects. (trains and buildings for garden modelrailroads for example, objects with a few hundred pieces, sometimes between 10 & 20 kg per project) As said before, for me, a spool can never be big enough :-)
  I even set my alarmclock in the middle of the night, to empty printbeds and start new printjobs :-)

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## Mjolinor

> I think you can divide 3D printer users largely into 2 groups:
> - The ones that print "something" from time to time, nothing to big, like gadgets, arduino cases etc ... I think those people prefer 10m and 0.5kg etc ...
> - The ones that print 24h/24h - 7d/7d (I have 3 printers up and running, 24 hours a day). I do really big projects. (trains and buildings for garden modelrailroads for example, objects with a few hundred pieces, sometimes between 10 & 20 kg per project) As said before, for me, a spool can never be big enough :-)
>   I even set my alarmclock in the middle of the night, to empty printbeds and start new printjobs :-)


At which point one wonders if a 3DAA (3D addicted anonymous) group should be formed.

Hello, my name's John and I have a printing problem.

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## iDig3Dprinting

So far our sample size of 11 does quite clearly favour larger sizes (1kg). But, as you all say, it does depend on what you are buying. People do appear to like the idea of being able to buy samples. The other thing mentioned was that you thought our filament prices were too high. so in response to these points:

 1. We are going to sell filament samples from the website. this should be available this week, in limited colours initially.
2. We have dropped our prices in-line with expectations so that you can get both ABS and Ingeo PLA fro £18.35 Kg

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## curious aardvark

cool - I'll try a roll and see how it compares to the reprapper stuff :-) 
I need some blue pla. 
Keep up the good work !

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## iDig3Dprinting

> cool - I'll try a roll and see how it compares to the reprapper stuff :-) 
> I need some blue pla. 
> Keep up the good work !


Thanks that would be much appreciated. It would be great, if you are going to buy some filament, if you create an account first so that you can write a review of the filament. Hopefully you will find it better than the PLA from reprapper  :Smile:

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## curious aardvark

as good would be fine. The reprapper stuff is very nice. 
I'll do a side by side comparison :-)

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## LambdaFF

> Well, with my recent fiasco with trying to order from GlobalFSD, I really don't have an option but to order spools. Yea, I would like to get a US company to drop me 5m or 10m chunks of a new filament to see what its about and whether my printer will be happy iwth it. But, unfortunately, such a company or opportunity doesn't exist.
> 
> Would I like 10m of BrassFill? Sure. Not an option so ColorFabb is sending me a 750g spool. Would I like 10m of bioFila Silk to play with? Sure, but I can't even buy it from any US retailer that I can find.
> 
> So, for filaments I know, I buy spools. Ones that are new or I don't know about, I try to find samples to buy.



Hi Wolfie, did you look at their sample pack ? http://colorfabb.com/specials-sample-pack

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## curious aardvark

I got a colorfabb exotics sample pack for christmas. 

Here's a thing. Not one of the bags conatining the samples lengths was labelled. 
I had to look up the pack online and then work out which bag held which filament.

Actually I just found the box and the filament isn't even in bags. Just loose coils of unlabelled filament. 
This stuff isn't cheap - at the very least it should be in a bag with a sachet of silicon. 

AT the very least I was expecting a label on the bags and a printed sheet with the printing specs on it in the box. 
Nope they don't do that.

***

Right, ordered a roll of blue pla from you, worked out £24.85 with postage. 
So that's still £6 a roll more than the reprapper. But I'll try it anyway :-)  
I know I know, 3d filaprint offer free second class post delivery.  
I'm just trying to compare like with like here. 

Cheap as chips pla from ebay is £13 a roll delivered. And yeah it does warp a bit and gets brittle if left for a while and is wrapped way too tight on the reel. But for a quick print that doesn't need much presision - it definitely has it's place (poop bag dispensers for example :-) .

Right I've promised my mate a nasa coffe coaster in blue pla - so that'll be the first test for this stuff :-) 

Review when i get it.

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## Wolfie

> Hi Wolfie, did you look at their sample pack ? http://colorfabb.com/specials-sample-pack


Ordered it.  :Wink: 

Along with this one:
http://colorfabb.com/color-sample-pack




> I got a colorfabb exotics sample pack for christmas. 
> 
> *Here's a thing. Not one of the bags conatining the samples lengths was labelled. 
> I had to look up the pack online and then work out which bag held which filament.* 
> 
> AT the very least I was expecting a label on the bags and a printed sheet with the printing specs on it in the box. 
> Nope they don't do that.


Sigh.  Seems to be a trend.  I ordered the exotics pack from MakerGeeks.  It too came in random bags.  Absolutely no labeling.  They even put out a youtube video on how to identify what was in it!  Seriously.  How hard is it to print a sheet of labels and apply them on the bags?  Sad thing is that two of the filaments were not even on the list or the video of what was to be included in the pack.  Not sorry they did the subs but it made identifying them nearly impossible.  Took several emails over two weeks to sort it out.  Should not be this way.  A box of Avery sticky labels are not that expensive and are easy to run through a laser printer in under half a minute.

I will say, one of the GlobalFSD boxes arrived (found its way out of Chicago after a week of circling downtown Chicago).  The two samples that are in it were in individual ziplock bags with a descant pack in each.  There was a proper label on each one noting manufacturer, filament name/type, diameter and it even noted what the batch # and the manufacture date were.  No printing specs but knowing what it is, I can find that out easily.  The critical info who made it and what is it are there.  Well done GlobalFSD.  This is the RIGHT way to handle samples.  Well marked so we don't have to roll the freaking dice and guess or have to get all Sherlock on it.

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## curious aardvark

Yeah - I've just spooled a very generous sample roll of filament that i got from the colorfabb people at the tct show. I have no clue what it is. I 'think' it's pet. 
But he didn't say and they were busy so i didn't hassle him. :-) 

I've got some proto pasta stainless steel pla, some soluble pva and some 3dxnano pet coming - that's supposed to be conductive. 

Fun times :-)

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## iDig3Dprinting

> Right, ordered a roll of blue pla from you, worked out £24.85 with postage. 
> So that's still £6 a roll more than the reprapper. But I'll try it anyway :-)  
> I know I know, 3d filaprint offer free second class post delivery.  
> I'm just trying to compare like with like here. 
> 
> Right I've promised my mate a nasa coffe coaster in blue pla - so that'll be the first test for this stuff :-) 
> 
> Review when i get it.


Got your order, it will go out tomorrow morning. Sorry about the postage but we have to cover our costs. Obviously if you buy more than one filament spool then the postage works out cheaper. Basically all orders <£150 postage is £6.50, >£150 and its free. Its done to even postage out across all products. Looking forward to see the results of the coaster test.

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## curious aardvark

Ah okay - that's pretty reasonable. 
So flat rate of £6.50 postage up to about 8 kg of filament. 
Can't complain about that - cheers :-)

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## iDig3Dprinting

We have created some sample packs for our ABS, Ingeo PLA and Biome 3D PLA now if anybody is interested. The shipping is free for the UK. We are still trying to sort out our international shipping.

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