support material and print quality

[candcpmi]

I am in the market for a 3d printer and new to printing. I had a meeting with a Stratasys rep a couple of weeks ago and was impressed with their dis solvable support material and the quality of their prints. I am not impressed with the price tag and how everything is proprietary to Stratasys. I am considering several different printers between 5k to 15k. I noticed that that not many printers have any information about support materials. I have read that it takes time to get it tweaked in but it can provide a much cleaner print. I also know it uses more material but I am more concerned about print quality.

Is it more accurate of a part?
Is the print quality noticeably different?
Pros/cons
If you have printed with soluble materials what printer did you use and what support material did you use?
pics of the part

thank you

[richardphat]

Remember you get what you paid for. These guy have been around 30 years in 3d printing.

It is worth looking at stratasys if you want to print without any worry.
There's no accuracy when we're talking about FDM printers. They suck (from a perspective of tolerancing and application)

Our tech guy has an 1200ES from stratasys, and he told me the support material was corn based. I suspect it is PLA basically and maybe other thing stuffed in it. You have to deal with a reservoir with some chemical.

Else there's a trend of people using PVA and dissolve them into water,and honestlly, there's big catch going on and it is quite hard to find a good brand.

Alternatively, some use direct PLA as support and use a solution of NaOH at 60-80C to remove them.


Or you can be like us, cheap and use the directly the same filament used to build your print as well as your support. Remove the support with tools.

[Mjolinor]

The Stratasys support material for the SST (soluble support) dissolves in sodium hydroxide. PLA doesn't dissolve in that, you can use D-limonene but it is expensive. I haven't found any material other than genuine Stratasys to use as support. The ABS is normal stuff but I have yet to figure out how come their extrude temperatures are so hot (270c) without giving problems.

[Mjolinor]

Perhaps also of interest is that the BST (breakable support also uses 270c and when I print with it on the Stratasys then it makes a very brittle object that is very easy to break off. When I print with it at lower temperatures on the Wanhao it comes out much the same as normal ABS, strong but flexible.

I concluded that Stratasys install a small bit of magic in their heads.

[awerby]

The Stratasys support material for the SST (soluble support) dissolves in sodium hydroxide. PLA doesn't dissolve in that, you can use D-limonene but it is expensive.

[All the information I've got says that PLA does dissolve in a lye (sodium hydroxide) bath, which makes it seem like Stratasys is using PLA as their support material. From what I've read, the support material that dissolves in D-limonene is HIPS (High Impact Poly Styrene). Apparently PVA has problems adhering to most materials normally used for FFF printing, and tends to clog nozzles as well. ]

Here are some discussions of this issue in other forums:

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!to...ge/M9jh9ZmLqQM

http://www.pp3dp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=23291

http://forums.reprap.org/read.php?1,239588

Andrew Werby
www.computersculpture.com

[richardphat]

Perhaps also of interest is that the BST (breakable support also uses 270c and when I print with it on the Stratasys then it makes a very brittle object that is very easy to break off. When I print with it at lower temperatures on the Wanhao it comes out much the same as normal ABS, strong but flexible.

I concluded that Stratasys install a small bit of magic in their heads.

My understanding from several people dealing with support material from Stratasys machine was corn based, aka, PLA.
Now, according to this video he used it NaOH to remove the support material.



http://youtu.be/BePRUTsZh_w?t=1m51s
Oh and ignore the music, all I care was the information.


Edit: Correction, it breaks instead of dissolve

[Mjolinor]

It may be PLA. Stratasys have actually released spec sheets for it somewhere on the web. I have never used PLA, i don't have any. The soluble support is printed at around 210c IIRC so that is probably in line with it being some sort of PLA.