OK, a real hillbilly approach to drying filament: [U]Dry your PLA and Nylon 3d printer filaments the easy and cheap way. Build a chamber in 10 minutes! - YouTube. The main issue I have with this technique is the argument made by the guy who did the previous one: that is, a really long print would allow very hygroscopic filaments to re-hydrate while printing. I really like the idea of having the filament heated and being dried all the while the print is going on.
I just got my food dryer and it is already drying 3 rolls of PLA at 43 degrees C. I used the box it came in to make the sides and only use the bottom tray and the lid. Perfect and not very loud just another fan. It only takes 6 hours some say, I guess it depends how wet your filament is.
↵Fantastic news. Ain’t it great that Amazon delivers on weekends?!
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Now, a few questions: [LIST=1]
No hygrometer just heat and a fan. Once it is dry I will bag it or seal it some way. I’m here all the time, I doubt I will be using it constantly. In the winter here the air is dry.
The reels of filament I have now don" have slots in the side but I think the heat and the fan drive off all the moisture. We will see.
I noticed something on a new print I did today: a 5+ hour print. At first I was getting somewhat blobby PLA deposit, on the first dozen layers or so, then it got better. I can’t help but wonder if the improvement is because filament from further into the spool started getting used, and it was drier.
It sounds like damp filament to me.
I just tried this print Platform Jack [Fully Assembled, No Supports] by Intentional3D - Thingiverse and I thought I had it but I broke it trying to free it up. I think I will scale it up 50 % and it might be a little easier.
I was thinking dampness too. R U trying the jack as a test? It doesn’t seem to have much practical use.
It’s sort of a test. It all prints at once and it can be tricky to make it cut loose. It’s just a neat little gadget not a useful tool. I use things like that to show my friends what you can do with 3d printing.
I’m hoping to make a couple of clamps to hold one of my deck umbrellas. The idea is that the clamps would go around one of the balusters, one up high & one down low. Part of the clamp would be a ring just a little bigger than the umbrella’s pole. After attaching the clamps to the baluster, the umbrella would slide down through the rings to the deck. This would allow the umbrella to be used without having to make room for a large, heavy base.
A good job for Tinkercad.
Perhaps. I haven’t looked at TC yet. I’ve been studying Blender, and liking it a lot so far and I found a new beginner’s tutorial series on YT for F360, so I’m giving that a try. The series is called Learn Fusion 360 or Die Trying, by Paul McWhorter. He says he understands why ppl have trouble with F360 and has the answer. We’ll see.
TC is so easy that even I can use it. I’ know there are better and more sophisticated programs. Often people that are adept at 3d design will use it for something quick.
My issue is that I found out today that TC is all online. Having spent so many years involved in cyber security, I’m not comfortable with having my stuff in the cloud. Sure, it probably wouldn’t matter for many of my things, but years ago I just adopted a policy of not keeping anything in the cloud. Don’t have to make decisions that way. With F360 I just export everything to local storage and never save anything to the cloud.
I can empathize with your paranoia having seen a demonstration of how much information they collect on people from everywhere.
Just remember, it’s not paranoia is they’re really after you… And, as far as information collection is concerned, what’s available to the public is only a fraction of what’s really going on.
I am very aware of that. I even had my credit card id stolen and it caused very big problems while I spent four months in the Dominican Republic. I am waiting for a group lawsuit to do their thing so I can get some satisfaction from my bank. I probably won’t live long enough to collect anything from the s.o.b’s with the length of time that takes.
I really am in a dilemma. I tried to print the “platform jack” that I referred to in a previous post https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:925556 at 150% and I thought it was printing beautifully when I went to bed. It had been already going for 6 hours and I guess it started making a ball of filament because it wasn’t sticking and then plugged shortly after. Or I would have lost a lot more filament. No way that filament wasn’t dry. I dried it for hours at the correct temp 40-45 C. I was checking the temp all the time. It was stuck solidly to the bed but I noticed that there was a lot of separation. Why that started I have no idea, it was looking so good.
well that sux. Not sure what to try. If the spool has solid sides maybe you could try respooling it onto one with open sides and dry it again???
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Or is it possible it picked up moisture during the printing, since it went on for more than 6 hours?
I tried a different brand of filament and it was worse. I seem to be having good success with some ereyone copper right now. We will see. PLA is not known to pick up moisture so quickly. I’m not sure moisture is my problem entirely any more. I wish I could figure how to upgrade my Marlin, I think my version has glitches. I would love to be able to use the M600 command in Prusa slicer to change colors too. I tried following two different videos on how to upgrade yesterday and they both baffled me. Of course I’m using a mac and they were using windows. That didn’t help. It should be easy they say because my boot loader is already flashed.