PLA Woes
Some days just don’t start well. I decided to kick off a print with some new “pla”. I started the print and while the mini was warming up I popped to the kitchen to get some breakfast. When I came back to check the first layer I was greeted by a ball of death wrapped around the print head. The room stunk too so I was concerned something was burning. I switched off then spent an hour cleaning the block etc. Something didn’t feel right, and the smell was coming from the filament. Once clean I did a first layer calibration with some Prusament and all was running. I switched back in the new “pla” and repeated the first layer test and it instantly went wrong and smelt terrible. So I contacted the seller/manufacturer if the filament. As suspected, my roll, clearly marked as pla was in fact miss-labelled. Apparently they had realised the wrong labels had gone onto some ABS. They asked me to send the roll back, at my expense, and they would send me a replacement. I got a bit miffed as having to spend more but they would not budge despite the law on this. Ended up contacting my card company who agreed to do a chargeback after I had sent them the correspondence. Fortunately no damage done, but if it had I am sure I would have struggled to get any recompense from that company. Only good thing was they quickly acknowledged their mistake. In future I shall not be using them and will gladly wait longer for Prusament or other decent brand. I’ll not name the brand in question in case anyone asks. Just wondering if anyone else has had a similar experience of the wrong filament being sent like this?
RE: PLA Woes
I've heard horror stories of mislabeled filament and failed and troublesome prints because of it.
I've also had a few failed prints due to my human error of printing with the wrong filament, such as just the other day when I printed a piece sliced with PLA settings using PETg filament, where I got what looked to be a near-normal print, but which crumbled when handled.
I've never had any issues of mislabeled filament using Prusa(ment), Hatchbox, Overture, Paramount, RepRapper, IEMAI, Amazon Basics, and a few others.
I've also heard of issues when printing with PLA blends and various modified-PLA filaments using standard PLA settings. When I bought a gently-used (non-Prusa) printer about a year ago, I got a partial spool of what's known as 'Tough PLA', and it definitely needs different print settings than does plain vanilla generic PLA.
RE: PLA Woes
Sounds like it is more commercial n than I thought.
I was more frustrated with the seller, they were happy to replace the product but it would have cost me. There also seemed to be an attitude of I should have known just by the feel of the filament. I am relatively new to this but even so, I have not got a built in spectrum analyser.
Hopefully as it matures the guff will get weeded out. There are some superb companies in the 3D printer game, and it seems some truly awful ones.
RE: PLA Woes
If this were me, I would have definitely pushed back in the form of 'If you don't have the authority to make me whole on this transaction, please transfer me to someone who does.'
Most businesses, particularly those in the States, **HATE** credit card charge-backs and will usually do about anything to avoid them, including eating consequential charges on shipping for returning defective products. No, the end user should not have known by feel that filament was ABS or PLA. You simply did not get what you paid for.
I would most definitely name the firm who sold it to you, and the brand of the filament that was mislabeled, to let others know of the difficulty.
RE: PLA Woes
When you know certain brands of PLA and ABS you might be able to identify them by feel indeed. However, PLAs from different producers can differ quite substantially form each other. I just think of Prusament PLA vs Fillamentum PLA. Generally the PLA should be stiffer and more brittle (easier to break) than ABS of any kind. No one can expect from you to second guess the polymer from feel and touch of a filament however. That's what labels are for.
One thing should be noted though, PLA has a very unique smell when extruded. That is usually a dead give away for PLA and also the final product is usually quite distinct in its hardness and touch from eg ABS. However I wouldn't want take a strong sniff of ABS fumes nor will you get a final product if already the first layer line fails.
I think you did the right thing. Try to limit the damage and shop somewhere else in the future.
Mk3s MMU2s, Voron 0.1, Voron 2.4
RE: PLA Woes
ABS most definitely has a distinct odor, causing my wife to exclaim 'Hey, it smells like melted plastic in here!' on occasion.
RE: PLA Woes
Not always. I am running ABS right now (from Push Plastic) and it doesn't really smell--Printed Solid's Jessie PLA has more smell.
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