Printable View
Is it possible to print pressure chambers on filament printers like the Fusion 3 F400 using ABS? We just bought one, but I'm worried that the print will be too porous to contain the pressure. Has anyone ever tried doing this with this printer or a similar one?
probably not abs, but it's been done with peek.
Porosity isn't your biggest problem. Layer adhesion is.
3D printed Abs just isn't that great.
PEEK is probably your best bet - but I think you'd need to upgrade the hotend to something that can take 400c
From what i can see on the fusion3d website they are just using standard e3d hotends.
A bit cheeky for the price they're charging, these days most industrial machine have a hi-temp option.
Because of the way fdm machines work, in individual layers, the vast majority of materials would not make reliable pressure vessels.
You could probably also do it with flexible pla or TPU filaments. They're layer bonding is much much better and they also would have less porosity, as well as a little flexibility to allow for minimal expansion rather than cracking.
It would probably be worth your while having a chat with ninjatek. Something like their armadillo (polyurethane) might conceivably work, or the stiffer variations of ninjaflex.
I suspect it's doable - but you won't be using cheap crap like abs :-)
So, we were on the fence about buying a Fusion 3 or theFormLabs Form 2 resin printer. We have pieces printed in Form 2 that are prettysolid. Basically we have the infill cranked up as high as it will go, and itgive us very dense pieces (similar to machined) with FormLabs ABS-like resin.Is the layer bonding issue specific to filament printers, or can you get alevel of density that you would get from a resin printer with the Fusion 3? Weinevitably went with the Fusion 3 because you could print in things like nylon,ABS, and polycarbonate, and they stated that the relevant strength moduli werecomparable to cast versions of these plastics. Is this claim misleading?
with things like nylon, printed in a heated chamber you could possibly do it.
Layer bonding in nylon is excellent - but it's a real bastard to print.
The formlab website states that the chamber only gets to 45c - in my opinion that's not hot enough to get a watertight print with nylon. Even for abs, ideally you need the chamber to be around 60c to make it worth your while.
For things like polycarbonate, nylon and some of the other newer industrial materials - it needs to be hotter still.
Polycarbonate also needs a hot end able to run at around 280c for long periods of time, plus it won't stick to standard printing surfaces.
I've got two 200gm rolls of polymaker pc plus that I can't really do anything with.
If you're in the uk - happy to send you one for p&p.
Density isn't the issue. It's purely down to layer bonding and the fdm process.
No matter how dense it is - it's still printed one layer at a time - hot plastic to cooler plastic. It's the temperature based shrinkage that stops fdm from producing things with the properties of moulded plastics.
So the hotter the print chamber - the better your layer adhesion will be. and as the chamber cools the whole model in one go - you don't get variations of shrinkage due to varying temperatures.
If it were me making a pressure vessel at anything like serious pressure I would most likely wrap it in thin resin fibreglass tape. Just to make sure.
If you could modify the printer to take PEEK - You'd be more likely to have real success. But it would need the hotend upgrading, probably need a better heating element on the hot bed and you'd definitely need a hotter build chamber with thermostat.
If you've got working models printed on a form 2 - then that would probably have been your best bet. There is a pretty decent variety of resin types available now as well.
Layer bonding is close to moulded and they are actually better for awkward shapes and geometries.
The other thing to consider would be the new formlabs sls machine: The Fuse 1
Laser sintered powdered nylon. Parts take a lot more post processing and might not be suitable for something that needs to be hollow and only has small in and out channels - as it would be filled with unsintered powder that would need to be extracted.
But parts are super strong - downside is it's £10,000.
https://formlabs.com/3d-printers/fuse-1/
Having handled things it's made I'd say results were as good as machines costing 2 to 3 times as much.
It does sound like you might have been better off with a form 2.
Resin prints are going to be a lot more like cast plastic yes. It's a much higher resolution print and the layer bonding should be near perfect as it's wet and solidified rather than melted in - relatively - thick layers.
The thing is to try different materials and see what you can do with what you have.
But in all honesty I don't think you were sold the right machine for what you want to make.
Anything can be compared to anything - apples can be compared to oranges. But that doesn't mean they're the same. SLS nylon 12 parts printed by the Fuse1 are rated at up to 52MPa for tensile strength, according to the Formlabs site: https://formlabs.com/3d-printers/fuse-1-tech-specs/ which is about as strong as Nylon 12 gets. But other forms of nylon, while not 3D printable, are a lot stronger, like extruded nylon 101, which goes up to 82.7 MPa : https://www.lairdplastics.com/produc...3350-nylon-101
If you're making pressure vessels, and the configuration of them requires 3D printing, then the nylon 12 might be as good as you can expect. But if they're machinable, you might want to go with a stronger form of nylon and a CNC machining process.
Just ahd a quick look - peek filament on amazon= £425 a kilo !
elsewhere, £580 for 750gms.
Just thought I'd mention it :-)
https://www.3d4makers.com/products/p...nt=13704093060
Worth a read and a: 'HOW MUCH !!!!!!' at the prices.
Read the reviews - they all claim it's cheap !