Best material for outdoor name plates! - General discussion, announcements and releases

RE: Best material for outdoor name plates!

efvee — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 22:55:13 +0000

@snuffleupagus:

Yes I think high Shore D filament would be great.

NinjaTek say on their site they're phasing the Armadillo line out, depleting their stocks. I would need to find another. I could use it for other purposes also. I have good experience with Shore 40D TPU but for some projects it simply is too elastic.

I print the plates flat, of course. They want the plates 'between 15 and 20 cm' but from what I have seen the trunks they want to cut the poles from do not have the diameter to have that in a section.

Yes the 'growth rings' are a nice feature. It was not my intention to have them, but I like them too.

RE: Best material for outdoor name plates!

efvee — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 22:28:08 +0000

Posted by: @diem
The 'S' of sylvatica should be in lower case ...
Cheerio,

Yes, of course. Thank you.

RE: Best material for outdoor name plates!

Snuffleupagus — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 19:09:59 +0000

@efvee

Tpu is also great for the environmental conditions described in your area, with excellent layer adhesion . Something with a shore hardness of 75D, I'm going to mention "NinjaTek Armadillo", I'm not pushing the products of Ninjatek, I'm using them as examples because they have proved to be what they claim. However I would think that other high end TPU's in the 75D to 80D durometer would work well. A nice thing about about the higher durometer filaments is that they print like a dream, almost like printing PLA can be, and with no warping, most manufactures offer great color selection.

BTW, I like the the look of the plaque, the layers are reminiscent of tree rings in my mind, and the height of the letters looks good, remember if you bend it around a post it will have the effect of widening the kerning (space between letters) if the radius of the post is tight. Assuming you print it flat then bend it to the post.

Good luck with the project, I'd be interested in seeing how it turns out.

RE: Best material for outdoor name plates!

Allen8355 — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 18:54:27 +0000

I use ASA and have no problems, and this is in AZ where it can get over 140F in the sun.

Diem — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 14:50:10 +0000

The 'S' of sylvatica should be in lower case ...

Cheerio,

RE: Best material for outdoor name plates!

efvee — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 13:30:00 +0000

I am considering to use ASA for uv resistance and 'seal' the surface with acetone to reduce porosity and foothold for algae and other growth. I would prefer to have the letters printed in a different color but need to find a way to avoid contamination. Maybe just print and seal them separately and 'weld' the dry letters in the wet baseplate.

TPU is another option I want to look at. It would allow to ply the plate around the (round) post.

The place is not far from Wageningen, in fact I pass by there on the way, but laser cutting plates I think would be expensive, the plates they want are pretty large. The sample I printed now in PLA is about 15 cm wide and 6 cm high.

RE:

Snuffleupagus — Mon, 14 Apr 2025 17:24:43 +0000

ABS, ASA, PC, PA, are what Ive used outdoors. I have examples used around the farm and home, some older then ten years, and some are working parts. As well TPU and TPE hold up crazy good outdoors even keeping their colors reasonably well after 8 years in the sun and weather with heavy to regular use, NinjaFlex especially.

Keep in mind that these materials come in varying grades, they are not all created equal.

RE: Best material for outdoor name plates!

zab — Sun, 13 Apr 2025 16:20:54 +0000

I second Diem's suggestion of painting the parts instead of printing in different colors. I've had very good success doing this with outside parts. I have a flag pole holder that I mounted outside 10 years ago. It was printed in n-Gen and painted to match the trim color of the house. It is still going strong. I have house numbers printed in petg mounted on the front and sides of a metal mailbox that is painted gloss black. the numbers were painted a) to seal them from water/freezing and b) I wanted them white and didn't have any white filament on hand at the time. These numbers are in direct sunlight on a hot metal surface all day long and and are holding up very well.

Diem — Thu, 10 Apr 2025 15:20:17 +0000

10 years outside ? I would not even start considering 3D printing for this.

I have printed boat parts that are in their seventh year surviving heat, cold, UV and saltwater — painted of course and repainted as needed.

Cheerio,

RE: Best material for outdoor name plates!

HermannSW — Thu, 10 Apr 2025 14:45:21 +0000

I used PETG, and besides the i and l in second row all is fine.
Outside for 2 or 3 years in southern Germany.